Paul Grenyer

Rivalry is a good thing. Well, healthy competition at least. When you look back through history the major times of technological progress have been at times of war and competition. The first and second world wars. The nuclear arms race between the Russians and the Americans during the cold war. The space race. Formula one teams. And the Shadows (Babylon 5 reference - not Cliff Richards lot). Last night was the very first SyncIpswich . SyncIpswich is the first SyncCity spin off from the hugely successful SyncNorwich . Carl Farmer is doing an incredible job. I first met Carl at Agile Cambridge a few years ago and he’s another Smart421 associate, like me. Coincidentally, I also met tonight’s speaker, Google’s Daniel Wagner-Hall at the same conference in the same year. It’s funny how these apparently small coincidences trigger much bigger things in the future. The reason I feel Carl is doing such a good job is that there was standing room only at the very first SyncIpswich. Ok...

I’ve had even less luck seeing Deicide than Devin Townsend up to now. A couple of years ago they were meant to be playing up North, so I bought, a ticket booked a hotel and then the tour got cancelled because they decided to trash their tour bus on the first night of the tour. Then they were meant to be playing at Bloodstock, but their performance there got cancelled. So when Deicide booked a gig at the Waterfront in Norwich I was very excited (everyone in the office will testify to that!). Of course those in the know (Andrew Martyn) were taunting me that it was only the start of the countdown to cancellation. With three support bands it was always going to start early. The doors opened at 7pm and I joined the queue outside the Waterfront as normal, only to discover that the long queue was for the band playing downstairs (Cancer Bats). So I got straight in and straight upstairs to where Sweetest Delivery were already playing. They were good but a bit all over the place. You d...

The last time I saw Skunk Anansie at the UEA in Norwich, on the Wonderlustre tour, they were amazing. Wonderlustre was weak, but the band was fantastic as the songs were much heavier live. This time around, even though the new album Black Traffic was only 35 minutes it was a solid 35 minutes. The songs still translated to live well, but there was too much bass throughout the show which rather spoiled the sound. I still enjoyed it, but there weren’t enough songs I knew. Skin of course put on a superb performance. Charisma oozing out into the audience. Unfortunately the UEA was at around half capacity. I suspect a few people balked at paying £24 for a ticket. We nearly did. The support band, Your Army were also very good. Other than Enochian Theory supporting Threshold two weeks ago, I haven’t enjoyed a support band so much for a long time! They weren’t enough of my sort of thing to buy their album, but I enjoyed them while they were on.

SyncConf , Norwich’s first Agile & Tech conference, presented by SyncNorwich on Friday February 15th 2013 at the Open Venue was a huge success! We had 160 people come for the day and 42 for the dinner in the evening at The Library Restaurant . The success of SyncConf speaks for itself with the numbers, press conference and reviews: Start-ups get boost from IT conference Norwich digital conference puts region’s technology industry ‘on the map’ SyncConf; Norwich's First Tech Conference and Taggart's Debut. Of course SyncConf wouldn’t have been a success at all without our speakers, sponsors, venues or delegates and my thanks go to you all. SyncConf also helped me realise a dream I’ve had for a while of having Kevlin Henney open a conference in Norwich. Kevlin has been a friend of mine for quite a while and huge influence on my professional career. Thanks Kevlin! Without John Fagan , SyncConf would have been a much smaller and less sexy Agile only conference. My thanks a...

What: Trisha Gee from 10gen does an unconference When: Wednesday, April 10, 2013 7:30pm to 8:30pm Where: The Reindeer, Norwich Sign-up: http://www.meetup.com/EastAnglia-MongoDB/events/95196662/ We’re very lucky to have yet another person from 10gen come to speak at our second meeting. I met Trisha Gee a few years ago when I was working in London. Trisha works on the Java driver for MongoDB. Trisha is going to do a general question and answer session, so please come prepared with your questions. Trish has a broad spectrum of knowledge, which is not just limited to MongDB, including: General intro to NoSQL Why MongoDB The new Java driver Java in general Designing for performance (general) General performance topics including diagnosing problems (not necessarily MongoDB specific, with a lean towards Java considerations) Financial Markets/banking stuff (e.g. design, domain knowledge, and with an overlap into the performance stuff) Really off-topic subjects like Agile Develop...

I haven’t been to the Underworld for a long time. I’m not even sure who the last band I saw there was. I have a feeling it may have been Deathstars . It’s a superb little venue with a great sound system and friendly staff! First up tonight were Cryptex , an interesting band from Germany with a really quirky sense of humor. Next up were Enochian Theory , a superb progressive rock & metal band. I was really impressed and bought their latest album, which the singer / guitarist signed “Thanks Paul, keep it disco”. Threshold are my favorite band, they have been since 2006 and I think they’re amazing. They did not disappoint tonight. With a set primarily from the new album, March of Progress the band played a blinder. I had to feel sorry for Pete Morton who was having technical difficulties which appeared at the beginning of Coda, the first song that he wrote for Threshold that they were playing live. Damian was of course on great form and had a real connection with the crowd. Let’s...