You may have already read a blog post or tweeted one of the featured speakers (or you may have seen my own breaking of the news last week in my Bamboo Nation Year in Review post), but in the event that you haven’t already heard, a brand new, community-focused SharePoint organization has been formed and its website has officially launched over at SharingThePoint.org.
Sharing the Point is a non-profit organization, and its mission is to foster SharePoint adoption, learning, and community involvement, with a particular focus on SharePoint communities based in countries and/or cities that have been underserved to date. Consequently, the Sharing the Point Asian Tour will represent a barnstorming tour of Asia this March, visiting three cities (Beijing, China, Manila, Philippines, and Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam), and presenting free, half-day SharePoint events in each city over the course of four days.
Want to know the best part of what’s in store for the attendees in each city? The list of featured speakers on the tour reads like a murderer’s row of renowned SharePoint figures: Joel Oleson, Dux Raymond Sy, Michael Noel, Paul Swider, Mark Miller, and Eric Harlan. Rounding out the team on the tour is none other than yours truly, as I’m honored to have been asked to join the tour in a capacity that I’ve taken to referring to as that of an “embedded journalist.” As such, I’ll be blogging the tour goings-on, bringing you official tour reports as well as behind-the-scenes information at the official Sharing the Point Asian Tour blog, as well as on the Bamboo Team Blog.
Especially exciting for me is the fact that the final tour stop in Ho Chi Minh City will be hosted by Bamboo, as our Technology Center is based in that city, and the tour will represent my first-ever visit to the local office (as well as to the country as a whole). I’ve been to Asia before, but both China and the Philippines will also be first-time visits for me, which is to say that this is going to be a monumental trip for me (and for my passport), and to say that I’m looking forward to it would be a gross understatement.
Right about now, some of you may be wondering why I’m posting this on SharePoint Blank, and that would be an entirely fair question. The answer is that I had a big hand in creating the Sharing the Point website from the perspective of content authoring and preparation, and the creation and editing of many of the site pages that contain said content. And since the site is (of course) a SharePoint 2010 site, my efforts towards readying the content for launch represented what amounted to a real-world crash course in SharePoint 2010 for me, going well beyond the toe-dipping I’ve done (and blogged) previously. Being real-world experience (and deadline-based at that), however, I didn’t exactly have the luxury of available time to take screenshots and notes as I bulldozed my way through creating and populating site pages, but in the days ahead, I’m going to attempt to recreate as much of what I learned during the exercise as possible, and will, of course, be sharing it all in this space.
Finally, I would be remiss was I not publicly thank our sponsor, Fpweb.net, without whose generous support the Asian Tour may very well have not come to pass. Three cheers for Rob and the entire gang over at FpWeb!
