Pam Klier told as many people as would listen at last week's Java Business Expo in New York all about how Computer Associates' object-oriented Jasmine database would help transform networks into multimedia application development powerhouses.
Well, she wasn't exactly telling people. Klier and three partners were belting out a swing-style song/dance/pitch bit on a small stage fronting the CA booth at the Javits convention center.
Sample lines: "Let's get down with the latest Web innovations" and "Jasmine gives you total enterprise management."
It's not the kind of stuff you'd normally catch on the radio, though I once heard Ella Fitzgerald singing something about "heterogeneous server connectivity." But I think she was just scatting.
Klier is not a multitalented chief technology officer, but rather an actress, singer and dancer who is paid by corporations to promote their products at trade shows. The 31-year-old works through Live Marketing, a production company based in Chicago, her hometown.
"Trade shows are a great way for an actor to make a living," says Klier, who does two or three shows per month.
For anywhere from $500 to $1,200 per day, Klier and other trade-circuit veterans will do a 7- to 10-minute performance about a dozen times per day.
Live Marketing employs writers who prepare scripts for its clients, many of which are medical or high-tech companies. (The week before the Java show, Klier performed for enterprise resource management applications vendor Epiphany at the Sales Force Automation Conference and Expo in Boston.)
While Klier and her partners may not be called upon to spearhead a data synchronization project across multiple database platforms, they do have to be quick studies. "We can have anywhere from two weeks to one hour of prep time to learn a script," she says.
After a few rehearsals, it's time to don the greasepaint - or at least a vendor T-shirt - and work the ever-flowing crowd.
Between sets, Klier and other performers wander around convention center floors, running into acquaintances and perusing technologies they may someday be jitterbugging to.
Somnambulistic CEOs and listless marketing execs could learn a couple of things from performers such as Klier:
1) A well-timed leg kick never hurt a PowerPoint presentation.
2) Success in getting your message across can be boiled down to two words: Sell it, baby!
OK, that's three words, but this is all about feeling, not math.
IT TAKES A VILLAGE TO RAISE A PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE With only about 200 exhibitors encamped in the cavernous Javits building, the Java Business Expo felt more like a small village than a teeming metropolis, a la Internet World. But it was nice to walk up and down the aisles and recognize almost every company.
Still, there were a handful of Java start-ups with which 'Net Buzz was unfamiliar. Here are three of them, along with what they do:
Instantiations, Inc. of Tualatin, Ore., provides services and technologies, such as the JOVE run-time compiler, designed to improve the performance of large Java applications.
SlangSoft, Ltd. of Ramat Gan, Israel, sells applications that allow users to do e-mailing, chatting and word-processing in any national language.
Caribou Lake Software of Minneapolis offers software and services for accessing relational databases with Java.
I'd like to close this column with a little number I like to call "Send Your Best Internet-related News, Gossip and Sheet Music to 'Net Buzz." It's a torch song. Contact Chris Nerney at (508) 820-7451 or cnerney@nww.com.
