While I managed to get to Lotusphere the last 2 years running due to other commitments I couldn't do it this year. It is however fantastic to have so many people blogging about the latest and greatest so you can still get  a great feeling for what is going on.

A couple of points I have noted so far:

IBM publically announced that they had a 30% growth in Notes/Domino for 2006. This is a huge figure and certainly lays to bed the comments that Notes is no longer growing.

IBM also started to reveal details about "Domino release beyond 8" which is also very encouraging and shows that they are very committed long term to the product. The one thing IBM has proven time and time again is that you don't need to wait for years for major upgrades to the product.

Ken Bisconti's comment that "Lotus Notes is the 'one and only' strategic e-mail platform for IBM.".

Some product announcements:

Lotus Connections
Lotus Quickr
Lotus Sametime 7.5.1
Lotus Notes/Domino 8
Lotus Component Designer

As I discover more I will mention it.