Outside speculation, but surely some of the booths at Comic-con and the like have paid for the privilege of being there? In this way, the cost of entry is subsidised by vendors and stalls, I would suspect. The Singularity Summit, as far as I know, pays all of its presenters to be there, and has no vendors which might subsidise the costs.
The dealers’ room is a major profit center for conventions which have them; at ICON this year (I was a volunteer), dealers were charged $15, not for any extra space, but for any additional folding tables. Some dealers did pay up, so you can imagine what it must have cost to gain actual entry… (One of the old ICONers told me that when the university kicked ICON out one year, it lost so many tens of thousands of dollars in revenue, they immediately asked ICON back.)
Perhaps the Summit should have a dealer’s room with representatives from longevity supplement makers and wearable computing device companies, recruiters from AI-focused startups, etc.
Yes, I was at Otakon a few years ago and the dealer’s room spaces were something like $750 each—there were probably about 100 dealers and I think each had about 3 spaces on average. Also, $65 each for extra dealer’s badges for employees. That said, I believe the money from the dealer’s room mostly goes to cover the expense of having a dealer’s room.
But remember that fan conventions tend to run at cost, while the Singularity Summit is a source of revenue for SIAI.
Outside speculation, but surely some of the booths at Comic-con and the like have paid for the privilege of being there? In this way, the cost of entry is subsidised by vendors and stalls, I would suspect. The Singularity Summit, as far as I know, pays all of its presenters to be there, and has no vendors which might subsidise the costs.
The dealers’ room is a major profit center for conventions which have them; at ICON this year (I was a volunteer), dealers were charged $15, not for any extra space, but for any additional folding tables. Some dealers did pay up, so you can imagine what it must have cost to gain actual entry… (One of the old ICONers told me that when the university kicked ICON out one year, it lost so many tens of thousands of dollars in revenue, they immediately asked ICON back.)
Perhaps the Summit should have a dealer’s room with representatives from longevity supplement makers and wearable computing device companies, recruiters from AI-focused startups, etc.
Yes, I was at Otakon a few years ago and the dealer’s room spaces were something like $750 each—there were probably about 100 dealers and I think each had about 3 spaces on average. Also, $65 each for extra dealer’s badges for employees. That said, I believe the money from the dealer’s room mostly goes to cover the expense of having a dealer’s room.
But remember that fan conventions tend to run at cost, while the Singularity Summit is a source of revenue for SIAI.