VAN (Virtual ALT.NET Meeting) Update

Zach has suggested the catchy name VAN for the online ALT.NET meetings and it’s sticking, so I’ll start calling it that now, too.

I apologize for last week. I dropped the ball at the last minute and forgot to update my blog with the fact that neither Zach nor I could host it. NOTE: A VAN is never cancelled if 2 or more people want to have one. You can always dial someone up on Skype, host your own LiveMeeting, etc.   I’ll check with Zach, but I think he has the resources to set up LiveMeeting every week, even if no one hosts it. If this is OK with everyone, even when we’re not able, others can still host/participate.

Another issue is that for people in the UTC+ time zones or –8 or lower time zones, it’s hard to add attend these meetings. I don’t want to have to make anyone get up at 4AM and I don’t want to get up at 4AM, so we may see about having one for our EMEA homies and maybe something for our Pacific homies also.  Any EMEA or Pacific folks want to chime in with ideas, I’m all ears.

Lastly, the next meeting is scheduled for January 7th, 2009 as the 24th is Chrismas Eve (a big holiday in the Americas and Europe) and the 1st is New Years Day. I don’t know about you folks, but I have other plans :)  If anyone wants to get together on those days, let me know and I can work with Zach about getting a LiveMeeting set up for you.

Thanks for your patience as we fumble and stumble through this.

Also, Zach posted the recording of Jeremy Miller’s presentation on StoryTeller.  It was a good presentation, but I was a little disappointed in the crowd participation. Online meetings are quite different from real life. We’ll have to figure out how to get move involvement when we have guest speakers like that.  Anyhow, here’s the link:

http://www.zachariahyoung.com/zy/post/2008/12/Jeremy-Miller-talks-about-StoryTeller-at-VAN.aspx