I read the summary of that session as described by the presenters and it did make me cringe.

First of all, it sounds like a boring way to spend an hour: making a csr jump through hoops to show how dumb they are and how smart you are.

And when put that way, seems a bit cruel as well.

The presenters could have conveyed the same information by simply describing the process of booking the toughest award they has booked without torturing a couple of csrs just for sport.

The Pool Session sounds like it would've been quite fun! Sunshine and drinks, never a bad start.

I kinda had the same feelings reading about that. Not sure what the point was other than to put someone on the spot and boost a presenter's ego. I get that there are some lousy and poorly trained FFP CSRs, but still.

^

Completely concur. I will assume that was not the intent, but it was the effect.

But in a culture of too many FT'ers (and I presume MP's too) that too often seems to think that its appropriate to talk about "lounge dragons," and "matrons" and "gate lice," etc., etc., I'm not sure I'm surprised.

I agree the intent was innocent/educational. And maybe it seemed less mocking in the room. We're obviously just reacting to the summaries provided by the presenters.

Those Bern's sessions were the best!

A big draw of either the FTUs or Chicago Seminars are meeting new people and seeing old friends.
Don and I went to three years worth of Chicago Seminars; the Grand Hyatt Tampa was so much more appealing of a venue than a fourth year at the Holiday Inn Elk Grove. I am sure the Chicago seminars will be great.

I'd be curious to know of all the FTU/Chicago Seminars etc.:

1) how many paid attendees
2) what percent of the attendees have never been to a class/seminar
3) what percent of the attendees is new to travel hacking/points etc.
4) of the new attendees, what percent said they learned new info
5) what percent of people would return to another one if they knew the likelihood of learning anything new was very low
6) how much to pay to have Eightblack lead a class, or well, basically tell stories...

Sorry to hijack the thread but eightblack is threatening planning to do exactly that on the Sunday during Japan Do 2 - provided we can keep him away from beer on Saturday night.

I have no inside knowledge of the numbers, but I have been to several of the FTU (all of them, I think) and I can make some reasonably educated guesses from this most recent event.

1) I think somewhere around 300.
2) 60-75%
3) Same
4) 100%
5) Quite the leading question and probably a bit of a red herring. Yes, there is overlap and similarities in the sessions but there are people I know who said they wanted to attend multiple concurrent sessions so those might attend again to do different topics. Also, the sessions do change each time. Maybe not a ton, but I know all three of my presentations were different this time than in DC. So were several others. And the ones which were the same were still new to the majority of the attendees who were first-time visitors.

I think that there is a core group of "regulars" who show up for the socializing and drinking. There was a group of 10 who were all paid attendees and who all spent Saturday on a boat rather than at the hotel. Most of them attended only one or two sessions at most. Then there were the couple hundred newbies who were somewhat overwhelmed by the fact that there are so many others who are similarly crazy and who were soaking it all up. I don't think that everyone will suddenly want to go to every event but I think there will be some repeat visitors from that group to future events.

One of the things I like about FTU is that it moves around, making it easier for locals to show up in different parts of the country. That is a significant portion of the attendee pool (plenty of people drove to the TPA event rather than flying) and making this information easily accessible to different people is a good thing IMO.

There seems to be some sort of strange obsession with the idea that no one should ever pay for anything or do anything other than read forums to gain knowledge. There are so many reasons this is a bad approach it isn't even funny. People learn differently. Being able to help others learn about these programs and how to better leverage their activities is what it is all about. If there are people who are more comfortable learning in a seminar format or conversations pool-side or over lunch at the event then let them learn that way. Help them learn more. I had several people express at various points that they had been reading the forums but that hearing it in a discussion finally helped it all "click" in their brain. That's a tremendous endorsement for these types of events.

And if they don't work for you (or if you think they don't) then don't go. Don't pay the trivial fee and don't have the experience. But don't get down on those who are running them, presenting at them or attending them. That's just plain silly.

Didn't mean to misleading on my question. I guess I was trying to get a feel for how many people (not bloggers) know they're not going to learn much, but love coming just to be with everyone else in a social setting.

I agree in moving the event. I would not have flown, but FTU-DC was 1 hour drive

Again, the implication that many people will not learn much is one which I do not believe is accurate. With more than half the crowd being first-time attendees (admittedly an estimate on my part, but I don't think it is too far off) the implication that they can learn everything in one go is somewhere between ludicrous and laughable, and probably actually a bit of both.

I totally agree with sbm12. I haven't been to FTU but have been to the Chicago Seminars three times and going again this weekend. At one of the general sessions the question is asked how many are first-time attenders. Well over half usually raise their hands. I have interacted with some of them over meals, breakout sessions, evening chats, etc. and it is amazing how much they learn. Heck, I think I am half way decent with miles and points but I still learn quite a bit each time.

No, you are brilliant at miles! ^

I posted some thoughts over on MP after the FTU-DC earlier in the year.

Like Seth said, if you don't want to go then don't.

I also attended one of the Chicago Seminars a couple of years ago.

For me neither one really had all that much info I didn't learn online somewhere already. I also think that beyond your learning style, your personality will have a lot to do with whether you get much out of it. If you like meeting a lot of new people you would probably enjoy it. If you are very introverted and don't talk to strangers much then you will get a lot less out of it.

The only reason I went to the event in DC is that I live less than 10 miles away so it was easy to go to. And at that event the sessionsI enjoyed the most were Stefan's talk about the off the beaten track places he goes and Chris Gillebeau's talk about visiting every country.

But there certainly was a bit of cliquishness to the whole thing. There is the core group in-crowd that know each other well and go to a lot of these events. And then there are all of the newbies. And I think it also helps if you enjoy listening to Randy go on and on (which I don't).

I think it's worth going to one of these events once though to check it out if you're in the neighborhood to see for yourself if you get anything much out of it.

We FT'ers are cheapskates. Yet we'll pay for Vanilla Reloads to get the miles. FTU is different because the benefit can't be quantified up front. That bothers some people, I guess.

IMHO the benefit for newbies is knowledge. People who know more going on will learn less. There are diminishing returns.

On the other hand the networking benefits exhibit increasing returns. The more you know the more you have to offer your fellow semi-experts. Then you can keep in touch and maybe get a head start on some great deals.