So, after six months or more, Ignite Seattle is back at the Capitol Hill Arts Center on February 19th at 7pm.  I suggest coming early and getting a beer, as this is a young, but very popular event–already outgrowing the CHAC’s available space (350 people): it will be standing room only.

If your into technology, humor and business, its the place to be: part seminar, lecture and stand-up comedy, and party = great time.  The premise is pretty simple: each talker/presenter gets to show 20 slides, lasting 15 seconds each for a total of five-minutes.  Usually is about 10 to 15 talks per night.

At previous events they have had a ‘Make’ contest or some sort of group activity (paper airplane, half-baked dot com) for folks that show up early, doesn’t look like that is happening this time.

I’d love to do a talk but am not sure if I can come up with the content / concept and get it submitted in time.

So Microsoft is having their Windows Server / SQL Server / Visual Studio 2008 Launch Tour starting the end of this month and running into the springtime.

If you thought that 2005’s “Ready, Set, Launch!” was dumb name, they’ve come up with a really, really lame name for it this time: “Heroes Happen Here”.

They are having a Seattle one on April 1st at the Convention Center.

Nik, Matt, Grant and I went when they did the 2005 stuff, it was worth attending (would be more worth attending now that I’m using those products on a day-to-day basis). There were several tracks–database, development, and administrators (I think)–for seminars, which were fairly well done. We got a bunch of free products/licenses (SQL Server 2005, etc.), as well as some door prizes.

Anyway, I was planning on going, would like to learn about the new stuff. This year they have four tracks: IT Pro, Data Platform, Partner/Reseller and Developer. Developer track is currently full in Seattle, but has a waiting list.

On a side note, check out this hilarious post on what it would be like if Microsoft were a Schoolboy and software were homework.