[yapc] "Sold out"

[JT Smith]

I agree. Our largest room only has 390 seats, and we've sold 411 tickets. So I've taken into account the fact that not everyone will be there. 

And you are absolutely right. Future organizers it is very very difficult to predict how many people will attend. Some has to do with the economy, some has to do with the city in which you hold it, some has to do with how expensive overnight rooms are, some has to do with who else's going to be there, and a lot has to do with how much you're doing to promote the event. If you're unsure, certainly err on the side of having too much space rather than too little. 


JT Smith
Director, YAPC::NA 2012
http://www.yapcna.org

PS 

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On Apr 30, 2012, at 11:18 AM, Casey West wrote:

> On Mon, Apr 30, 2012 at 11:58 AM, JT Smith <admin at yapcna.org> wrote:
> Happy to. The problem is finding single rooms that will hold 400+ people. We have the keynote, the lightning talks, the banquet, the Linode Beer Garden, and the cPanel game room. All those events need to be able to support the entire attendance of YAPC in a single room. The University has such spaces, but they aren't all available to YAPC, as they have their own events using them. So the event spaces we could get are limited to around 400 people. 
> 
> For what it's worth[0], not everyone will come to every plenary session. Ticket holders will not come for whatever reason, speakers will fail to show up, the hallway track will not always end when a keynote begins. People will sleep in or go for a scenic bike ride around a lake instead.
> 
> I've been involved in a handful of conference organizations in the last few years and there are a couple of concerns everyone has about plenary events.
> 
> 1) The room has seats for $MAX people.
> 2) The fire marshall is a looming threat if we exceed $MAX.
> 3) If we exceed $MAX our some attendees will miss out and have a poor experience.
> 
> I understand it's a difficult dance. 1) is a constant, although people stand and sit on the floor as a matter of course. I've never seen 2) happen at a conference venue (although I've seen it at a hotel room party...). 3) is managed with messaging.
> 
> I'll buy you a beer no matter what, JT, but I'll buy you an extra nice beer if any plenary session actually reaches the fire marshall's capacity restrictions. ;-)
> 
> Future conference organizers, you should certainly be aware that the guessing game of attendance is difficult.
> 
> - Casey
> 
> [0] That's just, like, my opinion, man. And also my experience. But whatevs.
> 
> 

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