I knew I saved these bags for a reason — the recent discussion of conference bags inspired me to photograph them and share with those who like to reminisce.
As you'll probably guess, I'm a big fan of this conference. I still prefer to think of it as the SMS User's Conference, because I believe the world revolves around SMS and because the conference should be by and for the users ("customers" might be a better term, or "administrators", but the conference really has retained a great community focus, IMHO). But I'll concede that it makes sense to discuss related management technologies at the same time, such as WMI and the stuff in the operating systems, so "Microsoft Management Summit" makes sense.
I've been fortunate to attend every one one of the conferences (except for some of the European equivalents (ITForum, etc.), and the traveling MMS road show). And to speak at all of the conferences, which really is an honor. It was tempting to keep all the conference handouts from them,
wallets,
badges, etc. but that stuff gets quite bulky after awhile, and the bags always seemed more subtantial. I may have all the CDs/DVDs since they started doing that, so that may be worthy of a page some day. I probably do have all the shirts, so expect another page soon (true, I should get a life, but Rod set the precedent...)
Be sure to see Rod Trent's MMS page, including the history section, for more details
Click on the images for much larger pictures (especially to read the text on the bags, etc.)
(if there's a big blank below, please scroll down to all the pictures. I'm new to this wiki formatting stuff)
Paul Thomsen - Microsoft IT
(
pthomsen@microsoft.com)
 1998 - the original! Simple but effective, and we were so glad to have an affordable SMS conference that no one complained. |
1998 - normally the back side of these bags is boring, but this one shows the involvement of Swynk and Computing Edge/Altiris
1999 - Computing Edge got much more involved, but budgets were still tight
2000 - very similar to 1999's bag, but without the Wise logo
I wasn't sure if I had the 2001 and 2002 bags mixed up, but Garth Jones thinks I did, and that's good enough for me.
2001 - more substantial
2002 - much more substantial, but the text is subtle. It says Altiris, intuitive > mangeability
2003 - Now this is a substantial bag! It might be my favorite, if I was doing a lot of smallish trips by plane. But bags of this size are a hassle to get home, and I find them to be too bag for the conference. But everyone else seems to like them. And it's now the Microsoft Management Summit, presumably sponsored primarily by Microsoft
2004 - back to a more traditional bag
|
2005 - Another very substantial bag!
2006 - What happened here? AMD obviously got involved, and they mustn't have been familiar with the trend so far. By this point in time we should have been getting shopping carts! (just kidding, but I do look forward to when the bag escalation gets to the point where we each get a minivan for our swag). I did hear a lot of complaints about this bag. Maybe future sponsors should check out this page so they can see what attendees are used to.
 2007 - another substantial bag |
A competitive conference to the SMS Conference
In 1999 and 2000 I suppose some people were fearful there was too much vendor participation and not enough community involvement, so a competing conference was hosted. It was smaller, of course, but much the same in subject matter. The conference was called the BackOffice Administrator's Conference (BackOffice was a suite of Microsoft applications including SMS and SQL Server)
1999 - a decent bag
2000 - simpler than the 1999 bag, but comparable to the MMS 1999 and 2000 bags
My Favorite
So why are ALL my bags in original condition? Partially because I like to preserve my MMS memories, but mostly because none of them have been practical for me. Fortunately, around 2000, SMS was part of the Windows Division of Microsoft, and we all got cool internal swag, including this Windows 2000 bag. It has a laptop compartment, three internal pockets, and one external one (handy for keys, etc.). I like it so much that I've had the main zipper replaced twice and a hole repaired. I mainly like it because it's a practical on-your-back kind of bag. So I can easily take it on long hauls at large airports, use it for day-to-day stuff, and (most importantly) bicycle to work with it every day. Perfect!
my favorite
Another SMS bag
I forget just when I got it, but it was probably when I worked as technical writer on the SMS product group (3.5 great years (but IT is even better)).