My second scheduled conference was full, so I couldn’t attend. While waiting for the next session, I read an interesting article showing that GDC isn’t paying its speakers (not even paying for their flights!) and that it profits massively from young people eager to help for free. GDC is a for profit event, and it is good at it!
I feel a bit stupid because I don’t need – and don’t enjoy – networking now, and the main reason to attend GDC seems to be networking. My excuses are that I think that online networking can be more efficient, like I did with Future Friends, and also I don’t like parties for networking.
SF is a capitalist dystopia, and my AirBnB is not relaxing at all (cold, noisy, shared with a 4 person family, note to self to never do that again) and I can’t work (no desk).
Awards are not impartial at all – from the fact that you must pay to submit a game to the paid jury. And too much Feminist-LGBT-diversity BS, it’s important, but only up to a certain degree. Too much of it is ridiculous.
I got a free beer from Unreal Engine’s booth. That’s exactly what I needed, a little antidepressant to take the edge off in this testing SF/GDC trip.
I shouldn’t have attended. I’m not looking for business deals, indies are rare, the parties –where the networking happens– are not an official part of GDC, and the talks are best watched at home. GDC is making a shit ton of money on volounteers and free speakers. Here’s a quick back of the envelope conservative estimate of how much they make. And that’s fine by me, I just shouldn’t have attended. What did I expect?
Estimated People = 28k
Average Ticket Price = $400 (It could easily be more)
Moscone Center Price = $2M * 5 days (total guess)
Estimated People * Average Ticket Price * Moscone Center Price = $1 200 000
And I’m not counting the sponsors.
Buy the GDC Vault + the cheapest ticket.
You’ll have almost the best experience, at a fraction of the price: ~$600, compared to the $2000 standard all access.
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