Later this week, registration will open for CodeStock 2010. In this calm before the storm, I wanted to mention some changes previous attendees will notice, including price. I’m not going to hide it – the cost of CodeStock has gone up.
The biggest driver of cost is the venue change. Our old venue kicked us out… or “didn’t welcome us back”… or “isn’t interested in technology conferences”. I never got a solid reason, but I did get a complaint that “our speakers connected their laptops to the projectors” (I think we were supposed to pantomime slides). Even if I was to cap the event at no more than 400, the old venue isn’t interested.
Enough of that, let’s talk about the awesome new venue! CodeStock 2010 will be held at the University of Tennessee Convention Center and the Bijou Theater, both located in downtown Knoxville, TN. The UT Convention Center is a space truly designed for events like CodeStock, and will let us raise the attendee cap to 600. The one drawback to the center is a lack of a 600 seat auditorium (there is a 170 seat auditorium we’ll have use of), which is where the Bijou Theatre comes in. This historic theatre can hold over 700 people, and yet doesn’t have a bad seat in the house (there are no “obstructed view” seats).
Because the two buildings are close, but not side-by-side, we’ve gone with an “Inversion of Conference” plan. Friday will start with registration and go straight to breakout sessions and the opening circle of open spaces (more on that in a moment). We’ll end the day Friday early with time for everyone to enjoy downtown Knoxville and Market Square for dinner before heading to the Bijou for our keynote with Rachel Appel. We’ll end the night at the Bijou with the CodeStock Social (details on the social to come later).
One thing I did not like about last year’s CodeStock was having open spaces split across class rooms. A key tenant of open spaces is the “law of two feet” – you should be free and welcome to bounce from one session to another. This year we have a nice, large room for open spaces where we can have 4 concurrent discussions and you can easily move from one to another. The excellent and experienced Alan Stevens will be facilitating again this year, keeping up the strong tradition of awesome CodeStock Open Spaces.
I’m also proud to say box lunches will not be present at CodeStock 2010. Every year I’ve endured the complaints, but knew what the old venue wanted to charge for anything better. The new venue has a much better set of lunch options, including a hot buffet lunch for only a few dollars more than the box lunches at the old venue.
Okay, time to cut to the chase. What does all this mean for you, the attendee? CodeStock 2010 will cost $55 this year, or $79 if you register on or after May 3, 2010. (Planning the budget, I just couldn’t bring myself to say $80 even though that’s where the numbers pointed). All registration fees and sponsorship money raised goes to cover the cost of the event, no one is paid for their part in helping to organize CodeStock and we plan the budget to break even.
I am biased, but I believe CodeStock is an excellent value. This year we will have 13-14 concurrent breakout sessions each day across a wide selection of technologies and are adding sessions for IT Professionals. I would love to say CodeStock is still $25/45 but the truth is we had a too-good-to-be-true deal (and was the reason I accepted many of the limitations and “quirks” of the old venue).
Finally, the AT&T reception is much better downtown than the old venue, so those of you with iPhones might be able to use them this year!
Michael C. Neel
CodeStock Lead Organizer
