Web Summit quits Dublin

stoneill

ThisRegard wrote: »

Add Criminal Law to that list of Don't knows.

You must have gotten your skill of flippant responses from the Enda Kenny school of answering questions.

JustTheOne

stoneill wrote: »

You must have gotten your skill of flippant responses from the Enda Kenny school of answering questions.

Ah now we're getting somewhere.

smash

I've never met Paddy Cosgrave but I know many who have, and not one had anything good to say about his attitude but that his over inflated ego speaks for itself. His previous comments about trinity education and disregarding other colleges annoyed a hell of a lot of people too. No matter what anyone says about the conference, it is in essence just a big piss up with a few people making speeches that not many people really listen to. There's lots of talk of investment in the wee hours of the morning while people are downing shots and trying to hold down that kebab, but there's little follow through with it.

stoneill

Calina wrote: »

You know nothing about event planning but you know what WebSummit were demanding was nothing too excessive?

Close a few roads, have good broadband, ensure delegates get to the summit, control hotel prices, stick on a few more buses, no nothing major there.

smash

stoneill wrote: »

Close a few roads, have good broadband, ensure delegates get to the summit, control hotel prices, stick on a few more buses, no nothing major there.

Do you think all of this happens when 82,000 people descend on Croke Park for all Ireland finals? No, it doesn't. And that's over twice the amount of people hitting one area on a single day than Paddy Cosgrave has coming to the RDS over the space of a week.

PARlance

stoneill wrote: »

Close a few roads, have good broadband, ensure delegates get to the summit, control hotel prices, stick on a few more buses, no nothing major there.

I wouldn't let you run a bath of Irish Water.

seamus

stoneill wrote: »

Close a few roads, have good broadband, ensure delegates get to the summit, control hotel prices, stick on a few more buses, no nothing major there.

All things that the event organiser looks after. Not the leader of the entire country.

seamus

smash wrote: »

Do you think all of this happens when 82,000 people descend on Croke Park for all Ireland finals? No, it doesn't.

To be fair, it does (except for the hotel prices).

Because the GAA gets off its arse and organises this stuff itself.

Daith

stoneill wrote: »

Close a few roads, have good broadband, ensure delegates get to the summit, control hotel prices, stick on a few more buses, no nothing major there.

Nothing major in controlling hotel prices? Are you crazy?

smash

seamus wrote: »

To be fair, it does (except for the hotel prices).

Because the GAA gets off its arse and organises this stuff itself.

There's very few roads actually closed, they don't control hotel prices or request additional public transport.

JustTheOne

smash wrote: »

There's very few roads actually closed, they don't control hotel prices or request additional public transport.

Or free leap cards and garda escort for all its attendees!

namloc1980

stoneill wrote: »

Close a few roads, have good broadband, ensure delegates get to the summit, control hotel prices, stick on a few more buses, no nothing major there.

Don't forget waiving appropriate fees, Garda escorts (have to laugh at that one), free rental of public buildings, free buses, free Leap Cards etc. And what do you want the Government to do about hotel prices. You want a centrally controlled market?

seamus

smash wrote: »

There's very few roads actually closed, they don't control hotel prices or request additional public transport.

Still, there are roads closed. I know CIE and IE do put on special busses and trains on match days, but I don't know how that works. I suspect the GAA let them know what matches are on and how many people to expect and then CIE does the figures.

Anyway, point being that the government is not needed to get involved!

smash

seamus wrote: »

Still, there are roads closed. I know CIE and IE do put on special busses and trains on match days, but I don't know how that works. I suspect the GAA let them know what matches are on and how many people to expect and then CIE does the figures.

Anyway, point being that the government is not needed to get involved!

Nor does it subsidise the travel expenses of the attendees.

mariaalice

Except for controlling hotel prices the web summit does have a point. It will be interesting to see after the event in Lisbon what hotel prices were like there.

Ireland is expensive and you get use to it and its only when someone point it out to you do you notice.

My daughter sent me a link for a place called drunken monkey a bar/cocktail/dim sum/ DJ place in Shoreditch( a very trendy area) now its London an expensive city all the main courses were in the between £7 and £8 good happy hour drinks and so on.

Daith

mariaalice wrote: »

Ireland is expensive and you get use to it and its only when someone point it out to you do you notice.

A ticket to the Web Summit ain't cheap either.

namloc1980

seamus wrote: »

Still, there are roads closed. I know CIE and IE do put on special busses and trains on match days, but I don't know how that works. I suspect the GAA let them know what matches are on and how many people to expect and then CIE does the figures.

Anyway, point being that the government is not needed to get involved!

Yes roads closed with 80k people in one small space. Reasonable. Mr Cosgrave wants roads closed in the City Centre to facilitate his organised pub crawl, I mean "Night Summit" (with appropriate fees waived of course). Not reasonable.

smash

mariaalice wrote: »

Except for controlling hotel prices the web summit does have a point. It will be interesting to see after the event in Lisbon what hotel prices were like there.

Ireland is expensive and you get use to it and its only when someone point it out to you do you notice.

My daughter sent me a link for a place called drunken monkey a bar/cocktail/dim sum/ DJ place in Shoreditch( a very trendy area) now its London an expensive city all the main courses were in the between £7 and £8 good happy hour drinks and so on.

The vast majority of attendees costs will be covered by expenses from their employers who can write it off against tax so the cost of a hotel room or ticket or even food and drink isn't really an issue for them. It's only an issue for people paying out of their own pocket and they'll be very few and far between.

homerjay2005

Not sure how or why this Muppet has been given so much coverage, he is just coming accross as self obsessed now and it looks like his general belief is that he is the best thing to happen this country since sliced bread.

The demands are pathetic though of course the usual water meter folk are lapping it up and trying to make it out like it's a national scandle and the government have messed up.

Good riddance to them

ThisRegard

smash wrote: »

I've never met Paddy Cosgrave but I know many who have, and not one had anything good to say about his attitude but that his over inflated ego speaks for itself.

Here's an article highlighting many of the shortcomings of the Web Summit. Cosgrave already has a bad enough reputation amongst some in the industry, his recent fit of petulance only reinforces this.

http://tech.eu/features/6244/web-summit-scam-well-ask/

It's worth reading the comments at the bottom.

Web Summit's not in the business of supporting startups; they're in the business of extorting startups. I tell every young startup I know now not to attend Web Summit.

I attended in 2013 and felt totally scammed pretty much immediately upon arrival. Since then its become a joke in the office whenever we get emails from Paddy about his next new thing. His hustle, which is undeniable, would be respected if it actually helped founders and startups

JustTheOne

mariaalice wrote: »

Except for controlling hotel prices the web summit does have a point. It will be interesting to see after the event in Lisbon what hotel prices were like there.

Ireland is expensive and you get use to it and its only when someone point it out to you do you notice.

My daughter sent me a link for a place called drunken monkey a bar/cocktail/dim sum/ DJ place in Shoreditch( a very trendy area) now its London an expensive city all the main courses were in the between £7 and £8 good happy hour drinks and so on.

In a capital city anywhere in Europe
hotels drink food will be expense in tourist areas.

People need to get over this.

Most Irish people don't drink in temple bar because they know its expensive and better prices are found a few streets away.

grundie

randy hickey wrote: »

If you don't, I'll be moving my summit to Lisburn.

Here? http://www.eikoncomplex.co.uk/index.php?value=1

grundie

FalconGirl wrote: »

The Govt dropped the ball on this one to be fair. Some of Cosgraves demands are outrageous but an agreement should have been reached. This event is a loss to Dublin.

But, the onus is his to plan all this stuff. He should be documenting what is wrong/needed in detail, arranging meetings with stakeholders to determine a fix/solution and then presenting his proposals to the powers that be for sign off and to secure funding.

His emails are acknowledging that his event is causing traffic problems, but demanding that someone else sort it out for him. Its his gig, he should be taking the lead on documenting the problems/requirements and sorting them out.

nc6000

Looks like a bit of a scam to me and having just watched his interview on RTE I would has said Paddy Cosgrave is a spoofer.

So you have to pay extra for "Access to Pub Crawls" ?

Triangle

mariaalice wrote: »

Except for controlling hotel prices the web summit does have a point. It will be interesting to see after the event in Lisbon what hotel prices were like there.

From what I understand he didn't want a cap on the hotel prices, he compared it to Lisbon where the government sat with stakeholders (i.e. hotel federation) and they discussed the benefits of having hotels filled when otherwise they might not be. The hotels saw reason and didn't raise the prices (probably did raise them but within reason I'm expecting)

It seems that hoteliers in Ireland are used to festivals not being able to move and holding people over a barrel in relation to hotel prices. I.e. Galway Races.
The prices in Galway during the Volvo Ocean race were nothing but extortionate. Not that the Ocean race is gone - the hotels have lost that revenue (very short sighted imo)

Triangle

Triangle wrote: »

From what I understand he didn't want a cap on the hotel prices, he compared it to Lisbon where the government sat with stakeholders (i.e. hotel federation) and they discussed the benefits of having hotels filled when otherwise they might not be. The hotels saw reason and didn't raise the prices (probably did raise them but within reason I'm expecting)

It seems that hoteliers in Ireland are used to festivals not being able to move and holding people over a barrel in relation to hotel prices. I.e. Galway Races.
The prices in Galway during the Volvo Ocean race were nothing but extortionate. Not that the Ocean race is gone - the hotels have lost that revenue (very short sighted imo)

That's not the Government's role. There is absolutely nothing stopping WebSummit chairing the meeting above and suggesting/educating, but that is not the Government's job.

Imagine if it was Dennis O'Brien's company and see if you'd consider the request fair.

kidneyfan

Can a private citizen hire a Garda escort? Would helicopters not have been cheaper?

Some startup attendees had a positive experience

http://tech.eu/features/6244/web-summit-scam-well-ask/
Find user 'Haider'

Many of the startup CxOs seem to have expected alot of spoon feeding.

Triangle

grundie wrote: »

But, the onus is his to plan all this stuff. He should be documenting what is wrong/needed in detail, arranging meetings with stakeholders to determine a fix/solution and then presenting his proposals to the powers that be for sign off and to secure funding.

His emails are acknowledging that his event is causing traffic problems, but demanding that someone else sort it out for him. Its his gig, he should be taking the lead on documenting the problems/requirements and sorting them out.

But was he not taking the lead and getting in touch with the governing body (i.e. Government) who have the control over these areas? From reading the emails that were published, it seems that in reply to his queries he was getting political emails that didn't seem to help in any way.
In business, you want results - not messages saying things will be investigated. You need results. in reading the emails, I got the feeling nothing would have materialised as there was no movement.

And comparing it to the GAA is nonsensical - the GAA have members in every branch of Irish society and can pull strings to get things done - it's not so simple for industries that don't have those ties.

Triangle

Deleted User wrote: »

That's not the Government's role. There is absolutely nothing stopping WebSummit chairing the meeting above and suggesting/educating, but that is not the Government's job.

Imagine if it was Dennis O'Brien's company and see if you'd consider the request fair.

Surely the Jobs Minster has done this role before and protecting this amount of jobs is important?

Didn't they sit with Dell, HP, and Apple to sort out infrastructure issues previously?

namloc1980

Triangle wrote: »

Surely the Jobs Minster has done this role before and protecting this amount of jobs is important?

Didn't they sit with Dell, HP, and Apple to sort out infrastructure issues previously?

What jobs are at stake?

namloc1980

Triangle wrote: »

But was he not taking the lead and getting in touch with the governing body (i.e. Government) who have the control over these areas? From reading the emails that were published, it seems that in reply to his queries he was getting political emails that didn't seem to help in any way.
In business, you want results - not messages saying things will be investigated. You need results. in reading the emails, I got the feeling nothing would have materialised as there was no movement.

And comparing it to the GAA is nonsensical - the GAA have members in every branch of Irish society and can pull strings to get things done - it's not so simple for industries that don't have those ties.

It's up to the organisers of any event to produce traffic management plans, transport plans etc. Mr Cosgrave believes he is above this and expects someone else to do it (for free of course paid by taxpayers).

kidneyfan

namloc1980 wrote: »

What jobs are at stake?

web summit employs dozens of people

heebusjeebus

kidneyfan wrote: »

web summit employs dozens of people

LOL

literally dozens

kidneyfan

kidneyfan wrote: »

web summit employs dozens of people

Close the roads! Strong Arm the RDS into installing a brand new WiFi network. Tell CIE to reroute the buses. Nationalise the hotels!

There are dozens of jobs at stake. Many 12s of jobs. Many.

namloc1980

kidneyfan wrote: »

web summit employs dozens of people

Oh the humanity!

smash

ThisRegard wrote: »

http://tech.eu/features/6244/web-summit-scam-well-ask/

It's worth reading the comments at the bottom.

Well if that's not damning then I don't know what is... Reading those comments makes me a bit uneasy, I have to say. The Alpha start-up programme just seems to use and abuse the participants.

I did notice the email a few weeks back (I get around 12/13 emails a week from web summit :rolleyes:) where they mention 40 start-ups making over a billion in investment between them and the photo associated showed the tiny spaces that the start-ups got. I also read a subsequent article somewhere which tried to break down the allocations of this money but the journalist couldn't get any answers from people who got investment. What they did note was that a huge amount of people got no investment, or even got to talk to investors at all.

smash

kidneyfan wrote: »

web summit employs dozens of people

You know that they mostly employ graduates and interns right? And that the jobs they give them are temporary...

grundie

Triangle wrote: »

But was he not taking the lead and getting in touch with the governing body (i.e. Government) who have the control over these areas?

No he wasn't. In the first instance he should be taking his problems and proposals to lower level people in the various state agencies - specifically the people who deal with that stuff on a day to day basis. But he can't just walk in and say "I have a problem, fix it", he needs to arrive with a detailed breakdown of his problems along with his ideas on how to resolve them. The civil servants will then discuss his proposals and suggest changes as necessary. At the end of it all there will be a detailed plan document that can be used as a basis for determining costs and from that funding can be sought or services paid for.

If the lower level civil servants can't/won't help then you escalate. But when you do escalate you really should provide proof that you tried at a lower level. Mr Cosgrave has offered no proof that he did this.

ThisRegard

kidneyfan wrote: »

web summit employs dozens of people

Many are volunteers I believe. From their own website

Students from 100+ countries will volunteer for 1 day at Web Summit. Our Web Summit Volunteer Programme is now full.

brooke 2

smash wrote: »

You know that they mostly employ graduates and interns right? And that the jobs they give them are temporary...

And, allegedly, he treats them like dirt. They must not be Trinity graduates!!

Triangle

Deleted User wrote: »

Close the roads! Strong Arm the RDS into installing a brand new WiFi network. Tell CIE to reroute the buses. Nationalise the hotels!

There are dozens of jobs at stake. Many 12s of jobs. Many.

I don't know the organisers and have no personal stake involved in this, but ridiculing things to make a point is useless. I don't believe that you can't see that having 30,000 people come to a city at a time won't bring revenue to the city. Revenue brings jobs. This leads me to believe you're arguing this point for other reasons.
I'm not going to waste my time in needless arguing.

brooke 2

grundie wrote: »

No he wasn't. In the first instance he should be taking his problems and proposals to lower level people in the various state agencies - specifically the people who deal with that stuff on a day to day basis. But he can't just walk in and say "I have a problem, fix it", he needs to arrive with a detailed breakdown of his problems along with his ideas on how to resolve them. The civil servants will then discuss his proposals and suggest changes as necessary. At the end of it all there will be a detailed plan document that can be used as a basis for determining costs and from that funding can be sought or services paid for.

If the lower level civil servants can't/won't help then you escalate. But when you do escalate you really should provide proof that you tried at a lower level. Mr Cosgrave has offered no proof that he did this.

Mr. Cosgrave seems to have had access to Enda Kenny since the Taoiseach had been in Opposition. So, you might say, once Fine Gael was elected to government in 2011, Paddy was 'well in', He got a good innings but, I guess he has been found out!

smash

grundie wrote: »

If the lower level civil servants can't/won't help then you escalate. But when you do escalate you really should provide proof that you tried at a lower level. Mr Cosgrave has offered no proof that he did this.

The thing is that he's a co-founder who made himself the face of the web summit. If I was the other founder is be selptaping his mouth closed at this stage and trying to get a good PR agency on my side.

I also received another email there to remind me that prices are going up tonight so thought I'd have a look and all the higher level tickets are sold out, and the applications for the pub crawls are closed.

Triangle

Triangle wrote: »

I don't know the organisers and have no personal stake involved in this, but ridiculing things to make a point is useless. I don't believe that you can't see that having 30,000 people come to a city at a time won't bring revenue to the city. Revenue brings jobs. This leads me to believe you're arguing this point for other reasons.
I'm not going to waste my time in needless arguing.

I'm fully aware of the importance of the jobs and the money that it can bring.

But that is what he was asking the Government to do. (His list of 'Asks')

Close the roads in the city centre - (asking the office of the Taoiseach to organise this)
Organise Garda escorts for VIPS - (again, asking the office of the Taoiseach to organise this)
Force the RDS to upgrade their WiFi network - (again, asking the office of the Taoiseach to organise this)
Interfere with private businesses to the extent of setting their prices - (again, asking the office of the Taoiseach to organise this)
Organise additional buses to service venues - (again, asking the office of the Taoiseach to organise this)

I can't see how any of these are acceptable things for a private business to ask the Government to organise for them so that they can make a profit.

Delegating and 'outsourcing' all your roles and getting people to do them for free/cheap seems to be a fantastic business plan, except when people don't agree to be exploited.

I don't pretend for a second that I think that the Government response was sufficient, but you have to consider that this is a person operating a private enterprise asking the Government to change/ignore laws and by laws for them, asking the Government to strong-arm other businesses into playing by his rules etc.

If the Government did all of these, wouldn't that be a prime example of corruption?

Triangle

grundie wrote: »

No he wasn't. In the first instance he should be taking his problems and proposals to lower level people in the various state agencies - specifically the people who deal with that stuff on a day to day basis. But he can't just walk in and say "I have a problem, fix it", he needs to arrive with a detailed breakdown of his problems along with his ideas on how to resolve them. The civil servants will then discuss his proposals and suggest changes as necessary. At the end of it all there will be a detailed plan document that can be used as a basis for determining costs and from that funding can be sought or services paid for.

If the lower level civil servants can't/won't help then you escalate. But when you do escalate you really should provide proof that you tried at a lower level. Mr Cosgrave has offered no proof that he did this.

I see your point, but all it would take is for the senior official to say in the email - Here is the person who should be dealing with this issue - can you take the issues here. If he case is that the summit didn't follow procedure then why didn't the official point them in the right direction?
This is all presumption - and we could talk ourselves into circles with it

smash

Deleted User wrote: »

I don't pretend for a second that I think that the Government response was sufficient, but you have to consider that this is a person operating a private enterprise asking the Government to change/ignore laws and by laws for them, asking the Government to strong-arm other businesses into playing by his rules etc.

By gas if Enda turned around and said "You want me to price manage private businesses? Ok, well then I want you to cover accommodation and travel costs for anyone buying a Premium or Platinum ticket!"

For Forks Sake

Triangle wrote: »

I don't know the organisers and have no personal stake involved in this, but ridiculing things to make a point is useless. I don't believe that you can't see that having 30,000 people come to a city at a time won't bring revenue to the city. Revenue brings jobs. This leads me to believe you're arguing this point for other reasons.
I'm not going to waste my time in needless arguing.

There were 55000 or so people at the Aviva for the Ireland Germany game the other night, maybe the FAI should have asked for Leap cards for all of them....

Sofiztikated

Triangle wrote: »

From what I understand he didn't want a cap on the hotel prices, he compared it to Lisbon where the government sat with stakeholders (i.e. hotel federation) and they discussed the benefits of having hotels filled when otherwise they might not be. The hotels saw reason and didn't raise the prices (probably did raise them but within reason I'm expecting)

It seems that hoteliers in Ireland are used to festivals not being able to move and holding people over a barrel in relation to hotel prices. I.e. Galway Races.
The prices in Galway during the Volvo Ocean race were nothing but extortionate. Not that the Ocean race is gone - the hotels have lost that revenue (very short sighted imo)

The Volvo Ocean Race was always going to move. It had nothing to do with the price of hotel rooms. And the revenue that hotels made during the period that it was on isn't "lost." It just that their budgets for the following year will have to take into account that the event won't be happening.

Around the world, if there is an event happening, then hotels use revenue and yield management to estimate how much they can get for their rooms. IT'S HOW THEY MAKE MONEY! Does it suck for the average Joe Soap that wants a night or 2 in whatever destination? Yes, yes it does. But they are in the business of supply and demand.

But it is in no way down to the Office of the Taoiseach to intervene. Paddy, or one of his minions, should have been meeting with sales and revenue managers of hotels, battering down the price themselves. That's part of event management. But as I've said before, the city has 18,000 hotel beds, and there was a supposed draw of 30,000 people, demand outstrips supply, so the hotels are best positioned to charge a higher price. You know, kind of like what Paddy was doing, and charging a cool €1000 a ticket.

Is it a loss to Dublin? Yes. But sometimes, just sometimes, a job just isn't worth all the hassle. ****, even his Leap Card suggestion (providing Leap Cards to 30,000 people, with, say, €20 credit on them, would cost have cost €600,000. Which he wanted for free. If he had said he wanted to purchase them at a discounted rate, and distribute them, or subsidize the cost, grand, but a "Here, give me these for free, or I'm leaving?" G'wan and f*ck yourself.

brooke 2

For Forks Sake wrote: »

There were 55000 or so people at the Aviva for the Ireland Germany game the other night, maybe the FAI should have asked for Leap cards for all of them....

The FAI could organise a European final in the Aviva back in 2011 during the few days the Queen was in Dublin. It was excellent, from what I hear, even down to the detail of having Gardai who could speak Portuguese stationed on duty at the exits (Oporto was playing). No histrionics from anyone and no complaints, iirc. Paddy has a lot to learn, poor chap.

smash

If anyone's interested in how much funding and support the state has already given Paddy, here's a nice bit of reading for you: http://www.independent.ie/business/technology/web-summit-wars-heres-how-some-of-the-failte-ireland-ida-and-enterprise-ireland-871000-fees-break-down-31614601.html