Posts from April 30, 2007

Dust off that blogroll. Highlight your best technical posts. Update that photo in the About tab. Polish the colours on your theme. Prime the hit counter and prepare for an invasion from the Web 2.0 A listers.

Justin Kestelyn (Oracle Technical Network) sparked some an interesting and though provoking discussion when he puzzled over the relatively low profile of Oracle Corporation in the Web 2.0 community.

Robert Scoble picked up the thread (twice) and there are some interesting comments. Certainly, I'd love to see a Scoble podcast from Oracle Corporation.

I don't know enough about what Oracle's rivals (IBM, Sun, HP, SAP, ~~Siebel~~) are doing out there in the blogging community or how these companies are perceived by the Web 2.0 community to know whether Oracle is hard done by.

That said, a couple of points on Justin's original post

'Oracle's aggressive support of blogging'

As an Oracle employee, while Oracle encourages and supports the blogging efforts of both employees and non-employees I think 'aggressive' is probably overstating the case. For example, Oracle don't offer a hosted blogging platform for aspiring authors merely a listing in a (albeit high profile) directory.

' rather large blogging community'

For a company of 70,000 employees worldwide, does a blogroll containing 61 employee blogs, 10 executive blogs and 100 blogs from technical users truly constitute a 'large blogging community' ?

It would be interesting to know how the number (in percentage terms) of Microsoft and Google employees actively blogging compares with Oracle.

I am an Oracle employee and I have a neglected (internal eyes only) corporate blog only and this blog for my own personal outpourings. I have also occasionally toyed with the idea of applying for a corporate blog. However, to date, I have always resisted this temptation because although I am positive that a listing on blogs.oracle.com would drive a lot of traffic and boost my ego, maintaining a corporate blog carries a great deal of responsibility.

I am not referring to the Oracle guidelines governing content on a corporate sanctioned blog as these are common sense and perfectly reasonable. In fact, I am already obliged to abide by those guidelines here on this personal blog.

Authoring an 'official' Oracle blog would immediately create a wealth of (self-imposed) pressure on me to maintain that blog and keep adding technical, well researched, accurate, interesting and valuable content.

In my current role, I spend most of my working time working for customers. I simply do not have the spare time to spend maintaining a corporate blog.

'Or maybe I shouldn't even care !'

Justin's closing paragraph is interesting. I am an Oracle employee and I also hold Oracle stock. Consequently, I am more concerned with Oracle product development and the stock price than how many engineers are blogging this week and whether Oracle have been invited to participate or host the latest 'Lunch 2.0'.

The climax of the football season is currently dominating my life somewhat. However, I feel obliged to inform the world of my exciting plans for the next fortnight.

Following next week's UK Bank Holiday, the scheduling goddess informs me me that I will be doing a 'brown bag'. This means that next Tuesday will see me wandering aimlessly around the shopping precinct in Reading, spontaneously shouting at shoppers while clutching four cans of Special Brew in a brown bag.

For the remainder of the week, I will be returning to the scene of last years summer holiday - Norway. Again, the work calendar informs me I will be spending 8 days embroiled in what is tersely described as a 'deep dive'.

While I appreciate the break from work and the respite from staring blankly at a computer screen, I do have some reservations about this 'deep dive' activity. Bear in mind that I very nearly drowned whilst hiring a motor boat on the Norwegian fjords last year.

Still, it will be a fantastic opportunity to learn all about the fascinating world of scuba diving and hopefully realise a lifelong ambition and gain my Padi Open Water qualification. This means I will be able to stop boring people with my detailed analysis of the football season and my offspring's sporting prowess and academic abilities.

Now, armed and dangerous with a Padi, I will fully empowered to participate in prolonged and tedious dinner party conversations about the joys of scuba diving and the pros and cons of the crystal clear, warm water in Egypt versus a purpose-built, 20 metre, freezing swimming pool in Plymouth naval base.