Disclaimer: I was recently a guest at Nimble Storage‘s Predictive Flash Platform announcement. My flights, accommodation and other expenses were paid for by Nimble Storage. There is no requirement for me to blog about any of the content presented and I am not compensated in any way for my time at the event. Some materials presented were discussed under NDA and don’t form part of my blog posts, but could influence future discussions.
Here are my notes on gifts, etc, that I received as an attendee at Nimble Storage’s recent launch (2016.02.23) of their Predictive Flash Platform. You can read the article I posted on the launch here. I’m just trying to make it clear what I received during this event to ensure that we’re all on the same page as far as what I’m being influenced by. I’m going to do this in chronological order, as that was the easiest way for me to take notes during the week. I’d also like to clarify that I took 5 days of unpaid leave from my regular employer to be at this event.
Saturday
I left my house Saturday morning at 8am and travelled BNE -> LAX -> SFO. My wife paid for airport parking on Saturday. I ate some plane food on the flight over, included as part of the fare. I also had a Bloody Mary, of sorts. A friend picked me up and I stayed the night outside the City.
Sunday
On Sunday I took a Caltrain to SF. Nimble Storage covered my accommodation (as well as my flights) in the Marriott Marquis. In my room was a Nimble Storage-branded backpack, a fleece jacket and a Beats Pill+ portable speaker. Nice. On Sunday night Jon Klaus and I had dinner in a nice Italian restaurant at our own expense.
Monday
Jon, Enrico and I had breakfast at Mel’s Diner on Monday morning at our own expense. We then all met up in the lobby of the Marriott to kick off the Nimble Storage event and headed off on a food tour of the Mission District run by Edible Excursions. So much good food, including half an egg and ham muffin at Craftsman and Wolves, chocolate at Dandelion Chocolate, half a chicken banh mi at Duc Loi Kitchen, a taco and Margherita at Tacolicious on Valencia, half a ham and cheese croissant at Tartine, and a salted caramel scoop at Bi-Rite Creamery. We followed this up with a meal at Epic Steak. I had the Hamachi Sashimi, Grilled Ribeye Steak and Chocolate Salted Caramel Mousse. This was washed down with a Kith and Kin 2013 vintage cabernet sauvignon. Good stuff.
Tuesday
I skipped breakfast on Tuesday. At the press event held at One Kearny Club I received a 4GB USB stick with some Nimble Storage collateral on it. After the press-only event I had lunch consisting of a California turkey sandwich, apple, Kettle potato chips and a choc-chip biscuit. I had two bottles of sparkling mineral water as well. At the customer event, we all received a Nimble Storage-branded “Chrystal Ball” (made of fairly solid acrylic), and a Nimble Storage-branded “Cobra VR Viewer”. Once the customer presentation was finished, I helped myself to a few Lagunitas Pils beers and tried an Anchor Steam Beer for good measure. I also partook of some pretty fine devilled eggs and a “Sidewalk” cocktail. This was all covered by Nimble Storage. For dinner I went out with some nice people to the Mikkeller Bar and had two Pivo Pils (by Firestone Walker Brewing Company) and some sausages wrapped in bacon. Stu Miniman kindly picked up the tab.
Wednesday
Wednesday morning Stephen Foskett kindly bought Jon and I breakfast as the Nimble event had concluded. I spent time with a local friend before making my way to SFO.
Conclusion
I’d like to extend my thanks to the team at Nimble Storage for organising such an enjoyable event and doing everything they could to make sure my stay was comfortable and informative. It was great to meet for the first time or catch up again with the team and I also appreciated the opportunity to rub shoulders with some really interesting folk from the press, blogger and vendor side of things.
