MySQL Focuses on Community

Post Summary: An apology with a lesson.

When Steve Curry contacted me just after the MySQL Conference and Expo asking me if I’d be interested in a community roundtable, I was excited. Not just because Steve Curry brought me an inflatable pink dolphin after I squee‘d that I needed one, although I never forget when someone does me a favor.

However, a few weeks ago it seemed like the event was more of a PR gathering than a community roundtable. I was disappointed, and told Steve as much.

And then, one of two things happened:

1) My concerns were brought up, discussed and folks decided a roundtable involving community was a good idea;
or
2) I had come up with two different pictures of the event in my mind, based on my expectations of “community roundtable” at first and “event with businesses and PR, to include community” as the final description.

Now, last night was an excellent opportunity for me and also a lot of fun. A lot of the questions were really implicitly asking, “Is open source better? Why?” More on that in the next post, I promise.

So I wanted to say to MySQL that I was wrong.

I am sorry.

Sure, MySQL did not know what I was thinking. And certainly the event could have turned out to be one I did not enjoy.

The lesson to learn from this is that sometimes we get upset at our perception of reality, and not reality itself.

And to follow up on my cranky post where I was annoyed at the MySQL’s website’s lack of functionality at http://www.pythian.com/blogs/1016/mysql-website-a-reflection-of-values, I feel I should note that I got a call later that day from MySQL’s web designer telling me that my concerns were valid and MySQL was actively working on them. Indeed, www.mysql.com has added a “Documentation” link in the orange submenu (first is “Products” and second is “Downloads”, so I completely agree with their prioritization as well).

The other lesson: Always trade business cards with people, so they have your contact information when they want to contact you. A phone call was so much more powerful than an e-mail ever could have been.

Post Summary: An apology with a lesson.

When Steve Curry contacted me just after the MySQL Conference and Expo asking me if I’d be interested in a community roundtable, I was excited. Not just because Steve Curry brought me an inflatable pink dolphin after I squee‘d that I needed one, although I never forget when someone does me a favor.

However, a few weeks ago it seemed like the event was more of a PR gathering than a community roundtable. I was disappointed, and told Steve as much.

And then, one of two things happened:

1) My concerns were brought up, discussed and folks decided a roundtable involving community was a good idea;
or
2) I had come up with two different pictures of the event in my mind, based on my expectations of “community roundtable” at first and “event with businesses and PR, to include community” as the final description.

Now, last night was an excellent opportunity for me and also a lot of fun. A lot of the questions were really implicitly asking, “Is open source better? Why?” More on that in the next post, I promise.

So I wanted to say to MySQL that I was wrong.

I am sorry.

Sure, MySQL did not know what I was thinking. And certainly the event could have turned out to be one I did not enjoy.

The lesson to learn from this is that sometimes we get upset at our perception of reality, and not reality itself.

And to follow up on my cranky post where I was annoyed at the MySQL’s website’s lack of functionality at http://www.pythian.com/blogs/1016/mysql-website-a-reflection-of-values, I feel I should note that I got a call later that day from MySQL’s web designer telling me that my concerns were valid and MySQL was actively working on them. Indeed, www.mysql.com has added a “Documentation” link in the orange submenu (first is “Products” and second is “Downloads”, so I completely agree with their prioritization as well).

The other lesson: Always trade business cards with people, so they have your contact information when they want to contact you. A phone call was so much more powerful than an e-mail ever could have been.