The value of a user group is usually gauged by the collaboration within it's members. Let me tell you why COMMON does one better.
Written by Steve Pitcher
The first weekend of each December is when this brave columnist and his fellow Common Americas Advisory Council (CAAC) members brave the cold and travel to Rochester, Minnesota, to meet with IBM for two days of meetings where we represent the collective community of the COMMON Americas User Group. While I can't discuss in specific detail what we talk about, I will tell you that there is a tremendous amount of collaboration between the CAAC and IBM. This benefits independent software vendors (ISVs), IBM Business Partners, and most certainly Power Systems customers. The CAAC has a counterpart organization affiliated with COMMON Europe that gives IBM a perspective from the European Power Systems community as well.