B. Mann Consulting

I just did my first post to the Raincity Studios blog, about Dries announcing his Drupal startup Acquia.

I really am pleased for Dries. I know that he's had a number of different offers and ideas that he's had to think through. Doing your own thing is exciting. Doing it well-funded is even more exciting :P

I think there are a number of different business models around open source that need more examples and experimentation. I've seen a lot of companies trying to make installing open source applications easier, but that's a "do once" operation that, to me, is not particularly high value.

Distilling the knowledge of lots of smart people into a focused distribution is a great thing, and upgrading / maintaining an installation over time is the much harder thing that I'd like to see more solutions around.

So, Dries, congrats on Acquia. I think we've got a few more adventures to go on together, and I'm looking forward to it.

It's settled, I'm heading to Portland. I'm going to be there from Sunday, October 22nd to Wednesday, Oct. 25th.

On the schedule, in no particular order:

• See Dries Buytaert, who is in town for some sort of crazy Java optimization conference
• Catch up with Scott Kveton and the JanRain guys to plan world domination via OpenID v53
• Go to a Geek Dinner - organized by Alex Williams and co. over at Feedia (ditto on the world domination) 
• Go to a Drupal meetup on Tuesday night

I'm staying at the very funky White Eagle Hotel. I stayed at the Kennedy School a couple of weeks back when I was briefly in town for a vacation. These are a cool chain of hotels/breweries/etc. Highly recommended.