Customer Reviews

Guerrilla Guide to High-Tech Trade Shows:: The Underground Resource for Saving Your Time, Money, and Sanity

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This book reads like the review of your hometown, where you know the reviewer has passing familiarity with the subject, but the information comes across as a pay-by-the-word exercise rather than a useful guide.

Much of this comes across as stating the obvious. Do you really need to pay to have someone tell you that if the phone line is long, go across the street and try another one; or sillier yet, go check the "restricted access" area of the hotel for a phone? Or that if you're carrying a lot of SWAG (i.e., stuff we all get) you might not want to walk back to your hotel because it might be awkward and your bag might break?

As to travel arrangements, is there really a big audience of attendees who are paying their own way and can't figure out just to call a travel agent and ask for the cheapest fare and leave it at that?

The "gonzo tours" were lame. Las Vegas, for instance. "Drive out to Red Rock Canyon". Any possibility of adding a little more descriptive information so someone would actually have a reason to check it out? The main tour consists mainly of trolling the boulevard in a pimp mobile. What about rating (or even mentioning!) the rides, for example, and maybe suggesting the best time to go for the shortest lines. Or mention why you might actually want to spring for expensive tickets to Cirque du Soleil. Or if you have a day off, one of the most spectacular places on earth, Zion N. P., is 3 1/2 hours away. And the largest (or one of the largest) roller coasters in the world is about a half hour away. The Las Vegas tours section looks like 5 minutes was spent on the web before writing it.

It seemed like every chapter I read left me waiting for real substance. For example, under the heading "Wear Comfortable Shoes", there isn't one helpful tip to elaborate. The authors should have stopped while they were ahead, i.e., after the heading. Maybe that was the point; it wasn't really written to be useful. It's really some guys' version of a humorous take on trade shows.

The other thing that really started to grate on me was the fact that they didn't even bother to use a spell checker or editor (apparently). A few examples: "PRESENTAION", "Freemont St." (It's FREMONT!), and "steady gate" (as opposed to steady gait).

In summary, you'd really do better with your own common sense or advice from a co-worker than you would spending your money on this mass of verbiage. "Hot tips" is really false advertising.

It's about time somebody wrote a book lampooning trade shows! I've been going to high-tech trade shows for years, and was thrilled to find some kindred (and extremely funny) spirits who could see through all of the hype to find the humor in these overblown events.This book is filled with wry observations and laughs. It's really more of a humor book than a traditional "how-to." It's also more of a take on the computer industry as a whole, with all of its huge egos and wacky marketing schemes. Therefore, although specific information on some shows may be dated, the essence of what makes these shows tick (and sometimes frustrate) remains true. The satire in this book is right on!A funny, entertaining read. Highly recommended!

A wonderful, funny guide to those big technology shows that populate Las Vegas. If you're going to Comdex as a visitor, get this one!

This book isn't designed to help exhibitors get more out of their show, but exhibitors will learn ways to keep themselves entertained after the show closes.

While the book uses the title "Guerrilla", it's not part of the series of Guerrilla Marketing books by Jay Conrad Levinson.

Get the book and get ready to laugh!

PC Magazine's John C. Dvorak calls it "one way-cool book."
PC WEEK says it has "really funny stuff," and Internet Underground
says it's "worth packing for on-plane reading."

The Guerrilla Guide to High-Tech Trade Shows uproariously
unmasks the world of high-tech industry conventions, while
showing you how to get everything you want at a show with
a minimum of hassle.It's packed with lacerating ovservations
and outrageous tracks of the trades discovered the hard way
-- through years of promotional dinners, complimentary hotel
suites and easy press passes. Included:

* GUERRILLA STRATEGIES for getting great airline deals;
free hotel upgrades; special trade show credentials; private
product previews; dodges around annoying lines; and access
to the coolest parties.

* FREEZE FRAME views of show culture, including bizarre booth
themes; strange ExpoVittles; free stuff (gimmes); brain-dead
marketing presentations; exotic party flora and fauna; and
common parinoid delusions that hit you while you're on the
show floor!

* GONZO TOURS to offbeat and unusual places in ten major
trade show cities (suggestions for wheels and tunes
included!). Once you've taken a Gonzo Tour, you'll never
look at a trade show city the same way again!

This is the underground survival guide no high-tech warrior
should be without!