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DEF CON 32 Was Canceled. We Un-Canceled it

forum.defcon.org

21–30 of 408 posts

Re: DEF CON 32 Was Canceled. We Un-Canceled it

#21
post #11

> This kind of no-notice cancellation of a contract is unheard of in the conference business. That's a big claim to make. Can someone with relevant experience confirm whether this is true?

It's seven months away. It's not like it's seven weeks.

For a conference at this scale, there's not a huge difference between seven weeks and seven months.

Re: DEF CON 32 Was Canceled. We Un-Canceled it

#22
post #11

> This kind of no-notice cancellation of a contract is unheard of in the conference business. That's a big claim to make. Can someone with relevant experience confirm whether this is true?

I mean, they've been running this event, which has topped 20k attendees, for something like 30 years. So one entity with the relevant experience is... them?

Re: DEF CON 32 Was Canceled. We Un-Canceled it

#25
post #4

I suspect Caesar's dropped DEF CON because the DEF CON attendees likely have a fairly low "avg revenue per attendee" yield because fewer of them gamble compared to the avg Vegas conference attendee. They also probably spend less on high-end restaurant dining and bar drinking inside the hotel. Since the pandemic Vegas has had a pretty strong resurgence in general and this may be a sign that Caesar's is doing well enou…

Doubtful, I'm sure it's related to the constant attacks against their infrastructure they must defend against (let's be honest, I'm sure Caesars is not defending successfully). The juice just ain't worth the squeeze. They have a business to run, and the risk of having a bunch of drunken and high hackers who happen to be the best in the world running amuck is not their idea of a good corporate event.

Re: DEF CON 32 Was Canceled. We Un-Canceled it

#27
post #4

I suspect Caesar's dropped DEF CON because the DEF CON attendees likely have a fairly low "avg revenue per attendee" yield because fewer of them gamble compared to the avg Vegas conference attendee. They also probably spend less on high-end restaurant dining and bar drinking inside the hotel. Since the pandemic Vegas has had a pretty strong resurgence in general and this may be a sign that Caesar's is doing well enou…

Doubtful, I'm sure it's related to the constant attacks against their infrastructure they must defend against (let's be honest, I'm sure Caesars is not defending successfully). The juice just ain't worth the squeeze. They have a business to run, and the risk of having a bunch of drunken and high hackers who happen to be the best in the world running amuck is not their idea of a good corporate event.

Wouldn’t you think that canceling and angering that community would be an even worse idea then?

Re: DEF CON 32 Was Canceled. We Un-Canceled it

#29
post #4

I suspect Caesar's dropped DEF CON because the DEF CON attendees likely have a fairly low "avg revenue per attendee" yield because fewer of them gamble compared to the avg Vegas conference attendee. They also probably spend less on high-end restaurant dining and bar drinking inside the hotel. Since the pandemic Vegas has had a pretty strong resurgence in general and this may be a sign that Caesar's is doing well enou…

Doubtful, I'm sure it's related to the constant attacks against their infrastructure they must defend against (let's be honest, I'm sure Caesars is not defending successfully). The juice just ain't worth the squeeze. They have a business to run, and the risk of having a bunch of drunken and high hackers who happen to be the best in the world running amuck is not their idea of a good corporate event.

Caesar's apparently explicitly said it wasn't related to anything the community did. It's possible that they're lying for some reason, but it's also possible that they're telling the truth.

> We don’t know why Caesars canceled us, they won’t say beyond it being a strategy change and it is not related to anything that DEF CON or our community has done.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Defcon/comments/1aj6ixn/def_con_was...

Re: DEF CON 32 Was Canceled. We Un-Canceled it

#30
post #17

Not a fan of what DEF CON has become in the last years, so I selfishly hope it somehow "goes away" and reborn in a more technical and actual hacker note. Too many "security researchers", "staff engineers" and people playing politics. But I suspect they will have no problem finding another venue, sponsor money has been flowing quite well, so I wish them well.

There are dozens of other conferences that do anything else you want a security conference to do. The point of Defcon at this point is to be the giant annual social event.

Well it's not going to do so well for that at the LVCC given the distance away from hotel parties.
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