On Wed, Feb 15, 2012 at 8:39 AM, Gilbert Wilson <[email protected]>wrote:
> All:
>
> A client of mine is putting together a conference. They're a nonprofit
> that does some really great work. To help participants promote the work of
> all the organizations involved they want to provide Internet access to
> everyone so they can tweet, email, etc during the conference proceedings.
> However, the hotel wants $10,000 for a 1.5mb line.
>
> I half jokingly told them that they could get faster Internet if they
> setup some soup cans and screamed AT commands into them.
>
> Anyone have tips on how to negotiate better Internet at a better price
> from a hotel?
>
>
FWIW --
The Ohio LinuxFest runs into a similar situation. We're in a convention
center, and the ISP is a 3rd party, but they are contracted to the
convention center, so it is "use them or use nothing." (We cannot stop
people from using their own 3g/4g/whatever devices, but that is individual
use.)
What we do is get a sponsor to pay for the connection. It's hard, because
for about $8k - which is, iirc, less than the advertised rate, but still
high - we cannot get a connection that allows 1000+ people on it, but we
can at least let those who absolutely require it on - typically those
teaching classes and our Sponsor/Vendor Expo booths.
It's a sucky situation. Every year people complain that "we're a computer
conference, why don't we have Internet access available to everyone?" And
we're happy to invite them to join our sponsorship committee to help find
{a} compan{y,ies} who will sponsor the additional $10k it would take to put
everyone on the 'net.
Good luck.
Moose
_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
[email protected]
https://lists.lopsa.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss
This list provided by the League of Professional System Administrators
http://lopsa.org/
