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From: sdo@u1100a.UUCP (Scott Orshan)
Newsgroups: net.usenix
Subject: Complaint about Uniforum plenary sessions
Message-ID: <788@u1100a.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 27-Feb-85 15:48:34 EST
Article-I.D.: u1100a.788
Posted: Wed Feb 27 15:48:34 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 1-Mar-85 07:04:23 EST
Organization: Bell Communications Research, Piscataway, NJ
Lines: 33

I was a bit upset by the plenary (opening) talks each day at
Uniforum.  Each speaker sounded like he was selling something.
(Yes, "he" - all the plenary speakers were white males.)

I think of a plenary talk as a speech on a topic of interest
to most people attending the conference.  All the talks
seemed to be thinly disguised efforts to plug a product or
service of the speaker's company.  It's perfectly alright to
have these talks at this conference - in fact, that's the point -
but not when there is a captive audience that has no idea of
the topic of the talk.

What I expected to hear were talks on the state of the art of the
UNIX system, proposed new architectures and applications, and
general talks on "the growing impact of UNIX in Office Systems,
Personal Computers, Technical (Engineering/Programming), and
Market Trends." [from the Uniforum Conference Program]

Instead, I heard about IBM, AT&T, and SUN products, and
AT&T services.  These are not "The Worlds of UNIX" as the
conference theme was stated, but the worlds of those companies
whose speakers spoke.

I'd like to hear if others feel the same way, and maybe persuade
the organizers of next year's conference to request more
appropriate topics for these talks.  Also, how about some
equal opportunity for the job of Plenary Speaker?
-- 

			Scott Orshan
			Bell Labs Piscataway
			201-981-3064
			{pyuxww,ihnp4,bellcore}!u1100a!sdo