TechNet Events in Phoenix???

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I know my blog readership is much broader than Phoenix, AZ, but I need to ask a question and ask for assistance.

For those of you who live in the Phoenix area, you will need to think about how important it is to have a TechNet Event in Phoenix every quarter (4 times a year).  If you are like me, the answer would be "Minimum of once every quarter!".  With that said, I'm letting you know that is NOT the case.  In this current quarter, Phoenix was omitted from the list of cities.  In the next quarter, Phoenix is on the list for December 20th.  In our third quarter, Phoenix is NOT on the list.  In our fourth quarter, Phoenix is on the list as a Launch city.  If you look at our Fiscal Year 2008, we only plan to visit Phoenix 2 times.  Is that acceptable for a city our size????  I say Heck NO! 

For this reason, I worked with my MSDN counterpart, Rob Bagby, to host a TechNet / MSDN event at the Microsoft Phoenix office on September 26th.  This is an unofficial event that we are putting together and handling all the logistics on our own (with the help of local marketing folks and such).  We are even paying for parking!

As of today, there are 110 people registered for MSDN and only a measly 32 registered for TechNet.  I guess the IT Pro community here in Phoenix doesn't find any value in having TechNet Events in Phoenix on a quarterly basis since this is very low registration.  If I can't get a full house on September 26th, I can almost guarantee that I'll have no basis to argue that Phoenix MUST have events on a quarterly basis and we'll be regulated to the status of a small city that only gets visited twice a year.

Now comes the ask (again - previous blog post: https://blogs.technet.com/haroldwong/archive/2007/09/05/technet-event-added-for-phoenix-on-september-26th.aspx).  If you agree with me that Phoenix MUST have a TechNet event at least on a quarterly basis (4 times a year), then PLEASE help me get the word out and let's get people registered for this event and attend.  I MUST HAVE A FULL HOUSE or my arguments to my OPS team will hold absolutely no water.  The main TechNet Events website (www.technetevents.com) has Phoenix listed in the drop down city list.  The direct registration page is: https://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/EventDetail.aspx?culture=en-US&EventID=1032351529. 

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE help me spread the word and pack the house! Thanks!!

Harold Wong
harold.wong@microsoft.com
www.technetevents.com