It’s Saturday morning and I’m hustling back to Redmond after a busy week in the City by the Bay. This week our MacBU team has been engrossed in one of the most important (and labor intensive) events we do all year: Macworld. Many of the articles and conversations swirling about the show have centered on this being Apple’s last hurrah at the annual event. The future, whatever it holds for the show, will feature neither Steve Jobs on keys nor their enormous product playground in the middle of South Moscone.  It’s the end of a 25-year era. There has been much written, said, whispered and yelled about that fact, and some of the whispering has been done in my ear. Will you be here next year? Is this the death of Macworld?

I have no crystal ball on the latter, although I truly hope not. On the former, we’ve already been talking with show organizers IDG about Macworld 2010. There are cool things I’d like to see at Macworld next year. For starters, I think in addition to David Pogue doing the anti-Keynote (guaranteed to be great), Guy Kawasaki should come and do the real one. As I walked around with him after his book signing in the Microsoft Lounge we literally could not go five feet without somebody stopping him to say hello, or to express their gratitude for the meaning he’s made in their lives with his books and talks. Ignore his 10-20-30 rule of PowerPoint at your own peril.



It didn’t hurt my feelings at all that Guy is a power user of Office 2008 for Mac. According to him (and all the flyers floating around the Moscone) “Office is the center of my writing and speaking world. Seriously.” I nabbed one of those posters and asked him to pen what he really thought – I’m definitely taking this one back to the office.



Hanging out with Guy was one fun addition to Microsoft at Macworld this year. Another was the impromptu Haiku contest we ran on Twitter on New Year’s Eve. I had a few complementary passes allocated to me prior to the show, but in the rush leading up to Macworld, I hadn’t distributed them (bad Sherjo!) These were really valuable passes – not just tickets to the keynote and the expo floor, but two full days of Power Tools sessions on Office 2008 for Mac. I sent word to fellow Twitizens that the passes were up for grabs for a mere 17 syllables. Full disclosure: I hadn’t actually started on the champagne yet. ☺


 

The first minute, only a couple of haikus came in. I’m a Twitterverse nobody (twitter.com/SherJo), and my Tweet had no reach. But then, my better connected friends started re-tweeting my original post. Thank you brianjo, guy kawasaki, robertlendvai, et al – suddenly, the haikus started to pile up. The first minute I was delighted, then, a little nervous, then, downright scared. I had visions of 30,000 haikus and five passes. Luckily, after about 15 minutes and less than 100 haikus, the hubbub ended and I had my winners.
 

Oh, Excel! Your new
UI auto-completes me;
my hands are in love

The Mac sans Office?
Is like Toast without butter.
You just don't do it!

Office:Mac's ribbon
is a bandana, and I
a spreadsheet ninja!

Office, your polished
sheen is like Aqua on a
Leopard's coat: bright, sleek.

word may liberate
excel powerpoint one sum
great mail entourage

 

“Publishable” didn’t mean it had to be a love letter, and I did get a few reminding me that we still have work to do. I was glad that we had announced the return of VBA when I got this one (long after I had my winners – but I found him a pass anyway )

My favorite story of the contest was that of my new friend Ron. He’s the Techincal Training Coordinator for the Los Angeles Community College District. Because of state budget cuts, Ron’s department decided they couldn’t sponsor his trip to Macworld this year after all. He had his vacation time authorized and plane ticket purchased, but needed a pass and really wanted to go to the sessions. Thank you, Twitter, for connecting his need with our opportunity.
 

 

Well, my flight is about to leave and so I bid farewell to Macworld once again. It was a great year, with enthusiastic coverage about Entourage for Exchange Web Services, and the new Document Collaboration Companion that lets Office users work together across platforms on SharePoint and Office Live Workspaces. We celebrated 25 years of Office applications on the Mac, and we met friends old and new. Farewell, Macworld – until we meet next year at Denny’s on Mission Street for another late night plate of Moons Over My Hammy.
 

(with a side of bacon.)