When I think back over the past three days I’ve spent here in Prague for the iGaming SUPER Show, there is really one word that comes to mind…FUN. No conference is perfect, and the company organizing the conference always faces unexpected challenges, but I just love attending iGaming Business events as the team does everything with a smile, and unlike some of the organizers out there, they’ll sponsor a party themselves if they have to. This is because iGaming Business knows that the igaming industry likes a good party, and we all know many people attend these conferences mainly for the nightly networking opportunities, so great job with this event guys, I can see it in people’s faces as I walk through the lobby- we’re all SUPER hung over and happy.
Of course there is some actual daytime work involved for those who are not, ahem, affiliates, so lets take a moment and review the actual exhibit hall aspect of the event. Clearly the affiliate side of the exhibit hall was more “fun” than the B2B side, but why? The affiliate side was wayyy hotter, that is, in terms of the number of babes modeling at booths in addition to the physical temperature, booths were giving away beer, condoms, vodka, and massages, we had poker pros, an F1 racer, and a Playboy Playmate, and many, many other things which help create the famous affiliate conference gong show.
On the B2B side it was much quieter, but it was a nice escape if you needed to cool off, sober up, or have an maybe even have an actual in depth business meeting, if you can imagine that. I did hear a rumor that next year iGaming Business will be mixing up the B2B and the affiliate booths in both sides of the expo hall which will be great because the B2Bers just wanna have fun too, you know.
And now for the parties. Call me biased, but I would have to say that the sponsored conference parties were pretty damn good this time around, or maybe that’s because I’m still drunk from the opening night CalvinAyre.com launch party sponsored by BodogAffiliate.com and iGB Magazine. With a tag line of “attend or die trying”, there are some who really did almost die trying- trust me- seeing as I was AMBUSHED on the 25th I certainly know, and so does my phone bill! I’d have to say the launch party is partially responsible for killing the first half of Day 1 because half the people did not surface until late afternoon due to severe absinthe bar hangovers.
In addition to the launch party, the other official conference parties were pretty good and held my attention until they shut down at 2am. I really liked that there was always somewhere for conference delegates to go, there were no huge issues with getting rejected at the door, the free alcohol was always flowing, and the strip bars welcomed us with open arms the minute our official conference parties came to a close.
The geographical location of a conference is also very important to the iGaming crowd. Everyone agrees that Prague is a gorgeous city, architecture and ridiculously beautiful women included, which offers some nice warm weather and some pretty interesting nightlife. While the iGaming crowd may have failed at hitting the local clubs this time around, we certainly did not fail with hitting the strip clubs every night until the sun came up and beyond.
From what I hear, most people loved spending the past week in Prague and many will remain over the next few days, so iGaming Business once again did a fabulous job of creating an event which brought everyone in our industry together. Even though the conference is officially over, the networking certainly continues, and so does the gamblin’, drinkin’ and carryin’ on…
iGaming SUPER Show highlights…and SUPER hangovers!
