Rick Schwartz Comments on TRAFFIC Conference Auctioning Sponsorships

[NewsMan]

The News of Our Demise Has Been Greatly Exaggerated
Rick Schwartz announced in an email a few days ago that the upcoming TRAFFIC show would be auctioning sponsorship positions. My gut reaction to reading this email was that it had a ring of desperation. I posted on a forum to see if I was alone. As you could expect from any good forum post about domains, and especially one involving Rick Schwartz, the topic got sidetracked. I let it rest a day or so. . . . It must have just been me.
A day or so later I received an email and later an IM from individuals who had not seen my posts. I guess I wasn’t alone and the overall sense I got from these others was that they feel that the thought of auctioning sponsorships showed a sign that the TRAFFIC conference is in some trouble. Add to the mix other off-the-cuff comments I’ve seen/heard about the show being in Brooklyn and not Manhattan, the recent low attendance at the Florida TRAFFIC East show, and TrafficZ (the main sponosor) and Oversee.net (former main sponsor) now operating competing events (DomainRoundtable and DomainFest respectively). It does make one wonder I suppose.
So why not ask the man himself ! I emailed Rick to get the low-down. Maybe we’re all crazy.
I wrote :

Hi Rick
A few industry vets have emailed me with unprovoked comments regarding the auctioning of sponsorships. They see it to be a sign that TRAFFIC is struggling . Could you comment on that viewpoint ?

Rick replied :

“We are just opening things up just like we did with the new multiple auctions. Competition creates a better product and what may be good for one company can not stand in the way of what is good for the entire industry. There was a lot of pressure not to do that as you might imagine. But we have to do what is best for domainers not what is best for individual companies and sponsors. The results as always will be quite evident and visible for the entire industry to see once we get to New York. No question that domainers welcome this decision and it will change the game as we know it. Plus it’s gonna be a LOT of fun!
The idea for opening up the sponsorships actually came from Dan Warner in a conversation a week or so ago. He suggested that we auction off the auction slots to the highest bidder in future shows. I just took his suggestion and applied it in a slightly different direction. Bidding for sponsorships that just started yesterday is already very active and new faces, companies and solutions are coming into the industry because of it. That is not in the best interest of the status quo. There are those that have taken our business and traffic for granted and the competition we are going to introduce in New York will challenge the business as usual mentality. Should sponsors take notice? You betcha!”

Although he did avoid the question about TRAFFIC struggling, I appreciate Rick’s candor on the topic and look forward to seeing how the bidding on sponsorships goes. I think shaking things up is always good and this business definitely could benefit from fresh ideas and sponsors can open that door. Between the multiple auctions, auctioning sponsorships and a new location, this will definitely be a show worth writing about. I hope these new ideas, new auctions and new sponsors give TRAFFIC and the industry another solid showing. At least one of us from Domain Name News (that’s me) will be at the show next month, so watch for our posts and look for me there.
(c) 2008 DomainNameNews.com
Domain Convergence, October 6-8, 2008, Niagara Falls
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Original post by Adam Strong


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