I’m not in a good mood today. I expected a little more consideration from our Presidents, but apparently my two encounters with our chief executives this past week gave me the clear message they’ve forgotten about the taxes I’ve paid for so many years.

It started with President Bill Clinton. I met with him on July 14th, and I was more than a little hurt he didn’t recognize me. Maybe he was distracted, maybe he had other things on his mind, or maybe he doesn’t have the eyes of a Golden Eagle and couldn’t spot me amongst 7000 people at the Verizon Center in D.C.  Still, I was only twenty yards away, and the least he could have done was to shake off a few of his Secret Service detail to come over and chat.

Pouting, I decided to walk down to the White House and see if I’d have better luck with President Obama. With far younger eyes than Bill Clinton, I figured it would be child’s play to spot me amongst the throng of people staring at the White House from the sidewalk.  I turned to the guy next to me who was wielding a camera and admonished him.

“Say, don’t use a flash from this distance. It’s not going to do you any good, and it will blind President Obama. He’s in there right now,” I said, pointing to the White House, “and he’s sure to send someone out to escort me in. Now he can’t very well do that if he’s blinded.”

The guy eyed me cautiously, and slowly edged away down the sidewalk. I walked down to the left and tried to get the security guard’s attention so he could call inside. I was confident he could just phone in, and President Obama himself would come out to unlock the gate, put his hand on my shoulder, and walk me to the spot where he, Vice President Biden, Sgt. James Crowley, and professor Henry Gates had beers. In fact, to save time, I was pretty sure he’d just have a couple of cold Samuel Adams in his hand. I was ready to crow at the little people in front of the gate as President Obama and I slammed a few Sammies as we retired  to the Oval Office.

My time is valuable, and after waiting for what must have been at least ten minutes with no sign of the President, I thought maybe I could save us both time and just jump the fence and meet him halfway on the lawn of the White House. But it occurred to me that, if one of President Obama’s staff members hadn’t properly informed the Secret Service I might be in town, my altruistic gesture to save the President and myself a few precious moments could be misconstrued as the actions of a mentally ill anarchist, and even more time might be wasted removing Taser hooks from my back and trying to convince the guards that this was all kosher.

I attended the Microsoft Worldwide Partners Conference in downtown Washington, and the keynote address on July 14th by President Clinton was among the highlights of the show. President Clinton spoke about the role technology could play in helping some of the countries in dire need at present, and he painted a particularly poignant picture of the strife and struggles in Haiti.

Prior to Bill Clinton’s speech, Kevin Turner, Microsoft’s Chief Operating Officer, reminded me that COO’s of mega-corporations often possess some impressive skills. What seemed to be a primarily extemporaneous discussion of Microsoft’s direction for the next and coming years, blended into a rather startling series of revelations about Microsoft’s successes against their competition. A few tidbits garnered from Turner’s particularly evangelistic presentation included:

• Next year, 80% of Microsoft’s R&D investments will be in cloud computing; even more stunning: 90% of next year’s expenditures will be targeted towards “The Cloud”
• Microsoft has gained ground with Windows 7. Overall, Microsoft OS sits on just under 93% of the world’s personal computers
• Microsoft hasn’t done well with their cell phone endeavors, but the new Microsoft Phone software clearly indicates Microsoft is not backing down from the iPhone and Android

Jon Roskill, Corporate V.P.  for the Worldwide Partner Group (and like myself, ex-Digital Equipment Corporation), bounced from one corner of the stage to the next, and worked with senior Microsoft Engineers to demo some prototypes of new technology. I liked a map presented that displayed people in the audience who were currently using Twitter.

Back at the ranch, also known as the Washington Conference Center, the exhibitors area blended some live stage presentations by some highly polished marketing folks, with Microsoft demos, vendor demos, and hands-on play time. I tried to get my hands on a hot looking demo of Microsoft Surface, but some gray-haired guy was clearly not going to give it up unless a firearm was involved. I did play with a 3D car racing demo that was brief, but impressive, but I really liked the way Microsoft Visio 2010 and Microsoft Project 2010 have been improved. I was a big fan of an old workflow tool in the 90’s called AllClear for Windows, but as all the workflow pretenders have dropped off the face of the Earth, I have been awaiting some significant improvements to Visio.  In the world of harmonization activities and workflow analysis, functionality beyond “boxes and diamonds” has been needed for a while. Although I didn’t have time to crawl all over Visio 2010, it does appear to be a significant improvement over previous offerings.

But back to the overarching theme of the conference: to say Microsoft is committed to The Cloud is a vast understatement. Clearly, with the billions that will be channeled towards cloud development, Microsoft is most assuredly deadly serious about transforming the landscape of software applications.

Not to state the obvious, but Cloud computing would not be possible without the astonishing improvements we’ve seen in the Internet in general, and networking tools and hardware specifically. If one had even tried to mention a Cloud environment a decade ago, you’d be on the short list for a demotion. But the context has changed, and so has the targeted environment for how people will consume applications, and utilize Cloud data.

So, it’s easy to summarize the Microsoft Worldwide Partners Conference:

The Cloud is Coming.