Hi all,
My name is Adam Cesnales. I am president of PMASI and on the MACNA 2007 committee.
I hesitated to post here because the discussion has been so caustic, but it pains me that this has all gotten so out of hand. I won't respond to anything that has been said above because it will only serve to fan the flames.
The biggest thing that strikes me about all of this is the amount of discussion regarding how much PMASI stands to make from the conference. I will state without question that the estimates of our profits are grossly exaggerated. The last two MACNA's have provided us with very accurate accounting for their conferences. Neither made even close to 50K and one made well less than half of that. Our projections are similar. When our conference is over, our records will be made public and I will personally provide a link to them in this thread.
In any case... what we will make is irrelevant. What it costs us irrelevant. What it costs RAG to provide the advertising is irrelevant. The only thing that matters is if we can come to an agreement that we both feel is a good value. If we can't, so be it. We won't trash RAG and we would hope that RAG won't trash us and won't stifle the free discussion of MACNA in their forums. After all, when Sports Illustrated negotiates with the Superbowl about advertising costs, do they bicker about each other's profits and costs? Of course not. The only thing that matters is if the deal represents a good value to both parties.
Quite simply, when we look at the costs of providing the RAG staff with what they have requested, it does not represent a good value to us. RAG's offer to provide webcam and wireless networking services is generous, but they aren't services that we need, so we can only consider the value of the advertising. Unfortunately, our offer wasn't a good value for RAG either, but we can't match other conferences offers because what was a good value for other conferences may not be a good value for us.
Our number one goal is to provide a great educational conference at a great value for our attendees. Making wise business decisons regarding advertising contributes to our success in this regard.
I am sorry to see that RAG and MACNA XIX could not come to a mutually beneficial agreement, but there are no hard feelings on our part and hope there are none on the part of RAG's leadership.
To the RAG membership... To further my analogy, if SI and the superbowl don't reach an advertising agreement, SI would still cover the superbowl as a news event and certainly wouldn't expect it's readers to boycott. I hope that you will all see past this unfortuanate discussion and make a decision about MACNA based on the value that it represents to you as an individual. If it is worth it to you to come and see the great speakers, workshops and exhibitors then we look forward to having you. If it is not worth it to you, then we have failed in our effort to maximize the value in the conference for our attendees.
Thanks for reading and indulging my two cents.
Adam
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