Storage Field Day 3: Coming up

March 5, 2013

I'm delighted to have been invited to attend another Storage Field Day (this one is the third such Storage-oriented Field Day).

This one is going to be unique, for several reasons. It's the first time it's being held in Denver, CO, for one. For two, there are two "secret companies" presenting that are still in stealth mode.

Of the companies that are public who are presenting, there are some pretty well-known names, as well as some much smaller companies. Here's the list:

Cleversafe		@Cleversafe
Marvell's DragonFly		@DragonFlyData
NetApp		@NetApp
NexGenStorage		@NexGenStorage
Pernix Data		@PernixData
SanDisk's Flash Soft		@FlashSoftTeam
Starboard Storage		@StarboardStor

Most Tech Field Day events have historically had eight slots for company presentations. There are seven listed above, plus two in secret. I have it on good authority that there may be another company joining us as well. This is going to be a very, very busy Storage Field Day.

Fortunately, I'll be in great company (and once again, not anywhere near the knowledge level of my associates, which for me is par for the course at an event like this). Here are the other SFD3 delegates:

There may be one more delegate as well, by the time we get there. Basically, it's going to be an event full of people who really know what they're doing. And me.

So, because I have, on occasion, been chastised by readers for covering companies that I see at Tech Field Day, I'm going to preemptively warn you.

I will be talking about these companies. I may say nice things about them. I may say not nice things about them.

At Tech Field Day events, delegates attend for free. We do not get paid to attend. We get free flights, free hotel stays, free food, and often, the presenting companies will give us free things, not unlike what you might get at a trade show booth. Some have even given us free hardware and software licenses to try their software on.

I ask that you please trust me when I say that nothing a presenter or Tech Field Day sponsor gives me will affect what I say about them, one way or another. I'm asked to attend because I'm independent and objective, and if I suddenly changed that, I wouldn't be invited back, and I'd be doing a disservice to you.

With that out of the way, I want to talk about some upcoming entries here. I'm not overly familiar with a lot of the companies that will be presenting. I want to spend some time beforehand to get to know them, and the best way I can do that is to familiarize myself with them, and write about what I learn. This doesn't mean that a blog entry about a company's products is a commercial. I'm not going to be writing about a company because I think you should buy from them. I'm only going to be sharing what I learn so that we can get on the same page. If you don't want to read about the technologies from these companies, then skip those entries of mine. They aren't commercials, though. No entry I ever write about a company should be construed as an endorsement, unless I come out and say it.

There are a few companies I've been introduced to through TFD that blew me away, and that I would buy from in a heartbeat if I had need of their products. There are a lot of companies that I know better because of TFD, and I would consider more heavily than a company that I was unfamiliar with. And there are even some companies that I have bought things from, in part because of my exposure to them at Tech Field Day, but it's not because they were at Tech Field Day, it's because their technology was better than the other options and I was more familiar with it because of what I learned from them.

So, basically, I'm saying that when I write about a company, don't think I'm selling out, because I'm not. If I say nice things, it's because I like something, not because someone asked me to say nice things.

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Posted in Tech Field Day, Vendors