Rene Rivera wrote:
On 5/18/2010 4:50 PM, Stefan Seefeld wrote:
On 05/18/2010 05:35 PM, Nelson, Erik - 2 wrote:
Anyway, I'm just curious what people think about Aspen or alternatives for a BoostCon venue.
I agree with you. Even if the venue is very nice, it's also very inconvenient, at least for many of us.
Same here.. And I've volunteered my time to do the on-the-ground work if the conference moved to the Chicago area in the past (after the first year we organized the conference).
Some time ago - within the past year - I suggested that another venue be considered. Having been to my first BoostCon - I don't think there is any better place to have this conference. a) The place was spectacular. b) I love being able to tell people I gave a talk held at the Apspen Institue for Physics. c) I love the architecture d) I love the gym/swimming pool e) I love renting a bike for $50/week and riding around down and going on excursions on the surrounding bike paths. f) Denver airport is a hub and I don't see that anywhere would be much less inconvenient at least for me. g) The hotel is expensive by my usual standards and this is a factor for me. There are other rooms in town at about 1/2 the cost. So this shouldn't be a major obstacle. In my case, I shared a room with Vicente so the cost as quite reasonable. The room is really a suite with a "working" area separteed from the sleeping area + an outdoor patio. Also has microwave, fridge, coffee machine, etc. So in practice, it's plenty comfortable. h) I found that eating more than one restaurant meal/day at 8000 feet leaves me with a large ball in my gut. So having some fruit/snacks in the fridge along with the free pastries between morning sessions worked well out for me. And of course saves a ton of money since restaurants are very expensive. (note to hotel, they could make a lot more money if they gave out discount coupons (25%?) to boost attendies to eat in their restaurant). All in all, the altitude, bike rides, restaurant situation, etc. resulted in a net loss of 3lbs for me over the week. Some of the conference sessions were also interesting. Robert Ramey