Database Month, a new conference "for all things database," starts this week with a series of evening events in NYC. "We took the principle of a conference and spread it out over the entire second half of January to form what is essentially a database festival," Eric David Benari, chairman of Database Month, tells 5 Minute Briefing.
"It is kind of like going to a free conference but it is much more enjoyable because it is spread out and you are not doing session after session, which can get tedious depending on the conference. You go after work hours and you choose the session you want and there is one per night. There is a lot of networking. A few of the planned events have registration numbers well into three digits," says Benari.
The series of evening events will all be held in-person at various venues in New York, as well as broadcast live via the group video-chat feature of GoChat (http://www.GoChat.us).
"It just seemed to be the biggest need because New York has a huge tech community but not many database-related events," says Benari, explaining the location choice for the inaugural event. The conference is expected be twice a year in New York and also expanded to other major hubs where there are active technologists but not enough events for them, says Benari. "It will not include Silicon Valley. That is the one that does not need us. They have ample events that go on there."
Conference presenters this month will include representatives of Continuent, ScaleBase, Schooner, the PostgreSQL Community, Couchbase, the MongoDB user group, and others. The conference is being spearheaded by the New York City MySQL Group, but the conference is database technology-agnostic, says Benari, who adds that he is actively seeking the participation of additional companies, including ones affiliated with SQL Server.
More information and a complete list of presentations is available on the Database Month website at www.databasemonth.com. All events listed have an RSVP link and all are free, with the exception of one that has a minimal fee for attendance.