Talk:Game Developers Conference

Some details on the missing bits of history section

http://www.erasmatazz.com/personal/experiences/the-computer-game-developer.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.27.89.139 (talk) 18:13, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

Needs more info

This article is completely correct but I can't help but feel that it doesn't cover the history of the conference as thoroughly as I would like. Come to think of it, the portion of the Article that is about the current conference is too short, too although I'm not involved in it so this isn't really my concern.

I'm going to use this space to throw out some things I remember in the hope that others will be able to fill in (or, sad to say, correct) my spotty memories. I would like to include a list of all the conference venues and what happened so even if you only went to one, please chime in.

I was there at the beginning and I remember the meeting at Crawford's house (although I don't remember there being a series of them). Chris announced that he wanted to do a formal conference and that asked for volunteers. 7 of us volunteered but I only remember Steven (last name?) who did the finance, Brenda Laurel, me (Dave Menconi, I did facilities), Tim Brengle and Chris Crawford; I cannot remember the other 2 -- which is why I'm not just editing the article directly! :)

The conference had 2 goals. First (and foremost) to bring the developers together. For all the years we'd been doing it we didn't know each other. We were not, therefor, able exchange information about which companies were good to work for and which were great much less able to keep track of where we all were. The second goal was the public reason for the conference: to exchange technical information.

Many of the design features of the conference itself reflect these goals and are still part of the current conference. For example, there are long breaks between sessions. You might think that this was so that you can get from one session to any other but in the early days everything was very close together. The purpose (at least *my* purpose, and I was certainly involved in this aspect) was to give people time to talk -- if you went to an interesting session you might use that time to continue talking about it. Likewise having the whole conference in a small area, having lunch on site and close, having extra time for lunch and so forth.

Davemenc 02:10, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, you sound as qualified as anyone else (or moreso) to make the changes to the article. After all, you were there! But we do need some references to back up all the information, and that's the hard part. After all, who writes about this stuff?

By the way, I used to work with Tim Brengle. He was in charge of the Tools department when I worked at Accolade. I guess he was my boss--I was in the Tools department. Small world... — Frecklefoot | Talk 18:16, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

Are you sure I need references in support of statements made about my own personal experiences? I suppose I could write a page on my web site and then reference it... :)

I'm not sure where Tim is working now but he's still with the conference (I think he still runs the volunteers). The games industry is much smaller than one might think: almost everyone has friends in common.

Davemenc 04:50, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Tim and Gordon Walton might be good sources, as they are the only two people who have been to every conference including the one in Chris's living room. As one of an unknown but still small number of people who have been to every one since that, I keep track! Dave, you covered things well, the only difference in my memory is the size of the first conference in the hotel in late 1988, I believe it was 180 but I've seen various figures. Chris started a "competing" series of invitation-only mini-conferences held the day before GDC in a different location in San Jose after he was kicked off the conference committee, but I'm not sure that's relevant to this page. Seems odd to me that the article also talks about Eric's Game Design Challenge as that is just one of hundreds of recurring sessions at GDC, and thousands of total sessions.

NFalstein 01:42, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

Yep, I wasn't sure if that section belonged at all. Feel free to nix it. — Frecklefσσt | Talk 18:29, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

It's been bugging me so I'll mention it: the "first CGDC" meeting at Chris's house was not really the first CGDC. As I recall, that was the meeting in which he asked for volunteers. Strictly speaking, the CGDC didn't officially start until the board was formed and we actually held the first conference at the Holiday Inn in Milpitas (which, by the way, wasn't "a Holiday Inn" as there was only one. The week before the conference it was very picturesque: there was a little cornfield right next door so it looked like a modern high rise hotel was rising out of a cornfield. Unfortunately, they cut the corn a few days before the conference so I was never really able to share the joke with anyone --"Milpitas" supposedly means "little cornfield" in Spanish). —Preceding unsigned comment added by Davemenc (talk • contribs) 23:55, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Vandalism

I'm seeing frequent Vandalism by TexCube. Mathiastck 20:33, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

missing some of the middle history

The article mentions the early history---its founding by Crawford, his keynoting the first few conferences, etc.---but then jumps to the present day, neglecting the messy bit in between where Crawford was forced off the board on bad terms and the conference was sold to a media conglomerate (without Crawford receiving any of the proceeds). --Delirium (talk) 01:19, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Where is the GDC???

Does it tour around the world or is it an U.S.-only thing? Same goes for the Developers - are there only American or also international Developers? And where did it start? Forgot my account-name, so you have to bear with my ip... 84.60.211.212 (talk) 16:49, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

FIX

Fixed a typo in Game Design Challenge, "Challenge was to created a game based on", d removed from create 85.156.239.212 (talk) 18:14, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

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