Just to add an extra point against the "booth babes".
I don't have numbers to back this up, just personal real world experience. But from what I've seen, most developers (the ones that are worth their salt at least), and notice I say most, not all, are generally on the shier, more introverted side. On top of that, once again, most, not all, developers that have the seniority to make good decisions for their company are happily married. These two assumptions, assuming they are true become the reason why many good developers won't even walk to up to the booth in the first place.
The introverted kind is too shy to take a chance that he'll have to talk to someone he's not comfortable with and is there as eye candy to go into the booth and find out more about the company. And the married kind is most likely to have his opinion of the company altered just by seeing these booth babes.
But besides this, this whole phenomenon is just dumb. I always thought booth babes were stupid and useless at autoshows (to reinforce my point, ever seen a booth babe by a minivan or a Camry?), and now to bring them over to DrupalCon is just plain stupid. I would hate to see us be perceived or even worse turn into a community of brogrammers (if such a thing really does exist).
We have fun at DrupalCons, but the reason that many of us put down the price for the cross continental ticket isn't to see booth babes. We go there to talk about Drupal things with Drupal developers, and see old friends. Let's keep it at that
The Reverse Effect
Great article!!
Just to add an extra point against the "booth babes".
I don't have numbers to back this up, just personal real world experience. But from what I've seen, most developers (the ones that are worth their salt at least), and notice I say most, not all, are generally on the shier, more introverted side. On top of that, once again, most, not all, developers that have the seniority to make good decisions for their company are happily married. These two assumptions, assuming they are true become the reason why many good developers won't even walk to up to the booth in the first place.
The introverted kind is too shy to take a chance that he'll have to talk to someone he's not comfortable with and is there as eye candy to go into the booth and find out more about the company. And the married kind is most likely to have his opinion of the company altered just by seeing these booth babes.
But besides this, this whole phenomenon is just dumb. I always thought booth babes were stupid and useless at autoshows (to reinforce my point, ever seen a booth babe by a minivan or a Camry?), and now to bring them over to DrupalCon is just plain stupid. I would hate to see us be perceived or even worse turn into a community of brogrammers (if such a thing really does exist).
We have fun at DrupalCons, but the reason that many of us put down the price for the cross continental ticket isn't to see booth babes. We go there to talk about Drupal things with Drupal developers, and see old friends. Let's keep it at that