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I thought I'd post a quick post-mortem of the DomainFest show in Prague. Overall it was a great event, and very well attended for a European show, with between 200-250 attendees (I've seen different figures on various blogs). Certainly the sessions were much quieter, but judging from the crowd at the big dinner event at the museum and the luncheon on the final day, I could easily believe it was the topside of that range...
Several familiar faces from the UK, but by and large it seemed that there were many more people there from Germany and Eastern Europe. Perhaps not surprisingly given the location and the strong domaining communities in many European countries. Also a good contingent from North America and further afield.
The sessions were interesting but not ground-breaking, but that's only because I follow topics such as Google's algorithm changes closely. To anyone less immersed in SEO, the keynote would have been very useful (and I did learn that Youtube allows a 5,000 character description for each video!) The 5 domainer myths presentation was good as well, but I'd seen most of the material on blogs after the DomainFest NY event.
The meals/parties were top-notch, in food and location. My highlight was definitely the first night dinner held in the National Museum, opened after hours just for DomainFest. Although it wasn't very widely publicised (I talked to several people who didn't realise it) the Minerals wing of the museum was open to browse for the first 2 hours of the party, and I can report that it has an outstanding collection (including some massive meteorites) filling some 5 or 6 large halls.
My one niggle, and it's the same niggle that crops up show after show, was the auction. Too many poor names at high prices, and the auctioneer's outcry system made it very hard to understand what was going on! I much prefer the sedate, clear enunciation of auctions that you see for example at UK property auctions. At the end of the day, it probably wouldn't take any longer or sell any less, but you wouldn't feel like you'd just been shouted at for 3 hours!
To see what I mean, contrast an example DomainFest auction http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_irqqoDRRM with an example property auction http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFQYIHX5OoM
The activity day was brilliant. I joined the Yellow team for a "spy game" that took us all over the Old Town area, looking for clues and chasing sinister men in red ties and black leather trenchcoats. We had to disarm an alarmingly real-looking bomb, use a UV reader to look for hidden clues, run to answer a ringing phonebox (very "24") and talk to a woman holding a cauliflower sitting in a park. Very surreal, and tons of fun. In the afternoon, I went on the "Castle and Churches" walking tour, where we were deluged by facts about the magnificent buildings we were walking around and through, and shuttled expertly from location to location through the rush-hour Prague traffic.
I skipped out on the last evening party to have a quiet final night in the city, so can't comment directly, but I'm sure it must have been good given the standard of the rest of the event.
Overall an excellent show. Less directly relevant to me than Meet Domainers, but Prague made a fantastic location and everything from the food to the organisation to the events was top notch.
Next year's European DomainFest show will be in Barcelona, and I'm already mentally planning a Spanish itinerary to take in that show.
NOTE: yes, DF is not a "cheap" show, but when you think you're getting first class food and drink for 4 meals plus several tours and events thrown in, you've quids-in on the entry ticket price even before you sit down for a single session or start networking. And of course it's the networking that's so crucial - I met several people for the first time that I've been dying to meet for ages, and had some extremely productive discussions that could prove very lucrative down the road...
Several familiar faces from the UK, but by and large it seemed that there were many more people there from Germany and Eastern Europe. Perhaps not surprisingly given the location and the strong domaining communities in many European countries. Also a good contingent from North America and further afield.
The sessions were interesting but not ground-breaking, but that's only because I follow topics such as Google's algorithm changes closely. To anyone less immersed in SEO, the keynote would have been very useful (and I did learn that Youtube allows a 5,000 character description for each video!) The 5 domainer myths presentation was good as well, but I'd seen most of the material on blogs after the DomainFest NY event.
The meals/parties were top-notch, in food and location. My highlight was definitely the first night dinner held in the National Museum, opened after hours just for DomainFest. Although it wasn't very widely publicised (I talked to several people who didn't realise it) the Minerals wing of the museum was open to browse for the first 2 hours of the party, and I can report that it has an outstanding collection (including some massive meteorites) filling some 5 or 6 large halls.
My one niggle, and it's the same niggle that crops up show after show, was the auction. Too many poor names at high prices, and the auctioneer's outcry system made it very hard to understand what was going on! I much prefer the sedate, clear enunciation of auctions that you see for example at UK property auctions. At the end of the day, it probably wouldn't take any longer or sell any less, but you wouldn't feel like you'd just been shouted at for 3 hours!
To see what I mean, contrast an example DomainFest auction http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_irqqoDRRM with an example property auction http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFQYIHX5OoM
The activity day was brilliant. I joined the Yellow team for a "spy game" that took us all over the Old Town area, looking for clues and chasing sinister men in red ties and black leather trenchcoats. We had to disarm an alarmingly real-looking bomb, use a UV reader to look for hidden clues, run to answer a ringing phonebox (very "24") and talk to a woman holding a cauliflower sitting in a park. Very surreal, and tons of fun. In the afternoon, I went on the "Castle and Churches" walking tour, where we were deluged by facts about the magnificent buildings we were walking around and through, and shuttled expertly from location to location through the rush-hour Prague traffic.
I skipped out on the last evening party to have a quiet final night in the city, so can't comment directly, but I'm sure it must have been good given the standard of the rest of the event.
Overall an excellent show. Less directly relevant to me than Meet Domainers, but Prague made a fantastic location and everything from the food to the organisation to the events was top notch.
Next year's European DomainFest show will be in Barcelona, and I'm already mentally planning a Spanish itinerary to take in that show.
NOTE: yes, DF is not a "cheap" show, but when you think you're getting first class food and drink for 4 meals plus several tours and events thrown in, you've quids-in on the entry ticket price even before you sit down for a single session or start networking. And of course it's the networking that's so crucial - I met several people for the first time that I've been dying to meet for ages, and had some extremely productive discussions that could prove very lucrative down the road...
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