Suffice it to say: Luke, I agree with you completely, though I do have a slightly more optimistic take on sponsorship involvement in sessions than you do. Perhaps the sponsors sessions neeed to be held separately, or scheduled with an asterisk, so the attendees can go in with their “pitch detectors” on high. But, for the most part, I think the self-promotion that ends up happening in these sponsor-led sessions has more to do with people using themselves as their own best reference than with any true need to subvert the discussion for the sake of personal business growth.

Sure, Network2 and Spreadshirt (among others) want to grow their businesses, but neither of them thinks they’re the only solution in town. They just happen to know themselves better than anyone else, so when someone asks a question, it’s hard to not give a personal reference as the answer.

You know what could be interesting? Having the sponsors products represented by their users next time around, so it becomes more of a consumer report than a possible shill…