the red room review for 2008

The red room was founded for several reasons, to communicate with Oracle customers and the general IT community was one. But to make this communication more interesting we wanted to explore how new WEB 2.0 technologies could assist. Could these largely social utilities add any value for Oracle, our readership and our customers?

The answer is a resounding yes. Technologies that worked very well included Twitter with live feeds from Oracle Open World OOW08, Linkedin to participate in group discussions around areas like security and compliance, and the content hosting sites like iTunes, Podbean and Scribd.

Sure these sites would enrich the experience on the red room for our readers. The real bonus is that each of these technologies has their own unique communities to tap into. For example the red room had over 5,000 visits from July this year, scribd which hosts our presentations had over 2,500 views from scribd users. So you see we reached potentially another 2,500 readers by placing the content in multiple sites and 632 people downloaded a podcasts from podbean.

Our readership includes 50% from Australia and New Zealand which validates that people are interested in reading localised content and not just from news from the USA. Other countries include France, Turkey, Japan, Italy and Spain (i need a field trip) with 74 countries in all.

The Oracle news highlights for me this year included the acquisition of BEA and Oracles first hardware appliance The Database Machine.

Our top 5 articles this year

1.       SOA or Not

2.       Unstructured Information Management

3.       Australian Federal Government and WEB2.0

4.       Oracle Role Management

5.       Oracle Universal Archive

Other notable articles include

·         The Clumsy Human PT 1&2

·         Open World Final Day and the Joy of X

·         Oracle and BEA – Full Circle

·         iPhone and its impact on Information Management

·         Have your ignored PCI

In 2009 we will have more contributors including a 10 posts series on SOA Governance. Look our for our new years eve posts from Paul Ricketts for more on this and what the future will hold for the red room in 2009.

Its time i bid you farewell, presents to wrap and no doubt a cold beer also. Have a joyous holiday with your friends and family, try and avoid the news so you can rest and recharge for what will be an interesting 2009.

Cheers

Carl

 

 

 

FaceBook Used to Serve Legal Documents

This is probably a world first! Lawyers in Australia have used FaceBook to serve legal documents to two defendants through their FaceBook Pages according to livenews.com.au. The ACT Supreme Court authorised the legal firm to use the FaceBook system once it was satisfied that it presented a 'sufficient method of communication'. Lawyers from the legal firm, Meyer Vandenberg, came across the idea themselves after investigating alternative methods of contacting individuals. They researched FaceBook and found the two defendants pages and established through their system of 'friends' that they were acquainted. Notice was then served on the two defendants through their FaceBook pages.

This follows recent and well publicised activites around FaceBook - one event occured when a group of restaurant patrons left without paying. Thanks to one of the waiting staff who recognised one of the patrons - FaceBook was used to track down the group, their employers identified and contacted and the bill settled in full with a large tip left.

The world is getting smaller and there are fewer places to hids

Paul