Comic-Con International is the biggest pop culture convention in the world, with an equally big problem. 145 comic-book geeks came to the first convention in 1970 to hobnob with legendary sci-fi collector Forrest Ackerman, but attendance has exploded in recent years. More than 125,000 people are believed to have attended the 2007 con, with its four days of geek nirvana: comic book and pop culture discussions, sci-fi movie marathons, anime insanity, and the ever-popular costume contests, where fans dress up en masse as Klingons, Imperial Stormtroopers, or spiky-haired ninjas and battle to see who can put on the most impressive show.
But Comic-Con, like some of its smaller contemporaries, is running out of room. Fortunately, an Australian mobile technology company named BroadcasterMedia may offer a solution.
Despite moving into the gargantuan San Diego Convention Center with its 2.6 million square feet of space, Comic-Con sold out every pass in 2006 and, for the first time in its history, had to shut out would-be attendees. More were turned away in 2007, and prospective visitors to the 2008 show are being urged to buy their passes well in advance if they want to be assured a place in the big show. Fans have been fighting massive crowds at Comic-Con and other conventions around the country to try to get into the panels they want, to get that revered autograph from a favorite writer, artist, actor, or filmmaker. While Comic-Con still blows away every other convention in sheer number of things for a bored fan to do, the crowds make it more and more difficult to prioritize. The situation is even worse at smaller shows, with booming crowds trying to get into a smaller number of events. 2008's Con Season, as the late spring and summer months are known among fans and creators, may be the most crowded yet.
Fortunately, BroadcasterMedia offers a high-tech system that promises to carry the wild and woolly cons into the twenty-first century. At last fall's Sydney Motor Show in Australia, Toyota used BroadcasterMedia's mobile marketing technology to help visitors download information on thefull Toyota fleet by sending a message to a text number provided at the show. A subsequent show in Las Vegas saw the system grow to offer the complete speakers program, biographies and maps of the conference venue.
?It delivers an interactive marketing experience that you can view online or save and take with you, which is a very big point,? Halter said in a company press release. ?It's an extremely flexible piece of software.
"It can be marketing information, news, events, catalogues, and they can be delivered to a mobile phone or a mobile device such as a PDA or Blackberry," she said.
It may also be the answer to packed convention halls. As geek culture goes mainstream with the success of big-budget superhero movies and the rise of the gaming generation, attendance at cons is expected to rise, and a system like BroadcasterMedia's, which can create an online community on users? phones regardless of handset model or service provider, may offer the waves of new geeks a chance to find panels and performances off the beaten path. The system has also been used at a theme park in Ohio, allowing tech-savvy teens to download line times for their favorite roller coasters.
Can the schedule for the Klingon clan reunion be far behind?