DC 11 Printed Program

[blackbeetle]

Okay, let's hear all the scathing criticism for the printed program. We seek to improve for next year.

[ripshy]

Looked good to me. Although, if possible, could I order another one from you guys if you have any left? At the party on sunday I threw mine away in my slightly-drunken chaos :D.

[blackwave]

that little yellow thing that people were putting on their badges seemed pretty useless... a lot more info could have been put on there... unfortunately since it was so thin and it covered up the badge constant twisting and turning would eventually leave it somewhere on the ground.

for the main program it would be great to have something on the cover or the front (where one would not have to flip through) to get the immediate data as to what is important... such as times and rooms... a built in compass would be nice :D

making it easier to carry would be wonderful... again because of its awkward size mine stayed in my box-o-swag instead of in my pocket.

[rusty]

My Thoughts

I liked the program this year. Good work.

Pro's:

Booklet
Not too big
Not too small
Much better than dc9's program, which was more like a giant poster and a pain to read.
Nice Art / Layout - Creative.

Con's:

Somewhat difficult to navigate to find event info.
(not very, but it could have been more intuitive with event data on the first pages)

see you next year.

-Rusty

[jesse]

my only complaint? my art didn't make it in. :P

other than that, it was K-rad 31337

[Shalome]

Looked awesome.

Impossible to navigate while drunk. :D

Next year, put a clear (well, clear as possible) schedule of ALL events right inside the cover. Maybe use page numbers, too, so in the clear schedule listing you could have the page numbers so it's like "Oh, this event is at 3pm on Saturday, and I can read more about it on page 6."

Yeah, I'm being anal, I know. But I'm lazy, dammit!

[Agent X]

How do you use the schedule?

Do you use the schedule in the program? Or do you view it ahead of time online? (print a copy and bring it to con?) The reason we are asking is that the schedule is changing right up to the last minute.

[blackwave]

It would be nice to have a summary schedule online to make it formatted for printers... that would certainly be nicer instead of having to kill x number of trees to walk around with a bulge of rolled up paper which is even suckier to carry around than the program itself.

[DrStrangeCheese]

I printed out the schedule online and planed what talks/events to attend ahead of time. It helped because despite the crowds I got into all the talks I was interested in. I thought the booklet kicked ass but it would have been nice to have the actual schedule near the front.

[murakami]

I thought I would be clever and use the defcon notexchange as a schedule on my ipaq. The last time I sucessfully got on to the network was Thursday evening ...

Fortunately, I cached a copy of each day. Still, if we could rely on the network, then last minute changes wouldn't be a problem.

[Agent X]

What about index card sized schedule....

What about index card sized schedule for everyday? Printed on plain white paper.
Fit's in your pocket, ready to go.

[Chris]

Maybe we could have the speaker bios/summaries in the program and then each morning put index card sized schedules of the day at the info booth, registration, and the media table.

That way any last minute changes would be on them. Also, when/if a change is made new cards could be printed and placed at the tables.

That might end up being more wasteful than beneficial though depending on the number of last minute changes.

[3believers]

Defcon 11 program:

Biggest needs:

A table of contents in the front, referencing *everything* contained in the booklet.

The compass points N,S,W,E printed on the hotel map. (It is printed "upside down" in relation to cardinal points.)

An "Errata" loose insert to correct information, if there have been last-minute changes made to any aspect of the con after the programs have been printed.

Organize the speech/speaker information in the same order that they appear on the schedule, rather than alphabetized by speaker's name. List the room and time of each speaker's speech with the info blurb.

Unless the size of the booklet is enlarged next year, omit the editorials. I'd rather see more space and info given to the actual events -- skydiving, lockpicking, leeto, etc., which were certainly given short shrift and minimal space in this booklet.

Larger type font. And pay more attention to how that type looks on a particular background color. Black type on gray background (Welcome page) was particularly tiring to the eyes to read. Gray type on black (Movie page) was better, but could have been more distinct.

Slightly larger overall size -- ~9"x6" is a medium-sized paperback book. The program for DefCon 9 was far too large and unwieldy. What's wrong with a standard 8.5"x11" format? Easy to handle, easy to carry, easy to read.

Choice of slightly slick, reflective paper was good.

Very nice artwork this year.

[javajedi]

The Printed Program

I thought the printed program was awesome, one possible improvement for next year might be making the con schedule and perhaps even the entire program available as a pda formatted document, something that could be downloaded and synced before or at the con.

[Shatter]

Re: The Printed Program

Originally posted by javajedi
I thought the printed program was awesome, one possible improvement for next year might be making the con schedule and perhaps even the entire program available as a pda formatted document, something that could be downloaded and synced before or at the con.

We did that at the DOC table a few years ago, surprisingly it wasn't used much. Maybe 15-20 came by for a synch.

I think too many people are paranoid of what might get sent with it.

We talked in the wrap up meeting of printing the actual lecture times and locations on a seperate, small pocket sized piece of paper. That way the prgram can be nicely layed out in advance, with all details and such, and the actual times and locations can be ran off fast & last minute to accont for changes.

We're also looking at ways to have a dynamic schedule posted around that hotel that can be constantly updated. The projector at the Info Booth is the obvious first spot, with other locations to be determined.

--S