In November last year I wrote a post asking the question "Does IBM(Lotus) Australia still
exist?". Although it's taken almost a year, that question was answered last night, and
happily it appears the answer is "yes".

Last night was the reincarnation of a Sydney Lotus User Group - to be maybe dubbed "Lotus
Energizers" (as SLUG or SNUG just don't cut it!). The turnout was huge (standing room
only), probably in no small part due to the fact that Ed Brill was the key speaker.

Although I know Ed has made trips to Australia a few times in recent years, I can't
remember the last time we had a quality US Lotus/IBM speaker available to the general
community as opposed to specific customers/business partners - probably since the last
Lotus Fusion conference around 5 years ago.

The numbers in the room meant that the session didn't really have a "user group" feel to
it, but the presentations from both Jonathan Stern and Ed were excellent. In addition to
some of the traditional marketing/sales figure stuff, we got a great feel for some of the
things coming up - 7.02 and Hannover specifically, along with a quick demo of Hannover. I
think it was a nice balance between future developments which are good to know, but too
far away to be practical, and real here-and-now features, particularly to a room where
only a handful were on Notes 7.

Technical info aside, the most positive outcome of the night was the buzz in the room.
People came out of business hours, to an out of the city location, and didn't rush off
immediately afterwards. Sure, there was beer (well, not for me), but there did seem a
real feel in the air that people were very keen to try to (re)create a local Lotus
community. This was also backed up by the strong message that IBM are committing to
increase their presence in the market. The committment from Jonathan was:
- to host regular events
- to increase PR
- to increase advertising (although no committment to out-market m$ft which would be a
futile effort anyway)
- to increase customer contact (which sounded like a revival of the old days I referred
to in my post above - regular visits to customers to see how things are going).

Another positive was the feedback form provided which asked, among other things, about
the interest in bringing back Lotus Fusion or something similar. I would be surprised if
they don't get a near perfect "Yes" result for this. Hopefully we will see some
interesting developments in the next 12 - 18 months. The positive sign that this may
actually happen is that the next event is already being prepared - a visit from Mike
Rhonin towards the end of October.

So, overall, it was a good night, with the promise of more to come.

On the back of Monday's terrible news regarding the death of Steve Irwin, Australia was shocked again on Friday afternoon to hear of the death of motor racing legend Peter Brock while racing in the Targa rally.

Although motor racing isn't a premier sport in Australia, Peter transcended the sport and became a much-loved sporting hero.

While the term "legend" is thrown around a bit too freely these days, the term does apply to both Steve and Peter, and to lose both in a single week from different incidents is hard to comprehend.

There's a reason why Tim & I have been so bad at finishing some of the things we've been talking about for the last few months (dominoblogs.com, openslice etc). For the last 5 months we (well, mostly me!) have been working on the next generation of Notes Developers - yep, we're pregnant!! We have a little girl (well, as far as we know - 80% guarantee given) on her way, due 2nd January 2007.

We are very excited at having our first child and it has been consuming most of our thoughts lately, not to mention causing us to have to pull apart our flat in order to start creating room for a (gasp!) nursery. This has been taking up most of our spare time at home,
which is therefore our excuse for the lack of blogging and other Notes-related promises lately. This also answers the question of whether we'll be attending Lotusphere next year - unfortunately no! It is sad for me to say that I'm disappointed about that, but sometimes we keep forgetting (out of fear, probably).

So, now the news is "out there" - as is my belly - so there's really no hiding it anymore....

Today is a very sad day for Australia. We were stunned at around 2.30pm this afternoon to hear the news that Steve Irwin "The Crocodile Hunter" has passed away - the victim of a stingray whilst filming a new documentary on the Great Barrier Reef.

I have always been a big fan of Steve Irwin, and always admired the passion he felt towards protecting and promoting the environment, particularly Australian Wildlife. Tim & I were lucky enough to visit Australia Zoo, his wildlife park on the Sunshine Coast (which is not far from Tim's folks), a couple of years ago, and although he wasn't there (as he often is), we were truly impressed by how dedicated Steve Irwin and his family were at putting their vast wealth into the creation of a fantastic wildlife park.

Although he had controversy a few years ago with his baby boy, and while many Australians thought him mad - he was well loved by most Australians, and the outpouring of sadness today in the media and on the internet has been something we don't often see in Australia.

My thoughts and prayers are with his family, close friends and co-workers in this very sad time, and I hope that his legacy is remembered by all.