Wade Wegner has left Microsoft (http://www.wadewegner.com/2012/03/leaving-microsoft/). It’s quite normal as people come and go - well, everyone is replaceable. This last rule applies to Wade as well, especially as he’s not a leading engineer or main architect, but he played a very, very important role for Windows Azure in past few years. A role that deservers some attention - Technical Evangelist.
Technical Evangelist is some kind of “celebrity” in geek’s world :) He has the best insider info and he’s privileged to share it with the world as the first one (what makes him as interesting for devs as pop stars are desired by teens), so tens of thoesands of developers read carefully every word he writes. He (and his pal - Steve Marx) was “Mr. Azure” - they did (with their Channel9 Cloud Cover Show - http://channel9.msdn.com/shows/Cloud+Cover) large part of positive publicity for Windows Azure and that required not only technical expertise but also helluva of non-obtrusive soft-skills and well-balanced, moderately impartial communication. This is very important, because being good is not enough for technology to become successful. Even “very good” may not be enough - you have to find away to SELL IT TO COMMUNITY in a reliable way, so developers are convinced they got it from other friendly devs, not marketing guys. IMHO evangelists made tremendous effort and played a big role in building better image of Microsoft products in past few years.
Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately), some of them have recently left their mother company:
- Phil Haack - ASP.NET MVC
- Steve Marx - Windows Azure
- Wade Wegner - Windows Azure
- Brad Adams - Silverlight
