Just finished the last of my Lightning Round presentations. The lightning round is our first meeting with the judges who will be judging us in the formal rounds. Basically we introduce ourselves and present our concept / architecture. No demos allowed. Not scored, but obviously still influences the score somewhat (at least if you can give the judges a good understanding of your system). I think it went fairly well. The judges seemed pretty friendly. Unfortunately my first presentation for the formal round is 9am tomorrow. Far too early. Slightly better is the fact that this year I am second off (last year we were first up). Last night was the welcome party at "Yokohama Blitz" - I'm still not sure what "Yokohama Blitz" is, but they had drinks, food, big sound systems and equipment, and a stage. Some interesting entertainment, dancers and drummers. I have pictures and videos. But it's a lot of effort to get them onto the net. Actually its a lot of effort to get them off my camera. Sony gave me a docking cradle for the camera, but not a cable that plugs directly into the camera - so it's too much effort. But I digress. Some other interesting facts (about japan not necessarily the imagine cup): My hotel room has a speaker for the TV in the bathroom. Useful, because the TV has music channels. Internet in the hotel rooms is free (and very fast). Yokohama is pretty smoggy. The bar at the top of the Yokohama Landmark Tower has a really good view. At night time from this distance Tokyo looks like an array of flashing red lights. That's all for now, off to explore. Then maybe some last minute coding :-)