Shmoocon 2006

[renderman]

As Shmoocon is coming up in January, just wanting to get a head count on who is planning on going.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm looking forward to a 'half way to defcon' con fix to keep me going till summer.

[alklloyd]

Myself, Dr. Kaos and his better half, and Digiunix will be there. Me for the 1st time, them for the second. After hearing their reviews of the 1st one I decided I wouldn't miss the second. I understand there's this amazing falaful place there. Wish they had a better price on the hotel; my AAA discount is three dollars less than the Shmoo's.

Al

[octalpus]

I'll be rolling in Thursday with quite a few other 206'ers, staying til Monday.

[noid]

I'm going as well. Looking forward to it, as for me it will be the calm before the storm that is LayerOne.

[TwinVega]

I'll be there once again with a few other Neg9 members (CK3K, crash, and possibly more)

[Deviant Ollam]

I'll be there, and i'm really looking forward to seeing everyone. Miss you guys... a year is too long to go without you. Heh, who can tell that i'm procrastinating writing a paper and have chosen to open a bottle of Jameson instead. Yeah, i think i'm in that zone where everyone is my best friend and i want to tell people how great they are...

[meee]

I will be there too. Maybe this time I will learn something.

[Thorn]

I keep forgetting to reply to this thread. So yeah, I'll be there, too.

[GodMinusOne]

I keep forgetting to reply to this thread. So yeah, I'll be there, too.

ShmooconTotal++;

[gdead]

Uh... I'll be there

I'll be there :)

Seriously, I'm running the hacker arcade with freshman and we need competition. Freshman and I have a few months head start on everyone, but you've still got 60 or so days to get an entry together. All proceeds go to the Red Cross, so even if your entry sucks, it still helps.

bruce (wondering if he has a sig somewhere)

[Deviant Ollam]

heh, perhaps we need to start plans for events like a ShmooCon sushi dinner. the defcon forums, as i understand them, aren't exclusively defcon-only, right? it's been said before that the community uses this space to discuss wider tech issues, other cons, and so forth. perhaps a forum sub-section or a shmoocon sticky thread under the "Local Meetings & Other Events" area?

[TheCotMan]

heh, perhaps we need to start plans for events like a ShmooCon sushi dinner. the defcon forums, as i understand them, aren't exclusively defcon-only, right? it's been said before that the community uses this space to discuss wider tech issues, other cons, and so forth. perhaps a forum sub-section or a shmoocon sticky thread under the "Local Meetings & Other Events" area?

History of the forums show use of Community Talk to arrange for meetings at other cons by active forum members.

Recently Skroo came up with a good idea to expand the description of "Local Meetings" to "Local Meetings and Other Events" to allow for posted announcements of other cons, security-related events, and meetings that DefCon-people would like to know about. (A great way to see that under-used forum get more action.)

I've reservations about dedicating entire subforums to each nonDefCon con, but will do that if a majority of mods desire it. (I have worries that the creation of a ShmooCon subforum, might cause some to request a 2600/HOPE sub forum, and a mental image of "slippery slope" comes to mind with all of the otherCons.)

Here's a suggestion:
This thread is about head-count. Start a new thread in "Local Meetings and Other Events" on things that you might do at Shmoo. We can see how it is used, and where it goes, and then mods can discuss the possibility of making it a sticky, or a new sub-forum.
If that turns out to be a bad location, we'll just move it. If any mod wants to make it a stickie, they can.

[GodMinusOne]

heh, perhaps we need to start plans for events like a ShmooCon sushi dinner. the defcon forums, as i understand them, aren't exclusively defcon-only, right? it's been said before that the community uses this space to discuss wider tech issues, other cons, and so forth. perhaps a forum sub-section or a shmoocon sticky thread under the "Local Meetings & Other Events" area?

The "ShmooCon sushi dinner", aka ShmooshiCon, is already in planning. I will post more details on here as the event nears.

[mythodical]

The "ShmooCon sushi dinner", aka ShmooshiCon, is already in planning. I will post more details on here as the event nears.

ah yes Sushi with some Sapporo to wash it down , count me in

[Deviant Ollam]

The "ShmooCon sushi dinner", aka ShmooshiCon, is already in planning. I will post more details on here as the event nears.

sweet. i'm looking forward to it. to toss in my $0.02, i'd be willing to sacrifice ever so slightly on how prestigious a place is or how over-the-top outstanding their chefs are if it meant that we could have that most unheard of sushi dinner scenario: a large group of people who arrive all together, all manage to obtain seating near each other, and who get served two or three courses of fish without waiting 45 minutes between the arrival of each individual roll.

i realize that this can be a difficult thing for many restaraunts to pull off. i further give recognition to those who, at previous cons, have given great advice to the group as to which joint has "the best suhsi in the whole town" etc etc. Basically every sushi dinner i've had at DefCon and ShmooCon and so forth in the past has been at a very very tasty place. however, without fail, the following course of events is what typically unfolds:

1. a group of about a dozen people arrives, with maybe another 6 to 10 people on the way. the restaraunt (even if they've been TOLD we are coming) is totally unprepared.

2. the people are either seated at a scattered array of whatever booths and tables are available, or else five to ten minutes is spent with hackers standing around the waiting area whilst a civil planning crew is called in to rearrange furniture, knock down walls, and make one long-ass banquet table without enough chairs and place settings.

3. everyone sits down (sometimes with two or three people still not fitting in, relegated to a side booth somewhere) and proceeds to wait five minutes for menus and glasses of water.

4. it is now nearly half an hour since people have arrived at the restaraunt. japanese salads and bowls of miso soup have been polished off by those who didn't eat since getting into town that afternoon. no one has ordered fish yet.

5. a waitress comes around to take sushi orders. (and damn if it isn't almost always JUST ONE waitress. we've had battalions of people seated across four tables and yet so often only ONE person is slowly inching around to everybody, writing down what they want. the waitress often gets frustrated or people just start shouting things out so much that the new plan becomes "let's just bring out a few starter platters and then we'll go from there"

6. twenty minutes later, two trays come out with a meager assortment of california rolls, tekka maki, and a few pices of salmon or tuna. half the people dive in, grabbing what they can, the other half try in vain to get the waitress' attention in order to ask for unagi, dragon rolls, or other less common items.

7. fourty-five minutes since everyone sat down... at least three or four people often haven't had a single thing yet somehow. some people are still trying to order the fish THEY want as opposed to what the "general platter" contains. the two pieces of eel and the alaskan roll which DID come out of the kitchen end up being split between the three people at the head of the table where it landed since they didn't have any idea it wasn't public.

8. an hour and a half later, people start leaving. most will not have had the opportunity to order what THEY want from the kitchen more than once. practically no one has had more than two or three rounds of drinks. everyone sorts out cash and credit card slips, commenting on how delicious and well-prepared the food was, but murmuring slightly that it's unfortunate how little they got.

9. back at the hotel, some people sniff around the bar or lobby shop for a pretzel, a bag of chips, or a few pints of ale.

i'm not saying that this is always what happens at Sushi dinner events. i'm not saying that i have a bad time when we go out like this. hanging with people i like is its own reward. but just once i'd like to sit down with ease, immediately order about a pound and a half of eel, then spend the rest of the time with the servers refilling my glass and bringing me whichever random fish which catch my eye on the menu, as i experiment with some of the more exotic sections on the menu, enjoying everyone else's company.

yeah, kitchen efficiency and ability to handle the logistics of a large crowd ranks a little higher in my book than having the most supreme sushi within a 30 mile radius. i realize i might be in the minority here, of course.