“This is the best show ever for me: I renewed a relationship with a former customer and signed several new distribution deals. I couldn’t be happier!”
Those enthusiastic words came from Internext attendee Jackie Barnard, chief executive of M Squared Productions (parent of MaskTV). She tracked me down on the show floor specifically to tell me how good a time she was having.
It was a welcome change of pace. The day prior to the encounter, I had been hearing almost nonstop how much smaller January 2006’s Internext trade show was compared to previous incarnations. “Where are the exhibitors, the attendees, the wild parties?” people wanted to know. “And where in God’s name are the seminars?”
The seminars, of course, were downstairs from the show floor—next to registration, separated from the rest of the cavernous exhibit hall by fabric drapes that did little to diminish the surrounding cacophony created by forklifts, extraneous chatter, and Sands Expo workers’ shortwave radios. The Sands, I was told, was overwhelmed by space demands from the annual Consumer Electronics Show, the Adult Entertainment Expo, and Internext, all of which simultaneously descended upon Vegas for the first time, and the “seminar tent” (as I heard it referred to repeatedly) was the only spot available for what traditionally has been one of Internext’s most popular attractions. The less-than-optimal environs didn’t seem to diminish attendees’ enthusiasm much: All of the seminars – even the first-thing-in-the-morning-on-the-last-day panel about age verification issues – played to good crowds. As usual, the ones addressing legal and emerging technology issues drew packed houses.
The show floor, however… that was another matter. Between the opportunity for some companies to exhibit at the more consumer-oriented AEE happening around the corner from Internext; the elevated expense for rooms, food, entertainment, and transportation that always accompanies CES; proximity to the year-end holidays; and an industry that is showing the transient stresses associated with at once expanding and contracting coupled with extraneous economic forces, the show floor was not exactly the wild-and-crazy, over-the-top, impossible-to-see-it-all place it has been in years prior. It wasn’t deserted by any stretch of the imagination, but it wasn’t mired in shoulder-to-shoulder traffic, either.
It was, however, as several exhibitors and attendees put it, “a great environment in which to do business.”
That was Graham Gilmour’s position. “This show has been tremendous for us,” said the chief executive officer of PayNowSMS, which traveled to Vegas from Gibraltar to exhibit, as it has for the past several years. “Yes, it’s smaller, but the quality of the people is excellent. Numbers don’t matter, really; it’s what gets done that counts.”
Password-By-Phone’s Marc Jarrett, attorney Eric. M. Bernstein, and Alexander Reus from Mobile Bridges also shared similar thoughts at their booths. It’s not the size of the show that counts, they said in one way or another; it’s what you can do with what you’ve got. That sentiment was echoed by GirlFriendX.com’s president Rick, who admitted his product got much more attention from attendees, other exhibitors, and mainstream and adult media than it might have if the competition for eyeballs had been fiercer. Norlane, a technology company in the mobile space, saw good traffic at its booth, probably because it has something new to offer in a sector that’s hot and getting hotter, according to business development manager Dawn Cole. Vindicia Vice President for Marketing Marv Su spent plenty of time shaking hands and explaining his company’s “friendly fraud” and chargeback reduction program to webmasters who are more than a little tired of needlessly giving away big chunks of their income.
Meanwhile, at the back of the convention facility, Zvi Meshi garnered quite a bit of interest in CommerceGate’s processing solutions and made valuable contacts with people like ChargeMeLater’s Stephane Touboul, who also said the show was good for him. Payment provider Epoch’s and mobile technology company Mobile Streaming Solutions’ booths suffered no lack of traffic. JFK’s F.U.B.A.R. Webmasters Adventures unveiled the first issue of a new print magazine called The F.U.B.A.R. Times (a mostly lighthearted look at the adult industry with a liberal dose of the sorts of candid photos for which JFK is famous) to enthusiastic reviews.
Attendees from new Las Vegas-based Three Deviants LLC and MobiTV reported they were very pleased with responses to their products and potential deals in the works. Johnathan C. Coopersmith, an associate professor at Texas A&M University, was exceptionally satisfied with the research material he collected for a forthcoming book about the adult Internet industry. Throb’s Jeff Random and scores of other webmasters and video-side folks scurried back and forth between Internext and AEE, using their Super Passes for entrée into bold new fields of endeavor they might not otherwise have been able to explore, and they were grateful for the opportunity.
Those guys had a great time and a profitable show experience because they were determined not to have anything less. I myself ended up with many more business cards than ever before after enjoying more opportunities to spend some quality time with movers and shakers, wannabes, experts, and rank-and-filers at both venues. It was a remarkable experience.
The parties were pretty remarkable, too. Although they may not have been as rampant in numbers as in the past, they made up for the apparent decline with lavishness. NoCreditCard.com celebrated its 10th anniversary surrounded by a plethora of its closest associates and other invitees, who toasted their hosts with champagne and noshed on a gigantic, exquisitely decorated cake. Qfest 2006 was as outrageous as ever, as were the Cybersocket Web Awards. Drinks and conversation kept the VBar lively during the days, and the Cock & Tail Reception, Cybersocket’s gay webmaster parties, the 365 Billing party, the Rock ’N’ Roll Revue, the closing party sponsored by NATS and Incredible Dollars, and the AEE Industry Party kept various local joints rockin’ all night. Of course, Hustlaball Las Vegas 2006 and The Jungle Bash were the hottest tickets in town.
What it all boils down to, perhaps, is that the industry and its needs are changing. What once was a group of nouveau-riche kids with the electronic equivalents of garage bands has become a more sedate, more serious, more business-like bunch of professionals who no longer feel compelled to engage in extravagant displays of conspicuous consumption like they once did. That doesn’t mean they’ve lost their joie de vivre (After all, the foam boobs still flew about the room as the lights dimmed on this year’s show); It just means they’ve settled into a new, more dignified mode that jibes better with their roles as titans of contemporary industry. January’s Internext this year was more akin to its summer incarnation (scheduled for Aug. 4-6 at the Westin Diplomat resort in Hollywood, Fla.) than it was to its old self. It just goes to show that sometimes change can definitely be a good thing.
