CodePlex - Free as in Beer

Last week, I spoke at Microsoft DevDays 2009 in The Netherlands. After the conference, I was able to do a little sightseeing in Amsterdam on my own, which included buying a small souvenir from the Heineken Plant, a CodePlex labeled Heineken bottle.

The conference was held at The Hague (which btw is a city, and not a building). We had beautiful weather for the conference, so I was very happy to get a chance to go out to the beach and grab some photos.

Since i grew up on a coast beach facing South, I’ve never seen a sunset on the water before.

And one picture to prove I did actual work instead of just sightseeing, I tried to capture just how large the 400 seat room was, but alas, my poor little camera just couldn’t handle it. To give you an idea, there were 3 projection screens from behind the stage, and 6 monitors within the audience.

Comments

• Anonymous
  June 04, 2009
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  June 04, 2009
  I'm glad you enjoyed the talk. Did you go to the evening one or the one during the day? Purely coincidental, although i do have a complex every time i say the word sandcastle. =D At the Heineken Experience (the official unguided tour), you can "brew your own" and put your name on your bottle. Since i went to the plant to take a picture with the CodePlex banner, i figured it only made sense to have a CodePlex bottle made. I mean, we share the same color scheme nonetheless. Then i occurred to me i wouldn't be able to take it on the plane back to the states. I was saving it for a very special occasion, but i figured no time like the present. I ask the hotel front desk people for a bottle opener, and they said "of course we have one." They encouraged me to drink it at 7am. I love the Netherlands.

• Anonymous
  June 05, 2009
  I attended the daytime talk. Hm, maybe then I should go and experience the Heineken Experience, even though I'm not a big fan of their beer, it still is beer, so... Then to own a famous brand beer-bottle with your name printed on it is pretty cool imho. And ofcourse any time is a good time to drink a beer, isn't it? you where about to sit/sleep for a few hours in a plane, so that shouldn't be much of an issue :)

• Anonymous
  June 05, 2009
  wow, you attended the daytime talk?! I think I fell asleep at one point. It takes talent to fall asleep during your own presentation. =D Seriously, I was so exhausted by the time of that talk. I did 2 talks the day before and did an interview for a magazine. Then when i walked into that dark room, it was game over. The jetlag said it was 4am and time for sleeping. in other words, i'm very, very happy to hear you enjoyed the talk. =) I was a HUGE fan of Heineken when i was in college in Northern Mississippi. Back home, we have Bud light, Coors light, and Miller light. So an import was fancy stuff. After living out here (Seattle) for a while, i'm no longer a fan of Heineken. But I had to take a tour of the plant for old times sake.

• Anonymous
  June 05, 2009
  Ton wasn't the only one who liked your talk. I went to your CodePlex talk on Friday and we talked a bit afterwards. Like Ton I enjoyed your enthusiasm and liked your funny examples and anecdotes.

• Anonymous
  June 05, 2009
  @Steven Glad to hear you enjoyed the talk too. I'm also happy to hear that you enjoyed your "lousy CodePlex sticker" =D  

• Anonymous
  June 06, 2009
  Now that we are on the subject of 'the stickers', ppl where quite surprised that these even exist in this digital world! I can tell you that I'll probably stick it on my SDN mug, once I take it to the office, to cover the SDN logo. People might think I'm actually a SDN member :)

• Anonymous
  June 06, 2009
  Sara, thank you for the talk at DevDays! I enjoyed the session. Was nice to see the photos and learn that the team members have a lot of fun developing CodePlex. Puts a face on the site. Did miss the laptop sticker though, as I attended Thursday in the afternoon. Bummer. :-) Patrick