Starting on Thursday....

[Schuyler]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

You know, I can understand some of what you are talking about. I continue to wonder if I wasn't in some sort of bubble this year, but the talk was extremely casual / tongue-in-cheek at times, and def. a different mood from LPV and, I would assume, your BH training. I think Alek's goal, and certainly mine, was to get people comfortable interacting with the physical security offerings at con, not actually teaching a great deal of information. That was the overall goal of DC101 as a whole, as I understood it. As a result, I'm confident some non-n00bs, even recent nons, were put off by it.

I mean, each one hour session, the lion's share of the room had no concept of how a lock actually functioned, made it perfectly clear from the questions they had, and the talk was approached from that standpoint.

Anyway, it's disappointing that it was so poorly received by some. As I said, I've never received such an overwhelmingly positive response, though it was all from brand new people. I'm wondering if DC101 might need some form of expectation management as well?

For me DC101 isn't about extending con for the gross majority of con goers, it's an opportunity for a person to say "Well, I finally want to attend all of the X sub-culture talks & workshops this year, so I'm going to go to DC101 X to get introduced to it" I mean, I'm a physical security guy, that's it. I can't get my head around a lot of the other things con has to offer. If my schedule allows, I'd like to get introduced the same way.

All of this said, I'm getting the impression that everyone's expectations for DC101, from attendees, to organizers, to speakers, to goons, to those not participating, are all over the map.

[Deviant Ollam]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

Deviant, what did you mean about the physical security side of things?

with all respect and fairness, i'll state plainly that you and i must have been speaking to different people. absolutely every last individual with whom i spoke concerning the Thursday lockpicking talk stated that it was sub-par. a handful of people made comments that it was outright terrible.

again, everyone's opinion is different... and i respect you and your input a great deal, so that makes me re-evaluate my opinion on the matter. but when up to half a dozen of my very own Black Hat students (whom i came to know rather well over the couple days prior to DEFCON) were literally groaning, that colored my opinion.

there is also the matter of a number of parties speaking to Alek before his talk offering help, only to have him say (somewhat dismissively) "yeah, no... i've got it under control" but then the moment he took the stage (again, i'm going by reports from others... please correct any errors i have) his first statement was "uhm, so... i like lost a lot of my gear and stuff so i can't really go into all the details that i wanted to in this talk"

all in all, just from a basic overview perspective, i spent more time this weekend than i would have wished having to apologize for the Thursday lockpicking talk and explaining to people that TOOOL and the LP Village weren't associated with it. hearing your side of things, however, makes me reconsider and temper my opinion somewhat. i want to hear more from lots of people concerning how it went, what they got out of it, etc.

[Deviant Ollam]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

The only other option I see is to significantly increase staff sizes so that we can give each staff member at least one day off during the con.

this wouldn't be all that bad, in truth, if there is an unstoppable public outcry for four "official" days of con.

i am willing to bet that a lot of the core people at DEFCON haven't actually had any "off" time at the conference at all for the past half decade or more.

i'd think that a mandatory "one shift off for every two shifts that you're on" system might be great for letting people actually see things they want to see. if DEFCON's thursday gets any more official, however, then i'd think that most of the pre-con events would have to shift back a day, as well... DC Shoot, TBBQ, and EFF Summit would push to Wednesday. that's the only way to be fair on the staff.

(this would also mean that QM Stores and Skybox keys would all have to be available a day earlier for access and gear movement... hotel costs are associated with that, no?)

[Schuyler]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

Deviant, what did you mean about the physical security side of things? Alek from Longhorn (legit guy from a legit, in fact the largest in North America, locksport club) ran the DC101 lockpicking intro talk, stuck just to introductory topics and the rooms were filled with clueless n00bs too intimidated to enter the over-crowded and under-stocked (with practice materials) Lockpicking Village without at least a little foreknowledge.

I tagged in to help Alek with the talk, and despite speaking last year about multiple high security attacks that got press & the year before about wide-ranging cultural issues that have garnered me other speaking gigs, I have never received such an overwhelmingly positive response from the audience. And I was only helping out, just piping up with anecdotes and examples to support Alek's infodump. People were still approaching me on Sunday thanking me & buying drinks. The n00bs who attended were obscenely well served by the DC101 lockpicking talk. And as I speaker, I've never had a more rewarding experience.

If there are problems with the DC101 concept as far as overutilization of Goons & the like, we should look toward solving those problems, not kiboshing the day outright. I got the impression that a Thursday session would happen next year again, so rather than debate the merits, let's see if we can solve the problems it raised.

One of the things someone mentioned was that a lot of the DC101 stuff overlapped & while I didn't attend any of the other talks, I thought Alek was clever in taking his 3 hours slot & splitting it into 3 one hour repeats. New faces came in for each hour and it was packed for each session. People could come and go as they pleased without interrupting his flow & there was Q&A built into each hour.

[Shinies]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

I would have loved to arrive on Thursday and make four days out of it, but I can't afford to pay for Defcon and not work two days of the week. However, I think we need to give more emphasis to the opinions of the people that work the con than the people that go to it. Going to Defcon is easy but working it seems to be quite the opposite.

We're lucky that this is all organized for us!

[converge]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

Why not make Defcon101 the first talk(s) on Friday? They could be alongside or independent of the first tracks .. but, options seem to be:
1) Drop content
2) Concentrate content
3) Extend the conference

Personally, I usually prefer #2 with a slice of #1 to accomplish #2. #3 is great and all but won't actually solve the problem (see following), it is also not a real time gain ... adding the value to some at the cost of others as noted by folks above.


With regards to unofficial events, *shrug* .. having attended the debauchery for a few years now I have growing understanding that I can't possibly do 1/3 of what goes down in Vegas related to the conferences.. regardless of how awesome they all are. I extend my time in Vegas, the number of fun things extends proportionally. Pick your fun route for the year and be flexible.

Missed everyone this year; hope brains cells, booze supplies and health were disregarded by all. See you online and next year!

[valkyrie]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

*sigh*

FWIW, I placed my vote and as only two choices were provided, I voted no.

Personal disclaimer, ala HighWiz's:

I recognize value in staging some casual, UNOFFICIAL presos (as the DC101 talk was originally envisioned) for noobs, perhaps on Thursday. I received a lot of positive feedback on it, both directly and indirectly. However, a full blown day of talks on Thursday seems over the top for all of the people who work so hard for DEFCON (reg, goons, contests, vendors, information booth, etc). All of these people are volunteers to this community and work their hearts out, many not just for DEFCON, but also for BlackHat. I respect them for that and was chagrined to find that the red shirts were required to work on Thursday.

There is more to say regarding this just perhaps not in this particular thread.

BTW, humble thanks to all involved in making the DC101 talk not suck. Those thanks will be formalized in thanks/boos thread.

JMTC

Regards,

valkyrie
_______________________________________
sapere aude

[Xodia]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

I voted yes, but I can easily see how Thursday is taxing on the goons. Registration alone makes Thursday into a jumbled mess, let alone adding talks to that. Like it or not, Thursday really did a good job of making new people feel welcome (at the expense of making it difficult on non-newbs). Seeing as a solid 30% of Defcon was new people this year there is no way that Thursday isn't coming back next year.

Perhaps next year there could be extra volunteers brought on to help with JUST Thursday? If Defcon and Blackhat share a day again it isn't going to get better any other way. The 101 talks had far more manpower than necessary and we could have easily helped elsewhere. I am sure if there was an open call for help on Thursday there would be plenty of trustworthy people willing to assist.

[Chris]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

i am personally willing to lob grenades at people who attempt to vote the other way if you can hand them to me fast enough, brother. i want to see Thursday restored to "doing stuff away from DEFCON" status. there's nothing wrong with dedicated people being in vegas early... nor is there anything bad about doing stuff together away from the con space early... but the actual doors opening on those ballrooms and the reg process etc etc etc... that should be Fri/Sat/Sun.

See, I think this is actually part of the problem with this poll and Deviant nailed it. I am not saying things like the TBBQ and Summit shouldn't be held on Thursday along with other unofficial events that have taken place for years on Thursday. I think those things should keep right on happening. I just think changing DEFCON from a 3 day "official" event to a 4 day (as happened this year and it appears the intent is to expand that next year) is wrong and forces too much on the staff. I hate to sound whiney, but it's Wednesday and my feet are still fucked up. The only other option I see is to significantly increase staff sizes so that we can give each staff member at least one day off during the con.

I will jump back on my soapbox for a second and implore you to vote No on this poll, keep Thursday unofficial and fun.

[HighWiz]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

Full Disclosure: being involved with DC101, my opinion may be biased.

On one hand, I can see how Thursday is too much for the staff and goons. A fourth day really can wear people down.

On the other hand, I do think that there is both a desire and need for something for the n00bs. I know many people, including some here don't agree with me on that front.

I guess perhaps the compromise would be something n00b oriented, running Friday or throughout con.

If the poll hadn't been an absolute Yes/No question. But rather, three choices...

Yes, 4 days of DEFCON is the way to go

No, 4 days of DEFCON is too much

No, 4 days of DEFCON is too much, but there still should be something n00b related.

I think you wouldn't have so many people standing behind 4 days of con.


As for the n00b related idea's, that's best left for another thread, at a later time.


I wasn't planning on posting for a while, but I figured that the poll may close before I was done my Post-Con break.

[Banasidhe]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

Maybe these events are becoming cliquish because they seem to be scheduled with complete disregard for the possibility of actually getting to more than one of them.

I don't think it's a matter of disregard for conflicting events, it's just that there are only so many hours in a Con weekend, and there are so many events, with new ones added every year, there's no way they're not going to conflict. You just have to chose wisely, young Padawan. Prioritizing is key! ;)

[Banasidhe]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

Although I loved the opportunity to be involved with DC101 on Thursday, I too, thought Thursday was supposed to be super low-key and low maintenance for the Goons, not a full-blown con day. The staff already works their asses off to make DC an amazing event every year. I hated to see them kill themselves like that, especially with so many of them coming straight off of BlackHat. I also missed too many folks at TBBQ, although there were SOO many people there this year, many of the usual staff suspects were absent because of the extra scheduled workday.

I was ultimately fine with the extra day, (and I really loved being there on Wed. when it was a ghost town except for a few key folks) but grumpy, overworked Goons on Sunday aren't pretty. I voted we drop Thursday. Thursday should be for the TBBQ, The Summit and getting settled into our hotels. The Goons should have time to reset between BH & DC. They shouldn't have to hit the ground running like that.

[Quiet]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

I voted no.

Wednesday and Thursday is for social engineering your way into the Blackhat parties.

[TheCotMan]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

I like 4 days of Defcon. I would have preferred to only have had the only Thursday presentation be the DC101 event, but I could be totally for opening skyboxes, if it did not require a goon to manage them.

There were 2 "must see" presentations on my list. One was Lockheed's presentation on the Defcon Network, and history of how they got from "then" to "now" and I had to rudely get up and leave his presentation after 1 hour because the toxic bbq was one of the two non-presentation events that was on my must-see list. (This year, the DC-Shoot was the other one.)

I did manage to meet Lockheed later, and let him know that it wasn't personal or about the presentation, just about other promises I made before I knew his presentation was on Thursday against the TBBQ.

I like having the opportunity to Thursday events, and choice is very nice, but because of the many rolled-out Thursday events, I lost opportunity to spend time with some goons, and take them to the Toxic BBQ for the first time ever.

Instead, we went to the store to buy some meat, bribed che to cook them, and brought back some steaks and BBQ-ed chicken back to two of the goons to eat. We met them just before they would have gone to Kady's to eat, and they appreciated the food, even though they lost the opportunity to attend to TBBQ. Other food was brought back to dispatch, and maybe the NOC by other people. I think I saw Banshee and 2 other people hauling supplies from the TBBQ while I was out with other people on the balcony.

For selfish reasons, I would prefer to see Thursdays limited to a few presentations that only require a small number of goons to be present, and if these events could be limited to totally newbie-related presentations, then there wouldn't be much or any push by long-time attendees to join these presentations, thus allowing long-time attendees to still have the usual Thursday events open to them without contention, or conflict.

Really, I'd like to see what few Defcon services there were, closed early every night up to and including Thursday, but that is for my own selfish reasons, even if my wants are unrealistic.

[astcell]

Re: Starting on Thursday....

Four days of Defcon? Maybe not.

Four days of Defcon and related events? YES

I did not get to the forum meets because I was still in line for food at the Toxic BBQ. I barely made the EFF. Sushicon overlapped another event too. Maybe these events are becoming cliquish because they seem to be scheduled with complete disregard for the possibility of actually getting to more than one of them.