I recently found out who will give the keynote presentation at
COFES 2007. I agreed not to spill the beans before the official announcement coming soon from
Cyon Research. I think the announcement will cause some who have been on the fence about attending COFES to commit to coming.
Cyon Research intends to keep COFES to a "manageable" size and will cap attendance if necessary. I'm betting the increased interest will cause the event to reach capacity. So, if you are planning to attend COFES but haven't registered yet, you might want to do that now.
I can't identify the keynoter yet, but I can sponsor a guessing game about this person's identity. Rules—and the winner's prize—are below. First, a few hints:
1. I have been lobbying Cyon to book this person for four years. So if you've ever talked to me about COFES, this person's name has probably popped up in the conversation.
2. I have quoted this person in my public writing and this person has quoted me in her/his public writing, but we have never met. (That removes from the list most CAD industry people worth inviting as a keynote speaker.)
3. The speaker's adopted home town has a summer beer fest that attracted 500,000 enthusiasts in 2006.
4. A word coined by this person is now an entry in
Wiktionary and
Wikipedia. The word—and the ideas behind it—are
very relevant to COFES.
I'll send a
3DConnexion SpaceTraveler 3D input device to the first person to guess who this person is, if the guess is posted to the comment section below before Cyon Research makes the announcement. No anonymous posting, please. Members of the CAD press corps (including CAD-related bloggers) are not eligible.
--RSN