I ran into O. Burtch Drake last night at the bar in the lobby of the Rosen Shingle Creek during the opening night of the AAAA's media show in Orlando. I asked the past association president. "What are you doing here?" His answer, I'm just here to party!"

Chalk one up for MediaBank in its below-the-line marketing battle with media data processing giant Donovan Data Systems at the AAAA Media Conference. When I searched the wi-fi networks available in the room during the general session this morning, MediaBank's wi-fi hub was among the networks. There wasn't any for Donovan.

This hit MediaPost's inbox just as the AAAA media show festivities were getting underway Wednesday night: Starcom MediaVest Group/Americas chief Laura Desmond has suddenly annoucned that Dennis Donlin will leave as general manager and president of GM Planworks, effective April 1. I'm guessing that's no April Fool's joke.

Group M potentate Irwin Gotlieb offered more to chew on Wednesday for those mystified by the industry's slow progress in moving away from glacial paper-based transactions to electronic ones.

So what's the first thing I spot when I show up at the Four As Media Conference in Orlando? A bunch of high-powered media industry execs sporting buttons that say "Free The Data -- Starcom" My first thought was that this must be some not-so-veiled reference to Starcom MediaVest Group's blowout with Donovan Data Systems, and the fact that SMG's new partner -- MediaBank -- is based on the kind of open source approach that is antithetical to Donovan's historic approach to processing media and advertising data.