What is vExpert?
From the vExpert Landing Page: The VMware vExpert Award is given to individuals who have significantly contributed to the community of VMware users over the past year. vExperts are book authors, bloggers, VMUG leaders, tool builders, and other IT professionals who share their knowledge and passion with others. These vExperts have gone above and beyond their day jobs to share their technical expertise and communicate the value of VMware and virtualization to their colleagues and community.
You can notice that it isn’t a new type of certitication but a award (quite similar to Microsoft MPV).
My vExpert
After a lot of time waiting for the response, on Fri Jul, 1 morning I receive this email from John Troyer:
We’re pleased to designate you as a vExpert 2011 as recognition of your contributions to the VMware, virtualization, and cloud computing communities. You’ve done work above and beyond, and we’re delighted to communicate more closely, to share resources, and to offer other opportunities for greater interaction throughout the year as we continue to grow knowledge and success in the community of IT professionals. Welcome to the vExpert 2011 Program!
Wow! An amazing way to start a day.
This is the second year (the first year I’ve never tried to apply to the vExpert nomination) and I’m really happy to be nominated again, considering that this year the level is really high and hard (seems that also VMware employees can now participate at this program, so probably less seat for “humans”).
And the better news was that also other 4 people from VMUG IT (plus one from VMware Italy) were also designed to this award:
- Fabio Rapposelli
- Giuseppe Guglielmetti
- Luca Dell’Oca
- Piergiorgio Spagnolatti
- Massimo Re Ferrè (VMware)
I don’t know how much weight has the community activity in this kind of recognition, but for an example of negative reply seems that criteria are very high and articulates: http://rvdnieuwendijk.com/2011/07/03/not-designated-as-a-vmware-vexpert-2011/
So I have to thanks the VMware selection committee and a special thanks to John Troyer for all the hard work on vExpert program and for the VMware Community.
Some vExperts directories
- There will be also an official page, but is not yet ready
- http://www.van-lieshout.com/vexpert/– One of the first list of vExpert 2011
- http://twitter.com/@maishsk/vmware-vexpert-2011– Maish Saidel-Keesing twitter list
- Eric Sloof’s LinkedIn vExpert group (by approval only)