As I alluded to in my earlier review of REALDevelopment ‘06, there was a small hiccup in the proceeding when Jerome Carron was presenting on ATLAS/AJAX that went something like this:

Jerome: “And anyway, it’s all just…yes, you have a question?”

Attendee: “Well, yes, I have two questions…”

The first of these was not a question at all, but actually a “Boy do you guys suck for the strange behavior I get when I set Firefox to be my default browser for VS and use ATLAS!”

The second part, unlike the first, was at least actually phrased like a question but amounted to complaining about the method that Microsoft was using for its bugtracking, complete with snide commentary of MS' stance that ATLAS is in beta.

What is with this kind of behavior? What is the motivation? Was this man thinking that the hot MSDN woman was going to go up to him after and say, “OOo…I loved the way you handled that nasty Jerome!!! You showed me you’re a real man – let’s go the back! No one will be in the popcorn stand until 1 PM…”

Sure, you could argue that he wanted this complaint heard in a public forum and that it is under the auspices of “making a better product.” There are tons of ways to contribute these ideas in a way that do not:

• make for an awkward moment for the presenter
• derail the conference for the other three to four hundred attendees
• make me dive over the railing and tackle you
  

You could argue that it is “courageous” to “confront” the MSDN presenters in a public forum this way.  I would argue it is equally “courageous” to douse yourself in gasoline and set yourself on fire in front of all the attendees in protest of ATLAS screwing with your Firefox settings. Certainly it would be no more disruptive and it saves others the trouble of doing it to you themselves!!

It's okay to ask questions!!  But you are not impressing *anyone* with snide commentary or questions that are not designed to elicit information, but are instead to simply show off how "smart" you are.

So, with all of this in mind, I’d first like to say that Jerome Carron is my personal hero (yes, even with that played-out black shirt and jeans) for handling this guy in such a calm and collected manner. If it were me on stage, the scenario probably would’ve gone something like this:

Justice: “That’s a great question. In fact, I think it’s so good that you’ve won a free gift! Come up here and get it!”
(attendee comes up)
Justice: “but first, allow me to shake your hand as you have rocked me to the core with your penetrating intelligence!”
(attendee looks around to the crowd. Should he do it? Everyone cheers. Attendee puts out his hand)
Justice (shaking hand): “Here’s your free gift!”

Now, although this is what I’d like to do when I present, it’s still kind of rude to the attendee. I mean hey, you guys deserve some respect just as human beings! So instead, at my own presentations, if I get asked stuff like the above, I will instead give the Stone Cold Stunner to Donald Belcham. Actually, scratch that, if the audience can scrape together $10* I’ll stun Donald Belcham every time someone asks me any question!!

Now that will make us all go home happy!!