Fantastic content and networking at second annual NamesCon conference.
You really missed out if you didn’t make it to Las Vegas last week for NamesCon. About 900 tickets were sold, making it the largest domain name investing conference ever.
Here are my thoughts on the show.
Venue
The Tropicana has fantastic meeting space for an event of this size. The three main session rooms were accessible directly from the exhibit floor. Everyone gathered on the exhibit hall to socialize and learn about new products, and then ducked into session rooms to catch the content they wanted.
The conference area is also separated from the rest of the hotel, so you don’t have to wade through a lot of gamblers to get to the area. Since the Tropicana is not a big gambling and eating destination, everywhere you went in the hotel you saw other NamesCon attendees without pushing through crowds.
As great as the conference area is, the rooms are pretty much the opposite. The Tropicana’s service is rather poor and the rooms have lots of flaws. One lesson I learned this year: ask for a room that doesn’t face the airport.
The juxtaposition of the conference area and the rooms creates a quandary. Do you move the conference to another hotel with better rooms, but lose some of the great things about the venue? I know a number of people stayed at the MGM across the street. It has great restaurants and nice rooms (priced about the same as the Tropicana last week). At the same time, the MGM is packed with unfamiliar faces and large crowds. Also, moving the conference to another hotel would probably necessitate a higher registration fee because the conference facilities would be more expensive. Tough call.
Above: the NamesCon exhibit hall (before it opened).
Content
There were something like 200 speakers at this conference. At times, there were five concurrent sessions.
The content and choice was great, but it might have gone a little overboard. I think two or three concurrent sessions in the three rooms located directly off the exhibit hall would be good. Attendance in each session will be higher with fewer concurrent sessions. The decision-making process would be easier, too!
As for the speakers themselves, they were a big draw. There were many speakers I had never seen before, which made it a lot more interesting.
The TLD Registry Chinese Masterclass was unlike anything I’ve ever seen at a domain name conference. It offered an in-depth crash course on the Chinese domain name market. I can’t imagine the effort TLD Registry put into creating the class, let alone delivering it for 5+ hours every day!
People
With just under 1,000 people in attendance, it’s safe to say the networking aspect of NamesCon was superb. I got to see the usual suspects, but also chat with people in person that I’ve only known online before last week.
It was also nice to have a positive backdrop to conversations. So much of the domain name industry has been doom-and-gloom since the domain name parking bust. Regardless of how new TLDs do in the future, they are injecting a lot of energy into the industry right now. That’s a good thing.
The great positioning of the exhibit hall, along with social activities such as ping pong and Foosball, made it a great networking location. Maybe I’m getting old, but it’s nice to be able to have a conversation in a semi-quiet location like this compared to during a loud party.
A big congrats (and thank you) to Richard, Jothan, Jodi and James for putting together a great conference!
Paul Stahura says
+1
Eric Lyon says
Great review Andrew and it was nice meeting you in person finally. 😉
Domainer Extraordinaire says
Maybe next year the .crap hype will die down and then I can attend. 🙂
bdoshier says
Spot on review, Andrew. Obvious to me from last year to this year the new TLDs are gaining significant traction. PS I met Traffic people there. Lovely folks.
pinkybrand says
Nice review Andrew. While the hotel rooms were definitely not luxurious by modern Vegas standards, it’s not like I was there for the room vs. the networking and the great ease of being able to pop up very quickly every now and then to catch up on email and other day-to-day tasks without any interruption or having to fight crowds in the casino to get there.
I noticed a fair amount of industry folks attending that I had not seen in years. However the big plus for me was being able to talk to entirely new people to the industry, or at least domain investing. That alone indicates to me that the new gTLDs are attracting some new faces, although much work remains to be done.
DNPric.es says
They should follow ICANN’s tradition and hop to other places/countries/continents.
bladel says
Yes, I made the “room facing the airport” mistake last week. Not much sleep.
Dxdomain says
This is good news hear about nearly 1000 people attend this NamesCon conference.In future new gTLDs attract new people, this shows the future is great for domainers..Thanks
Michael Piotrowski says
Nice review. It was a pleasure to meet you all last week at NamesCon!
Michele says
I’ve got mixed feelings about the hotel. I was there for nearly two weeks, as I was at CES the week before.
The rooms aren’t as nice as what you’d get in most other Vegas hotels.
On the upside the hotel staff were mostly very pleasant
Paul Nicks says
Agree on the venue overall being great and to NEVER get an airport facing room again.
I made a real effort to spend the majority of my time this year in the convention area and it paid off in a big way. The conversations I had from people just passing by the booth were better than anything I could have pre-arranged. Now it’s down to business for all of us, gotta turn those opportunities into actions.
Kevin Fink says
It was great to finally meet you in person, Andrew!
Jennifer Standiford says
+1
Russ says
My club tower airport-facing room wasn’t that bad, mostly just needed a decor update, though the helicopters could be annoying. I heard more complaints from people who had pool-view rooms and were kept up by the water night music.
If the show is there again next year, since its a DoubleTree, sign up for the HHonors loyalty program and you may get offered a nicer Paradise tower room – I was, but opted to stay closer in the club tower.