Kicking-off our Roadshows in Chicago

Last Friday, I had the pleasure of attending our very first "Roadshow", which was hosted together with our partner Dunn Solutions Group at the Willis Tower in Chicago. As part of our releasing Liferay Portal 6 EE, we're launching a series of roadshows across the world together with partners local to the area. This allows for those that were unable to make our symposiums a chance to still get a small taste of the Liferay community. 

While our symposiums have seen significant growth in attendance in comparison to last year, I have to admit that I was uncertain as to how many registrants we would see for these roadshows. It turns out that I had little be concerned about, however, as we discovered our very first Chicago Roadshow to be even much larger than expected, to the point where we had to bring in more chairs to accommodate!  The attendance at all of our events this year and in this economy is a testament to the burgeoning demand of Liferay Portal and Social Office. 

I enjoyed the dichotomy of the roadshow in comparison to our symposiums. With its being a smaller crowd, you can get a snapshot of the heartbeat of the community, especially through engaging in conversations with the folks that attend. I, personally, had some great conversations with people that were struggling with other portals that were currently being used in-house, with people that were just genuinely curious about Liferay, and with those that were just about to make the leap into open source with Liferay. For those of you unsure of what to expect, I wouldn't worry about what whether you're on the business-side or technical-side of things. We had a mixed crowd of people attending our first roadshow. If you're just generally interested in Liferay, feel free to attend to hear what Liferay Portal 6 EE is about and, at the very least, meet with us and our partners. 

Here are some pictures from the Chicago Roadshow at the Willis Tower. The first picture is of Bill Dunn doing a quick introduction:

And here you see Michael Han, our Director of Operations, giving his presentation of Liferay Portal 6 EE:

Thanks to Dunn Solutions Group and our marketing for helping to organize this particular event! If you missed our first Chicago Roadshow, we'll be having a repeat performance on October 14th. See our event page for more details on all of our upcoming roadshows: 

www.liferay.com/liferay-roadshows

If your city isn't on the list, don't worry, we're planning on expanding to more cities around the globe and will be updating the list as we do.