For anyone who hasn't been to EMC World before, it's huge , especially compared to Momentum.

And when it comes to size... paste whatever attribute and meta tag (spell check insists it's two words) you want on to it, it matters.

So being the rebel I am, instead of my usual long posts, I'm going to write small, short, posts on the different aspects of what I have seen and experienced.

The conference officially opened last night with a real nice reception (I'm talking pasta cooked to order, Virginia ham sandwiches, exotic appetizers, free booze) and the Goo Goo Dolls.

I'd paste in the video but the web's incredibly slow, at the moment, and I know ya'all are smart enough to look'em up on YouTube, should you so desire.

Aside from the fine food and music at the conference, there are people, lots of them, over 9300 according to EMC's esteemed leader, Joe Tucci.

And when I say people, I'm talking folks from all over the world. At the press Q&A today, Tucci took questions from journalists from Korea, Poland, Israel, Argentina, Germany....need I go on?)

The questions seemed to be all storage,iomega (though the acquisition is not yet complete), VM and business strategy related, so I kept my big mouth shut. Are you going to release a version of Content Server that is optimized for 64-bit bit hardware? didn't seem to be appropriate for him ( but Mark Lewis, who heads up EMC software, will be getting it from me tomorrow, I promise.)

Software and ECM is just one of five of EMC's big businesses and since that's my one window into EMC, it feels, just a little....disruptive. Not in a bad way, though. And much as I'm often critical, Tucci seems like a smart, highly focused, competent leader who knows exactly where he's going. Paste a non-IM attribute on to his mission,and he'll set you straight. Ask him what kind of company he's likely to buy next, he'll refuse to answer. Why? The stock in that market goes up 10% and the purchase becomes more expensive. The man's not going to work against himself or his stockholders. I don't see many leaders who seem both smart and straight forward all that all that often.

When EMC says it wants to be "Where Information Lives" , take it to heart. What does that mean to you as a customer, systems engineer, investor, supplier...figure that out and you'll find your role in EMC's quickly growing world (EMC spent 1.8 billion in acquisitions last year.)

I'll post more later. If you have any questions for me to ask Mark Lewis, or anyone else at EMC software, I'm all over it tomorrow.

Still to come...What's new in Documentum 6.5? Hint: Nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, hey, hey hey, bye bye ...and hello to JRun!