more extensible non-human badge reg options

[Deviant Ollam]

i realize that this consideration applies to a much smaller range of people at DEFCON, but i'm willing to bet that a lot of them read the forums.

i would have loved it if there was one room for all non-human badge reg and if that room also had a supply of human badges, as well, for people stopping by on related business. again, i realize i'm a bit of an exception, but at this year's DEFCON i had to reg:

1. as a speaker
2. as a vendor
3. as a contest/event organizer
4. as a human (with Daisy's black hat ticket)
5. as a human (with Babak's black badge)
6. as a human (just because i wanted to pick up a badge for someone else)

this ultimately led to my making about a dozen separate trips walking around the ground floor on thursday and friday when i wanted to be upstairs in the skybox. i wound up going to Capri 111 and 112 multiple times, often not finding people who were allegedly supposed to be there. in actuality, all the primary reg goons and conference staff were not properly informed as to where alternate reg was happening most of the time. (contests and events badges were actually taking place at the contest leader's meeting, vendor reg was happening in the vendor room, and absolutely all human badge business was just the one long, single line, it seems.)

i'm not speaking out of selfishness when i suggest this (i don't want to be some sort of badass and slip in a half-dozen of my friend's badge needs in some private room so they can have their gear sorted out earlier than anyone else just because they know a speaker, etc) but rather i really think it could help with the lines... anything to reduce people's needs to be part of the main queue is a good thing, in my view.

i could be way off base. or i could have been such a rare case this year that this doesn't apply to anyone else.

[Chris]

Re: more extensible non-human badge reg options

i realize that this consideration applies to a much smaller range of people at DEFCON, but i'm willing to bet that a lot of them read the forums.

i would have loved it if there was one room for all non-human badge reg and if that room also had a supply of human badges, as well, for people stopping by on related business. again, i realize i'm a bit of an exception, but at this year's DEFCON i had to reg:

1. as a speaker
2. as a vendor
3. as a contest/event organizer
4. as a human (with Daisy's black hat ticket)
5. as a human (with Babak's black badge)
6. as a human (just because i wanted to pick up a badge for someone else)

this ultimately led to my making about a dozen separate trips walking around the ground floor on thursday and friday when i wanted to be upstairs in the skybox. i wound up going to Capri 111 and 112 multiple times, often not finding people who were allegedly supposed to be there. in actuality, all the primary reg goons and conference staff were not properly informed as to where alternate reg was happening most of the time. (contests and events badges were actually taking place at the contest leader's meeting, vendor reg was happening in the vendor room, and absolutely all human badge business was just the one long, single line, it seems.)

i'm not speaking out of selfishness when i suggest this (i don't want to be some sort of badass and slip in a half-dozen of my friend's badge needs in some private room so they can have their gear sorted out earlier than anyone else just because they know a speaker, etc) but rather i really think it could help with the lines... anything to reduce people's needs to be part of the main queue is a good thing, in my view.

i could be way off base. or i could have been such a rare case this year that this doesn't apply to anyone else.

Actually, all non-human badge registration was supposed to happen in Capri 111. Unfortunately, when registration time started, many of us had no badges (to include no temp badges yet). This meant we had to sit in 111, wait for someone to show up, then physically walk them past the gaurd to the area where they needed to be (in my case the vendor area). The way this was SUPPOSED to work was that they'd be badged in 111 and that would allow them past the guard so we ended up improvising as best we could. Was it the optimal situation for everyone? Obviously not, was it the best we could do at the time? yep.

[russ]

Re: more extensible non-human badge reg options

i realize that this consideration applies to a much smaller range of people at DEFCON, but i'm willing to bet that a lot of them read the forums.

i would have loved it if there was one room for all non-human badge reg and if that room also had a supply of human badges, as well, for people stopping by on related business. again, i realize i'm a bit of an exception, but at this year's DEFCON i had to reg:

1. as a speaker
2. as a vendor
3. as a contest/event organizer
4. as a human (with Daisy's black hat ticket)
5. as a human (with Babak's black badge)
6. as a human (just because i wanted to pick up a badge for someone else)

this ultimately led to my making about a dozen separate trips walking around the ground floor on thursday and friday when i wanted to be upstairs in the skybox. i wound up going to Capri 111 and 112 multiple times, often not finding people who were allegedly supposed to be there. in actuality, all the primary reg goons and conference staff were not properly informed as to where alternate reg was happening most of the time. (contests and events badges were actually taking place at the contest leader's meeting, vendor reg was happening in the vendor room, and absolutely all human badge business was just the one long, single line, it seems.)

i'm not speaking out of selfishness when i suggest this (i don't want to be some sort of badass and slip in a half-dozen of my friend's badge needs in some private room so they can have their gear sorted out earlier than anyone else just because they know a speaker, etc) but rather i really think it could help with the lines... anything to reduce people's needs to be part of the main queue is a good thing, in my view.

i could be way off base. or i could have been such a rare case this year that this doesn't apply to anyone else.

Yeah, tried this. Didn't work out. And since we're all volunteers and not a professionally run, paid for organization.... well....

[Deviant Ollam]

Re: more extensible non-human badge reg options

i will say that the process did yield one of my favorite DEFCON quotes of the weekend for me... at first, on thrusday, folk from all the various departments had staff in Capri 111 doing whatever they could with the limited resources and time.

then vendor operations had to move to the vendor room entirely. then contest and events staff had to leave for their meeting. then speaker reg started to shut down. heh... by the last time i stopped in that room to check on an update with the badges, i was met by two fellows who were not DC Staff at all, but instead said, "nope... no badges here... this is a nursery now"

sure enough, there were toddlers wandering about. it made me laugh.

[Chris]

Re: more extensible non-human badge reg options

i will say that the process did yield one of my favorite DEFCON quotes of the weekend for me... at first, on thrusday, folk from all the various departments had staff in Capri 111 doing whatever they could with the limited resources and time.

then vendor operations had to move to the vendor room entirely. then contest and events staff had to leave for their meeting. then speaker reg started to shut down. heh... by the last time i stopped in that room to check on an update with the badges, i was met by two fellows who were not DC Staff at all, but instead said, "nope... no badges here... this is a nursery now"

sure enough, there were toddlers wandering about. it made me laugh.

Yeah, I think the non-human reg in Capri 111 was a great idea, we just had logistical problems that we had to overcome. I'm sure you know that pretty much anything that we do at DEFCON for the first time has had, let's say, growing pains. Next year, in theory, we'll get the non-human reg right. The only real bummer (and this is 100% a staff issue and doesn't mean much on the attendee side) is that I used to do Thursday/Setup by myself and give my entire staff that day off. I thought it was a nice way to let them participate in some of the unofficial events (TBBQ, sushicon, whatever) while I handled the setup. Having a centralized registration where I have to be in that room means I have to put someone in Royale 5 for vendor setup which extends their work days by one. Again, that's a staffing issue that i'll figure out but it is pretty much the only wrench in the gears for centralized non-human registration (which like I said I think is a good idea).