Back in 2004, PICnet was just a few years old, Soapbox wasn't even an idea yet, and I found myself in Philadelphia with a bunch of non-profit tech geeks.  It was my first Non-Profit Technology Conference (NTC), organized by our good friends at N-TEN. and I remembered thinking to myself, "wow, there's really a lot of other crazy folks interested in non-profit tech."

Little did I know that 10 years later, I'd be registering for the same event.

It's been an incredible string of events during the past 10 years.  The N-TEN community has changed, dramatically, since the early Circuit Rider days, and so has the NTC.  I swear that it seems there are more folks hosting booths at the Science Fair these days then there were total attendees back in the early days!

So this afternoon, when I started working on my annual registration for the NTC 2013 (early bird, of course), I reflected for a moment.  As the N-TEN community has evolved and grown, do I still fit into the new generation of N-TEN folks?  Were my interests back in 2004 the same as they are today, and if so, are they being reflected in the type of event that the NTC has become?  Did I really manually blow up, by hand, 96 penguins with my PICnet buddy Pradeep back at the NTC 2006 in Seattle?

In short:  is the NTC right for a guy like me in 2013?

Each quarter, PICnetters from across the country fly in to our Washington DC headquarters for a one day all-hands meeting to discuss the success of the previous quarter and plan for the quarter ahead.  Since today's Quarterly Connect was our first of the year, it doubles as our annual planning event of the year, giving me an opportunity to share a vision for the company moving forward through the year.

We discussed the unique opportunity our team has in today's environment to take some important steps forward on new products that we've planned for many years.  We've agreed that our Soapbox Engage service's integration with Salesforce, and the tools we've created to help organizations fundraise more effectively online, are key to our clients' success in 2013.  Based on these building blocks, we're excited to work with our clients, partners, and friends to continue expanding our services for the sector.

This plan dovetails nicely with our existing commitment to further evangelize about the Salesforce Foundation's Nonprofit Starter Pack, a service that enables organizations to utilize the Salesforce service more appropriately for charitable organizations.  All of our new products planned for 2013 will have deep integrations with the Salesforce service, benefitting the more than 10,000 organizations currently using Salesforce.

The good folks over at Socialbrite have put together an awesome list of non-profit-related events for 2013 that will sure fill your brain with ideas and keep you in the good graces with your frequent flier program.  Of course, if you go to all of these events, not only will you be breaking the laws of physics, but you might never be able to deploy your new skills back at your organization.

So, to help you short-list what you shouldn't miss in 2013, here's a little cheatsheet we've compiled about the events we make sure to attend each year.