Pen-Elayne on the Web

Not Quite Once-in-a-Lifetime

Awhile back Lis Riba (link at sidebar) was wondering whether she should attend the upcoming BloggerCon at Harvard this October. I told her the $500 admission fee seemed a bit steep to me, particularly since there are tons of blogger-related gatherings and conventions popping up all over the country (Lisa Rein, link at sidebar, always seems to be recording one or another of these seminars), making this far from the unique gathering touted by its organizer, Dave Winer. I mean, right here in NYC there's one being planned for the end of this month. So I have no idea what Lis has decided to do, but this morning I find a "personal" invite from Dave in my in-box as well, going through the whole spiel then saying, you guessed it, that the cost was a "mere $500." My response:

Dave, I regret to inform you that in the real world, as opposed to Harvard I guess, $500 is not "mere." That's a good chunk of my monthly rent. If the invite were free (which is usually what the word "invite" implies) I'd consider it, even though brr, Boston in October?, but there are enough blogger conferences around to not only belie your "once-in-a-lifetime experience" claims but that actually invite people for free, so I think I'll pass on yours. Thanks anyway!

And now I see that Tom Tomorrow also got an "invite" and responded on his blog in his own inimitable fashion. (Tom, if you're reading, I'm fairly sure The Week conference will be free, and you're already on their to-contact list. And I've finally finished your book and will be reviewing it here as soon as I get a few quiet moments at home.)

Update #1: Teresa Nielsen-Hayden's reaction on getting the same form letter is a lot of fun to read as well.

Update #2: Good grief, this kinda-nonstory actually seems to have "blogs' legs!" Tom-I-Mean-Dan follows up (thanks for the Amazing Colossal Traffic-Generating Link, Tom; review tomorrow, I promise!); August has a counter-offer; Jesse wonders where his invite went; and Kevin at Calpundit does a nice wrapup (and yay, it's Friday Cat Blogging again, I love FCB!).