So the first day of the conference is over. What a long (long) day. Hours spent at the Google booth talking to people followed by my presentation on the main stage, followed by more booth conversations followed by preparation for tomorrow's sessions. I am SO tired. But I'm getting ahead of myself. I should start at the beginning, after all, I hear that's where most good stories start.
Depending on how you look at it, my day either started at 3:30 am or 5:30 am. 3:30 is when my good friend, Ambien, decided to leave me and I found myself staring at the ceiling contemplating whether or not Goa had creepy crawlies that scurried in the night. What was that? Did I feel something on my leg? Wait, now it's on my neck. Eek! No, nothing was there other than my paranoia. But these are the fun things your mind gets up to at 3:30 am with nothing else to do.
I fell back into a restless sleep to finally awake for the day at 5:30. Yup, it was gonna stick this time so I woke up and got to it. I put on the old gym clothes and headed for the gym to commence the daily ritual of pointlessly moving heavy objects and sweating more than I generally like to.
This morning, I noticed just how thick the air is here. In the early hours it's misty but cool (ish). As I returned to my room from the gym I noticed smoke rising from the bushes. At first I thought it was steam or fog from the ground. Then I noticed all the men with blowers who were blowing this smoke everywhere. I was hit by a smell that was somewhat like diesel exhaust. Then the thought occurred to me that I was breathing in some sort of bug killing smoke. Thanks for the cancer Grand Hyatt.
The morning was uneventful. I spoke with several nice CIO's and IT leaders and generally discussed Google's approach to helping businesses.
Then it was time for me to do my main stage presentation. I walked into the room I was going to present in and caught the end of the previous presenter. I didn't catch the whole thing but from what I could tell, it was an interesting take on mobile device use to drive increased sales performance. Nice.
I looked around the room and counted 25 people. Okay, I thought. I can do that. No big deal. That session ended and it was time for my session. We were setting up the slides and the video clips in the back of the room when I looked up and noticed 6 people in the audience. Ugh. Having nobody care to come is worse than the fear of speaking to a large crowd. I came all this way so I was going to go through my materials and call it a day. Then the conference worker assigned to the room came and asked me if it was okay to let people in. What? They hadn't let people in yet? Sure I said and the doors opened.
Depending on how you look at it, my day either started at 3:30 am or 5:30 am. 3:30 is when my good friend, Ambien, decided to leave me and I found myself staring at the ceiling contemplating whether or not Goa had creepy crawlies that scurried in the night. What was that? Did I feel something on my leg? Wait, now it's on my neck. Eek! No, nothing was there other than my paranoia. But these are the fun things your mind gets up to at 3:30 am with nothing else to do.
I fell back into a restless sleep to finally awake for the day at 5:30. Yup, it was gonna stick this time so I woke up and got to it. I put on the old gym clothes and headed for the gym to commence the daily ritual of pointlessly moving heavy objects and sweating more than I generally like to.
This morning, I noticed just how thick the air is here. In the early hours it's misty but cool (ish). As I returned to my room from the gym I noticed smoke rising from the bushes. At first I thought it was steam or fog from the ground. Then I noticed all the men with blowers who were blowing this smoke everywhere. I was hit by a smell that was somewhat like diesel exhaust. Then the thought occurred to me that I was breathing in some sort of bug killing smoke. Thanks for the cancer Grand Hyatt.
The morning was uneventful. I spoke with several nice CIO's and IT leaders and generally discussed Google's approach to helping businesses.
Then it was time for me to do my main stage presentation. I walked into the room I was going to present in and caught the end of the previous presenter. I didn't catch the whole thing but from what I could tell, it was an interesting take on mobile device use to drive increased sales performance. Nice.
I looked around the room and counted 25 people. Okay, I thought. I can do that. No big deal. That session ended and it was time for my session. We were setting up the slides and the video clips in the back of the room when I looked up and noticed 6 people in the audience. Ugh. Having nobody care to come is worse than the fear of speaking to a large crowd. I came all this way so I was going to go through my materials and call it a day. Then the conference worker assigned to the room came and asked me if it was okay to let people in. What? They hadn't let people in yet? Sure I said and the doors opened.
AH! There they were.
The room sat 150. They ended up opening an identical room to accommodate everyone. While I realize they were there for Google and not me (who was I to them?) it still felt good.
The session went great! No problems. Great crowd interaction. Then it was time to go back to the booth. This time when I went back thing were different. I wasn't just the only white guy at the Google booth. All of the sudden I had become the embodiment of Google (yes, the entire company). It was at this moment that I began to understand the lyrics to Pink Floyd's Brain Damage:
'Got to keep the loonies on the path'
Since I was from Google HQ I became the focal point for all things Google. Here are my favorite questions/comments:
- What did you do with Picasa?
- Response: What do you mean? It's still there, just embedded inside Google +
- Them: What did you do with Picasa? How do I edit my photos?
- Response: Like I just said, it's still there. It's just embedded inside of Google + (this is how that conversation continued for some time)
- So how do I buy a Nexus phone? It's not for sale in India.
- Response: Our devices are generally sold through retailers or in the case of phones, through mobile carriers. I'm not sure what our distribution plans are but I can check around when I get home.
- Them: I want to buy a Nexus phone but it's not for sale in India. (just like the picasa guy, this went on for like 5 mins until I pawned him off on a co-worker)
- I don't like the way Google music works. (luckily, that's where that conversation ended)
- So tell me, what's the next BIG thing from Google. You know, like how inventing Search was big.
- Response: We're always innovating and trying to do new things like self-driving cars and Google glass
- Them: yeah, we know about that stuff, but what's the next BIG thing (like self-driving cars isn't enough for people or like I'm going to share inside secrets.)
- Why won't Google prevent my employees from taking videos at work and posting them to the internet? (I won't even bore you with this full conversation but it went on for 15 mins and ended with this person quite frustrated that I wouldn't agree that Google should own policing his employees)
Yes, keep the loonies on the path. Tomorrow is my last day then my epic journey home begins.
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