I thought I'd chime in here about the CFUnited 2007 pricing - I'm a third-party with nothing to gain from the conference pricing, but I'm on the advisory board, am aware of a lot of 'behind the scenes' information, and I help-out a lot with various aspects of organizing and running conference. I'm also no stranger to conferences, including what goes into organizing and running them. That said, here's some information about running a conference, and about CFUnited in particular, that I wanted to contribute:
There three main reasons for the CFUnited 2007 price increase from last year's event: 1. hotel event prices have increased, as they typically do every year at most hotels 2. last year was a bit of an experiment - the first time TeraTech actually planned for 1,000+ attendees... and it ended-up being a complete break-even gig for them. That's a lot of work to put-in and only break-even 3. this year's event is going to have a TON of improvements based on suggestions from Myself and the other advisory board members as well as from attendee feedback from 2006 So, what are all these big improvements? Well, I can't get into the specifics of all of them, but here are a few major ones - most of which being a direct response to 2006 attendee feedback: 1.TeraTech is arranging for better equipment, including better AV equipment 2. Better Internet access for all of the attendees 3. A larger on-site staff 4. Better food 5. Make 2007 a much bigger and better event than last year I won't speak to all of those points directly; some don't really require saying anything more. Food and internet access were the number one issue people reported last year. Internet access should be much better this year, and food definitely should be. In fact, Liz has invited me to have a long "CFUnited 2007 food tasting" lunch with her in the very near future, so if anyone has special requests, email me ;) The big one there is #5 - making it a better event. I've been kicking back and forth a ton of ideas with TeraTech. There are a few big changes planned for this year. One of them is a social event that is leaps and bounds better than the social events at prior CFUnited/CFUN conferences. Another change I can mention (without detail) is that we're trying to make sure that there is something "extra special" at the conference for attendees who are more advanced developers. I can't say more than that, except that I'm very involved in the planning of that initiative and if anyone has some thoughts/suggestions please email me off-list. Anyway, the bottom line is that the cost of CFUnited is now in the same ballpark as the cost to attend MAX, a major corporate event. TeraTech is committed to making sure that along with that price tag, the CFUnited conference offers the same quality of entertainment and services as well as the same type of experience, that one would expect from a conference that carries that type of price tag. One last reminder: I don't work for TeraTech, don't run CFUnited, and don't get paid to do the conference or to promote it. When DevCon went away, CFUN became my favorite conference. I've always had a preference for grassroots events (which it was back then), and I still do, but I am committed to helping TeraTech to keep CFUnited my favorite event despite the fact that's it's grown so popular, in any way that they'll let me. Though I don't work for them, I have a lot of pull and a lot of access to peoples' ears so if anyone would like to send thoughts, suggestions, concerns, etc. about the conference to me (off-list of course)... please feel free. The same goes for the other advisory board members, who, if not already listed on the CFUnited site, will be shortly. ~Simon -- Simon Horwith CIO, AboutWeb - http://www.aboutweb.com Editor-in-Chief, ColdFusion Developers Journal Adobe Community Expert Adobe Certified Master Instructor Blog - http://www.horwith.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Introducing the Fusion Authority Quarterly Update. 80 pages of hard-hitting, up-to-date ColdFusion information by your peers, delivered to your door four times a year. http://www.fusionauthority.com/quarterly Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/message.cfm/messageid:260901 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.4
