Hosted Solutions' SaaS User Group is Something to Keep an Eye on

• By Isabel Wang on February 20, 2007

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Speaking of events... I was really glad to hear from Josh Wolff at Hosted Solutions that he's creating a SaaS User Group. 75% of his customers are local, Josh said. He wanted to provide a forum where they can share best practices, resources and experiences. The first meeting will be on March 15.

I think this is such a great idea; I wish more hosting companies would expand their roles beyond providers of hardware/connectivity to social networking platforms that bring like-minded customers/vendors/prospects/etc together.

Carolina SaaS could use a sprinkling of Web 2.0 stardust though. Josh said over 100 people have expressed interest, but you'd never know from looking at its website. In fact, you wouldn't even have any inkling of Hosted Solutions' involvement. Of course, this is a brand new initiative - but RedMonk analyst James Governor's Adobe "unassociation" is in the same boat. But the Bedale Group has a blog, which interested parties can comment on and trackback to. Instead of waiting until scheduled meetings to "establish direction", why not get some conversations started right away?

I LOVE the idea of an unassociation, by the way. James defines it as "a loosely-coupled social affiliation where the membership is driven and created by the participants, generally day-by-day, without any dues, and with social rather than top-down articles". I've been in more "why isn't there a web hosting association" conversations than I can count, but no organization has ever materialized because it's impossible for diverse types of companies to agree to the same objectives, priorities, membership structure, etc.

But is consensus really necessary? Or could interested folks skip all the administrivia, connect with no set agenda, and collaborate on an ad hoc basis whenever there's mutual interest in a project?

PS - On an unrelated note, there's something very important happening today. Kayla turns 23! Say happy birthday, everyone!

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