Web Summit quits Dublin

CrabRevolution

Muahahaha wrote: »

Agree that there was nothing that could be done about hotel prices, wifi, etc. But I think if any city knows it is going to have an influx of 30,000 visitors then measures should be put in place like extra buses so those attendees dont end up waiting around for already packed buses that dont pick up. Also any major sporting event has to have an event management plan during which several organs of the state plan out how to run the event smoothly. Entire roads are closed down traffic diverted. Its not a fair comparision and even more so when you consider major sporting events tend to occur at the weekends and not during the working week like the Summit does.

During last years Summit it was patently obvious some sort of traffic management plan/increase in public transport services was badly needed as Dublin was completely jammed with traffic for those few days.

Paddy is no doubt a plonker but at the end of the day if someone with a bit of initiative in the Dept of Tourism and Transport had of grabbed the opportunity to solve the traffic problems then Dublin would have been in a very good position to say that hosting large scale conferences was something the city could handle and actively manage. But instead the message that was sent out to organisers of large scale conferences was that Dublins got traffic problems which will have our delegates frustrated at the choice of venue. Plus the government dept with responsibility for attracting visitors to the country doesnt really seem bothered in at least trying to solve the problems of hosting conferences on this scale.

To put the missed opportunity into perspective just last week the Convention Centre hosted 1,200 delegates for a conference on mobile phone technologies. They will have to do those numbers at 25 more conferences just to make up the 30,000 the Summit was pulling in. Imagine the economic boost to the city if we had 3 or 4 30,000+ conferences a year, it would be huge. But instead of trying to chase that opportunity (as Lisbon has done) our lot just sat on their hands and did nothing.

Add up every Ireland and provincial rugby match, irish soccer match, and inter county match in a year and it would utterly dwarf anything multiple web summits could ever bring in. Yet you don't see the heads of the FAI, GAA and IRFU petitioning the government to treat them as special cases and do all their work for them.

I think the signal the whole web summit affair has sent out isn't "Ireland is bad for major events", it's "no matter how important you reckon you are personally, if you try to bully the state into doing your work for free, you'll be laughed at".

Seth Brundle

In terms of recent irish summits, does anyone roughly know the percent of foreign attendees versus Irish attendees?

Dyr

lawred2 wrote: »

Because I'm Paddy and I'm great..

That's pretty much it.

I had the misfortune of dealing with the colossal twat, and its actually more a case of "I'm paddy and I don't want to pay for anything."

ZeroThreat

Bambi wrote: »

I had the misfortune of dealing with the colossal twat, and its actually more a case of "I'm paddy and I don't want to pay for anything."

Typical farmer

Muahahaha

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

Yes, a traffic management plan should be put in place but the government doesn't need to get involved. We have 10,000s of people attending the All Ireland, internation football and rugby games, concerts and other events every year and the government doesn't get involved in creating traffic managements plans. The companies themselves do it, so why can't WebSummit?

You use sporting events as a comparison but as I said already it is not comparable as they take place on weekends in the summer when Dublin is typically quite dead. You cant compare the event organisation of something like that to what is needed for something like the Summt being held over four working days in Dublin 4 which is already thronged with traffic, people going to work, etc.

But even with GAA events some government decision making takes place. After all it is the DoT who fund Irish Rail whose fares are subsidised by the taxpayer. So when extra trains are put on for GAA events then on some level the DoT needs to give Irish Rail an extra funding to do so. And they do and rightly so. But decisions like that will have input from the Minister for Transport of the day who controls the transport budget.

Likewise with the Web Summit- 30,000 people, the majority of them from abroad and the Govt feels on no level do they have a responsibility to at least help make the event a success in the hope of attracting more of these €100m boosts to the economy ? Why do we even have Failte Ireland if the Minister for Tourism isnt going to harness them to ensure events like this can become the norm for Dublin? Theres no point Failte spending millions on trying to get visitors into the country and then when they get here they face a clusterfcuk of a transport system. Other cities seem to manage this fine but Dublin didnt.

You have also got to remember that Ireland has one of the most centralised power structures in all western democracies. County councillors here are completely powerless to make any of the sort of decisions that could ensure an event this big runs smoothly. They have no say over transport, traffic planning, use of Gardai, etc. That power all lies in the government itself as was seen in 2014 when Garth Brooks went pleading to Enda to have his concert held. It is dumb, I agree but we have a remarkably weak local governement in Ireland that simply doesnt have the power to deal with anything even remotely out of the ordinary

Don't forget that WebSummit wanted the fees associated in closing roads to be waived as well. Why should they get these fees waived when any one else looking to close down a road for an event has to pay?

Agree with you here, Paddy certainly rubbed people up the wrong way and he always seemed to want stuff for free, including paying his employees. Of course he should have to pay but the cheeky pup tried getting it for free. But just because he asks for something for free doesnt mean they couldnt have put a price on it and charged him accordingly. And it doesnt mean he shouldnt have been engaged with to solve the problems and keep the event in Dublin. And thats what happened- lets not forget he sent dozens of emails to the Taoiseachs advisor who led him up a garden path before rustling together a three page report on a traffic management plan when it was obvious that a few scribblings would not solve the chronic traffic problems.

ThisRegard

5rtytry56 wrote: »

Statement of the obvious I know, clearly there are people reading this thread like myself who believe that paddy c got his just desserts the way things worked out for his web summit.
There are also most ardent supporters for paddy and his enterprise reading it and making some positive noise.



Just sayin'

There was a series of tweets yesterday purporting to be from different people, but all somehow managed to capture the exact same photograph and just as miraculously post the same thing, all in praise.

Muahahaha

ChikiChiki wrote: »

Genuinely can't understand how people continue to ignore it's obvious success. People are declaring it a failure because the burgers were to dear and the WiFi didn't work well last year. Yet the numbers are up! They're doing something right. The stats don't lie.

Like you I'm off the opinion both Paddy and the Govt acted like petulant kids but the Govt should have seen the bigger picture.

yeah I think its mainly because Paddy has rubbed a lot of people up the wrong way. But if you take a step back from all the noise and look at the bigger picture then you can only come to the conclusion that the Web Summit was good for Dublin and Dublin was good for the Web Summit. It brought 30,000 people into the city from abroad during the tourist off-season, from an economic perspective it had huge upside.

A cursory search of Trivago shows there are 503 available rooms in Dublin for tomorrow night. If the Summit was still here they would have all been sold out months ago instead of going empty as they are now.

gandalf

Muahahaha wrote: »

yeah I think its mainly because Paddy has rubbed a lot of people up the wrong way. But if you take a step back from all the noise and look at the bigger picture then you can only come to the conclusion that the Web Summit was good for Dublin and Dublin was good for the Web Summit. It brought 30,000 people into the city from abroad during the tourist off-season, from an economic perspective it had huge upside.

A cursory search of Trivago shows there are 503 available rooms in Dublin for tomorrow night. If the Summit was still here they would have all been sold out months ago instead of going empty as they are now.

TBH yes as an "event" it is a success but a success built on very shady sales tactics directed at cash strapped startups and exploitation of volunteers and over hype.

If I was starting up a digital business I would avoid the web summit as a means to try and secure any sort of funding. It now suffers from too much noise.

With regard to the hotels. They are doing very well these days. If there are 503 rooms available out of an estimated room pool of 19000 rooms that's an occupancy rate of over 97% which is excellent. They don't need the Web Summit based on this calculation.

Personally at this stage the whole thing is a social mediawancfest and provides very little of any substance at all. There is a gap there for a meaningful startup orientated event based out of Ireland still.

Calina

Muahahaha wrote: »

yeah I think its mainly because Paddy has rubbed a lot of people up the wrong way. But if you take a step back from all the noise and look at the bigger picture then you can only come to the conclusion that the Web Summit was good for Dublin and Dublin was good for the Web Summit. It brought 30,000 people into the city from abroad during the tourist off-season, from an economic perspective it had huge upside.

A cursory search of Trivago shows there are 503 available rooms in Dublin for tomorrow night. If the Summit was still here they would have all been sold out months ago instead of going empty as they are now.

TBH, I don't really buy the Web Summit being good for Dublin. Sure Dublin was good for it, because it's where it was born. But from the point of view of someone who should be target audience for it, the key issues I have with the Web Summit is that it was too big to be interesting, far too many of the speakers were not technologists, but tangential to tech. Money more than tech, tbh.

I don't think we typically have the scale to run events like the WebSummit, and I think it was telling that the high profile WebSummit funding successes dated from the early days when its numbers were considerably lower. 30 other smaller scale conferences would bring in the same number of people and potentially, create better networking opportunities. And we do have the wherewithal and facilities to do those things. What they lack is the mass scale PR and publicity which Websummit had. Is this a good thing? Probably.

I wish Lisbon well with Websummit but to be honest, I'm not sure it's a life changing experience for the city here, and I don't think we've lost that much.

Seth Brundle

Muahahaha wrote: »

Likewise with the Web Summit- 30,000 people, the majority of them from abroad and the Govt feels on no level do they have a responsibility to at least help make the event a success in the hope of attracting more of these €100m boosts to the economy ?

Muahahaha wrote: »

the Web Summit was good for Dublin and Dublin was good for the Web Summit. It brought 30,000 people into the city from abroad during the tourist off-season, from an economic perspective it had huge upside.

Just checking, are you sure that 30k people travelled into Ireland from abroad for the WS and if so have you a source?

prinzeugen

Gabriela Spicy Clarinet wrote: »

https://www.rte.ie/news/2016/1107/829929-web-summit/

Opening event in Lisbon

Why are RTE giving this so much time? There are tons of conferences and exhibitions held in Ireland but they never get broadcast live on RTE.

The twat is in Lisbon now so RTE should give it zero airtime.

VinLieger

prinzeugen wrote: »

Why are RTE giving this so much time? There are tons of conferences and exhibitions held in Ireland but they never get broadcast live on RTE.

The twat is in Lisbon now so RTE should give it zero airtime.

Nah im grand with it getting negative attention, sure remember Sharons interview with paddys junior vice president last year? I think that set the tone for all future RTE coverage and rightly so tbh

namloc1980

Food situation in Lisbon getting slated on twitter. Hour long queues. Poor selection and some vendors only accepting cash.....at the bloody web summit! Farce.

mzungu

namloc1980 wrote: »

Food situation in Lisbon getting slated on twitter. Hour long queues. Poor selection and some vendors only accepting cash.....at the bloody web summit! Farce.

Must have been starving waiting that long for a byte to eat.

ZeroThreat

mzungu wrote: »

Must have been starving waiting that long for a byte to eat.

Next up for Paddy is becoming a travelling salesman for monorail.

tinpib

Again taking a quick skim from time to time of #websummit on Twitter I'm not seeing very many complaints at all. In general people talking about the talks and not whinging about things.

BMMachine

tinpib wrote: »

Again taking a quick skim from time to time of #websummit on Twitter I'm not seeing very many complaints at all. In general people talking about the talks and not whinging about things.

no its a disaster and its sh*t. people on after hours on boards.ie said so and that basically means its a fact

Paddy Cosgrave is on with Marian "4 hours per week for €300,000" Finucane at the moment.

He said at the start he just called his child "Cloud". Really hard to listen to anything he's saying now. Himself and Geldof need to get a room. Serious gobshíte.

ZeroThreat

Deleted User wrote: »

Paddy Cosgrave is on with Marian "4 hours per week for €300,000" Finucane at the moment.

He said at the start he just called his child "Cloud". Really hard to listen to anything he's saying now. Himself and Geldof need to get a room. Serious gobshíte.

Wicklow farmer ruined by going to Trinners.

Just imagine what Miley would have turned out like.

Seth Brundle

Momma, I'm coming home...
https://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/paddy-cosgrave-hopes-for-web-summit-s-return-to-dublin-1.3060716?mode=amp

Mal-Adjusted

he described winning back the event as being akin to securing the Rugby World Cup.

God, he never changes...

VinLieger

kbannon wrote: »

Momma, I'm coming home...
https://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/paddy-cosgrave-hopes-for-web-summit-s-return-to-dublin-1.3060716?mode=amp

Hope it fails miserably, saw hes also hiring someone specifically to liaise and try make nice with the Irish government again as well so im guessing Lisbon saw through his bull**** and its not gonna last too long there.
From talking to people who have worked there id advise everyone to steer well clear

Dyr

VinLieger wrote: »

Hope it fails miserably, saw hes also hiring someone specifically to liaise and try make nice with the Irish government again as well

I wonder what Frank Flannery is up to these days? :rolleyes:

eviltimeban

"Trinity degrees are optional" :rolleyes:

serfboard

Paddy made the (naturally for him) egotistical mistake of thinking he was the attraction.

Now, to his surprise he has discovered that it was Dublin that was the attraction. Lisbon mustn't have been all Paddy made it out to be :rolleyes:

Other Tech-Summity-type things (like the Dublin Tech Summit) are now cashing in on the opportunity and benefitting from their founders not making arses of themselves.

Dyr

three roll eyes posts in a row, such is the contempt yer man is held in

have another ya skidmark :rolleyes:

Sofiztikated

Could it be possible for him to approach whoever, about the Web Summit coming back to Dublin, and be told "Nah, you're alright mate, jog on."

Cos that should be televised.

serfboard

Sofiztikated wrote: »

Could it be possible for him to approach whoever, about the Web Summit coming back to Dublin, and be told "Nah, you're alright mate, jog on."

Cos that should be televised.

"Dear Mr. Cosgrave,

Thank you for your interest in bringing the Web Summit back to Dublin, but we are afraid that, since Dublin has already replaced it with a Tech Summit, we could not possibly organise two tech summits given your opinion that we couldn't organise one.

Thank you for your interest, and we wish you all the best in your career in Portugal."

SEPT 23 1989

I presume all suppliers will increase their prices accordingly

andekwarhola

Like the kid that threatens to leave home and their bluff is called; sneaks back a few weeks later to find his room redecorated.

murpho999

How can organizing a conference be any more complicated than arranging a music festival or big bloody wedding.

They just have to book speakers, and arrange facilities.

They way they go as if the company is achieving something amazing is very galling.

ToddyDoody

serfboard wrote: »

Paddy made the (naturally for him) egotistical mistake of thinking he was the attraction.

Now, to his surprise he has discovered that it was Dublin that was the attraction. Lisbon mustn't have been all Paddy made it out to be :rolleyes:

Other Tech-Summity-type things (like the Dublin Tech Summit) are now cashing in on the opportunity and benefitting from their founders not making arses of themselves.

As my mother would say "that softened his cough"

Sofiztikated

murpho999 wrote: »

How can organizing a conference be on more complicated than arranging a music festival or big bloody wedding.

They just have to book speakers, and arrange facilities.

They way they go as if the company is achieving something amazing is very galling.

A big conference can be quite intricate, and most venues would rather a big bloody wedding than a big bloody conference.

But he's not curing cancer.

Seth Brundle

serfboard wrote: »

"Dear Mr. Cosgrave,

Thank you for your interest in bringing the Web Summit back to Dublin, but we are afraid that, since Dublin has already replaced it with a Tech Summit, we could not possibly organise two tech summits given your opinion that we couldn't organise one.

Thank you for your interest, and we wish you all the best in your career in Portugal."

Will he be looking for a reference?

Seth Brundle

murpho999 wrote: »

How can organizing a conference be any more complicated than arranging a music festival or big bloody wedding.

They just have to book speakers, and arrange facilities.

They way they go as if the company is achieving something amazing is very galling.

True but doesn't he believe that all the difficult stuff should be done for him. Like ensuring his guests have WiFi.

murpho999

Sofiztikated wrote: »

A big conference can be quite intricate, and most venues would rather a big bloody wedding than a big bloody conference.

But he's not curing cancer.

Exactly, it's just a big logistics exercise.

He's going on as if he's an absolute genius that has created something but he has actually not created anything of any lasting worth but he thinks he can hold governments and cities to ransom for his demands.

touts

Irish Times making something out of a nothing comment. It might come to Dublin some time in the future or it might go to any of dozens of other cities. I don't think the Web Summit will be back on these shores anytime in the next decade if at all. All that interview proves is Paddy has had a bit of media interview training.

VinLieger

touts wrote: »

Irish Times making something out of a nothing comment. It might come to Dublin some time in the future or it might go to any of dozens of other cities. I don't think the Web Summit will be back on these shores anytime in the next decade if at all. All that interview proves is Paddy has had a bit of media interview training.

And them employing a person to specifically make nice with the government means absolutely nothing......

VinLieger

Apparently theres gonna be some major announcement from them at lunchtime today, any bets for where its moving to apart from Dublin?

Glenster

eviltimeban wrote: »

"Trinity degrees are optional" :rolleyes:

That's the sort of thing someone who has only recently realised that Trinity Snobbishness is unfounded would say.

Idiot.

murpho999

VinLieger wrote: »

Apparently theres gonna be some major announcement from them at lunchtime today, any bets for where its moving to apart from Dublin?

Will it not be the announcement of the smaller Moneyconf moving to Dublin from Madrid as rumoured by the press?

skankkuvhima

According to the article he is not planning on moving back to Dublin, or am I reading it wrong? This is what the article says

The Irish-founded tech conference that started in Ireland in 2009 with less than 400 attendees and grew to about 40,000 by 2015, caused controversy when its upped and left for Portugal last year under a three-year deal.

The summit, which attracted 53,056 attendees from over 166 countries in 2016, is expecting to draw 60,000 people to Lisbon this November. Web Summit also organises several other global technology events, including Collision in the US, Rise in Hong Kong and MoneyConf in Madrid.

Dyr

murpho999 wrote: »

Will it not be the announcement of the smaller Moneyconf moving to Dublin from Madrid as rumoured by the press?

He's announcing that their spambot has achieved sentience

uck51js9zml2yt

Bambi wrote: »

He's announcing that their spambot has achieved sentience

I thought he had achieved sentience

I was obviously wrong!

osarusan

he described winning back the event as being akin to securing the Rugby World Cup.

Mal-Adjusted wrote: »

God, he never changes...

To be fair to the guy, if I am reading that article right, he was just saying that the event need not be fixed to one place, and lots of events are mobile and move from venue to venue, and gave the Rugby World Cup as one example.

If so, and he didn't make the claim elsewhere, it's actually pretty crappy reporting.

jmayo

osarusan wrote: »

To be fair to the guy, if I am reading that article right, he was just saying that the event need not be fixed to one place, and lots of events are mobile and move from venue to venue, and gave the Rugby World Cup as one example.

If so, and he didn't make the claim elsewhere, it's actually pretty crappy reporting.

That lad has some head on him.
How he can equate a multi site event that runs over a period of a month to his one site few day conference.

If one was to sell tickets to an event where he was getting his ar** kicked one would probably be running a bigger event than his own.

osarusan

jmayo wrote: »

That lad has some head on him.
How he can equate a multi site event that runs over a period of a month to his one site few day conference.

From reading the linked article, I don't think he was equating them, just giving an example of an event that is mobile.

But whatever, I don't care about him or the event, so I don't really care if he gets criticised for it.

namloc1980

..

Paddy and his Circus are coming back. Wonder what happened in Lisbon?

c_man

The Web Summit is a big load of sh!te. Spent years in a MNC, it was a jolly to get up to it but mainly for the days off. It was 99% bs in stands.

Bonavox

namloc1980 wrote: »

..

Paddy and his Circus are coming back. Wonder what happened in Lisbon?

Different conference. Web Summit is still Lisbon, this is MoneyConf.