Embedded Systems Conference priced out of reach?

I just got my flyer for the April San Jose ESC. Inside
the front cover I found the following "best value" prices
for all access passes:

before Feb 6 $1795 (the brocure arrived on the 10th)
Mar 5 1995
Mar 29 2195
on site 2295


Or you could just attend the free exhibits and a single
90-minute class at $195 No downloadable class notes
or proceedings CD, though ;-(

It seems to me that the sponsors of this conference have
priced themselves out of reach of small companies. About
15 years ago, I actually talked my employer into sending
me to an ESC---and paying the $395 for the full set
of classes. I don't think a request for $3000 (travel
plus conference) would fly today. As a self-employed
consultant, there's no way I can justify anything more
than attending just the free exhibits.

Don't these conference organizers realize that they are
competing with a wealth of free or low-cost technical resources on
the internet? Heck, for less than the cost of two classes, I
can purchase freely redistributable source code for an
RTOS, SD disk driver, USB stack, etc, etc.


If I were working in marketing for Atmel, MicroChip, IAR,
etc. I'd have my boothies do a little pre-qualifying and
hand out passes for the kind of free seminars they
hold where you get a morning with some FAEs, lectures,
and a free dev kit. For something like that, plus
the free ESC exhibits pass, I'd consider the $500 cost
of travel from Oregon to San Jose. I suspect that
the conference organizers strongly discourage such competing
attractions.

Mark Borgerson

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