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MillionManLAN Party: The Doors Are Open
socram writes "Tom's Hardware has an overview about one of the biggest Lan Parties. This event is sponsored by AMD, ATI, ASUS, ABIT, Cisco, NVIDIA, and the Hitachi storage division. Check this article out, more than 1000 people killing their brain cells! Presentation by ASUS, ATI's Q&A Session and more."
Does this event actually fit one million people, or is that just hyperbole?
Dreamhack Summer 2003 had about 4000 visitors.
All the sponsor discussions have been off in a separate area of the event, and it's been pretty low-key. I don't have a sales-gerbil up in my face all day or anything. They've got products to talk about, sure, but they've also got free stuff to give away and people to answer questions about their products. It's been handled really well.
Killing their brain cells? Alcohol is rarely seen on the LAN parties I've attended. Doesn't help the aim. Other drugs are similarly unattractive to gamers and smokers are usually separated from non-smokers. So how do you kill brain cells on a LAN party anymore than a computer worker does all day every workday?
Firstly, this must be one of the most poorly written /. "news" items in the history of the website. "Tom's Hardware has an overview about one of the biggest Lan Parties". That sorry excuse for a sentence alone makes me sick.
Second, with LANs like DreamHack attracting I believe around 5000 visitors each year (actually twice each year, since there's both DH Summer and DH Winter nowadays), a LAN of merely a thousand peeps hardly qualifies as "one of the biggest" IMO. Reading the official website they seem to really think they're the largest LAN party in the world, judging from the "about" page. A bit US-centric are we? Morons.
I won't even go into how the whole thing seems more like a giant marketing gig (the people attending are basically paying $30/day to be fed advertisments from AMD, ASUS et al) than a LAN party.
Quality, performance, value; you get only two, and you don't always get to pick.
I really doubt most of the attendees even have children. It's a LAN party, not a vacation trip! And if you need a theme park to "make the trip more worthwhile", then you are not geek enough for this kind of event anyways! It's about surviving through days and nights of antisocial filesharing, fragging and fun, even if you need a Jolt Cola IV. Who has times for themeparks? The UT2k3 tournament is about to start!
Claiming you'll be modded down is the quickest, weaseliest way to get mod points on Slashdot, and everyone knows it, yet the mods still fall for it.
it makes perfect sense, since they are both targeting the same demographic.
Note to self: No more arguing with the faithful.
I'm at MML2 and it being on the 3rd of 4th days now, I can say it's been incredible. I'm Lockhart on Netizen CS Team 2, and we lost to our Team 1 13-11 in the quarters. Our match was played really late because we had a hardware problem on one of the tourney computers, but other than that 1 glitch, the computers are incredible. I didn't win anything other than all the amazing free things up on the FTP here... I'm not at liberty to say what I've gotten, however ;D
For the people who said that there isn't anything to do for the family... Six Flags Kentucky Kingdom is literally next door. And so far, I've left my stuff here 3 days straight and not a single thing has even been touched. My monitor, case, mouse, keyboard, even my backpacks and food have not been taken. This is one of the coolest things I've ever been to, and even if you don't come for the games, come for the free stuff and the people. I drove for 15 hours from CT to get here, and it has been worth every minute of the drive.
Ahem....
:D
The largest and longest running "monster Computer Party" is The Gathering in Norway.
Note The "computer Party" monniker as it's not just Gamers that attend.
These event are huge BECAUSE we don't focus on one specific group.
We try to give everyone something here. Frome the person that just started using a computer, to the Linux Fanatic, the Uber Gamer or the Demo Scener.
And all the people in between.
Is it doable..well..we've been told that what we do is not possible,can't be done,the hardware does not exist, and so on since we started doing these kind of things in late 80's.
My hat off to the guys doing this LAN thou..because it is not easy to get started. You need a certain kind of insanity to keep it rolling when you reach the 450+ limit.
Heh..some of the "core" people even have clauses in their employment contract that states that they can not be made to work when The Gathering is being held
But..I'm rambling..
Don't be negative, so they are a bit brash..so what..pulling of an event like this IS cause to be proud.
You US guys WANT these large events, they are something else entierly, If you THINK you know what this is but havent been to one..then please dont knock it until you've tried it.
Also..what is this BO fetish you guys have??
is it an american thing??...
I've been taught by my parents to keep myself clean, and most other Lan Party/Computer Party people I meet do the same.
It get's stuffy, true. But it's not like th hall smells like an outhouse!
Hell even with 5400 people attending this easter noone died from BO poisoning.
So please..stop stereotyping okay?
it's just plain sad.