In the weeks leading up to ISC, old colleagues reestablish communications, vendors reach out to partners and prospects to arrange meetings, and reporters and publishers scurry to line up their interviews and briefings. And there is one thing in common with most of this activity: the preferred place for all of these ISC attendees to meet on the first evening. The ‘watering hole’ as it is affectionately called, is the bar at the Radisson Blu hotel next to the convention center in Hamburg.

As I was sitting at the watering hole on the opening evening of the conference, an image came to mind. The hundreds of folks gathering at this one spot, with looks of excitement and relief at having made the journey, draws a strong comparison to another annual event – the great migration of the Serengeti.

The Serengeti migration is an annual occurrence in which more than two million wildebeest migrate clockwise around the Serengeti in search of better grazing and calving conditions. So, we use the analogy loosely, of course, and it breaks down if you get too literal, but you have to admit – there is a wonderful sense of parallelism in the two migration stories.