Ten tickets available to developers made redundant
UK game developers who have fallen victim to recent cuts and downsizing have been offered the chance to attend a key industry event for free.
Ten tickets are up for grabs for the Develop in Liverpool Conference, which takes place Thursday 25 November.
“There’s no doubt that the recent demise of some studios and the downsizing of others has hit the development community hard and things are tough for some developers right now,” said Andy Lane of event organiser Tandem.
“The Develop Conferences in both Liverpool and Brighton have always been about providing a focal point for the development community as a whole,“ he added.
“We recognised a while back that there was a shift in the industry, which was one of the reasons why we introduced a number of free sessions to Develop in Brighton and we’re keen to make Liverpool equally as inclusive.”
Last week Develop revealed the UK games development workforce had contracted by nine per cent since 2008.
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The bleak statistics came weeks after Realtime Worlds – once the UK’s biggest independent game studio – fell into administration.
Lane added “This event is as much about bringing developers together as it is about learning new skills & techniques, so it offers an ideal networking environment for developers from right across the UK to stay connected with the industry. That’s why we’re happy to play our part and give away free passes to the first ten developers who get in touch and have genuinely been affected by recent events, and we’ll offer a discounted rate to those that miss out on the free tickets.”
The ten passes are available on a first come, first served basis. Email passes@developconference.com to apply.
Come on, give ALL of those affected free passes provided they can confirm they're out of work. It's not like these things are cheap.
Sure, lets give them all cab rides down there and Bollinger on arrival eh? There's a real cost attached to attending events. They're not a charity.
If it costs too mucgh then simply DON'T DO IT, instead of blowing your trumpet about helping out ten of the 900 people who have lost their jobs in the last year.
It's like Liamm said.
As for the cost, it's not as real as you might think - most of those who might take advantage of the otherwise free tickets might not actually ATTEND the event without them, and the organisers can always look to sell a few more exhibitor tickets on the basis that there will be a whole bunch of eager, unemployed devs there, so they could end up making MORE money as a result.
But that's obviously far too complex an argument for you to get your head around, eh
What a lovely idea. Unfortunately the reality is that there is a cost attached to EVERY SINGLE attendee for show organisers. 'Tis a business after all.
A show full of free attendees = a large unpaid bill. So yes, have a charity event this year and invite as many as you like gratis. Enjoy it, as there won't be one next year. No 'complex' argument required, simples.
The Browsergame Forum in Frankfurt (on right now) is free for all developers of browser games.
The bills are paid by sponsors and those attendees that are not developers.
Why can they do it in Frankfurt and not Liverpool?
What are you smoking?
We're talking about a trade show. We're talking about an event with paying attendees. Many of those attendees will be recruiting, so surely offering free access to unemployed developers would be an added bonus for those (paying) attendees.
Your "show full of free attendees" doesn't apply in this case. Only some of them would be "free". And they'll be targets for a lot of the companies there.
A) It's 300 POUNDS to attend this thing, not pence. If you think that's cheap by all means paypal it to me and then some, I'll happily blow it on some Bollinger.
B) On the flip side, the only devs out of work aren't very good ones. Like everything else in this world, the cream always rises to the top. If you're worthy of attending this show you certainly won't be unemployed, and if you're unemployed you're really not worthy of attending this show. See how that works?
They should come to Canada, the trade shows here have given free admission to the recently laid off for quite a while.
James,Your views on the unemployed are incredibly naive and stupid.
Your second point simply isn't true.
Yes, there's a small core of unemployed developers who, in all honesty, will struggle to get back into the industry for various reasons - jobs being shipped overseas, ageism (yes, it's there) or plain incompetence.
But you'll also have many who WILL get back into the industry and will do quite well, thank you very much.
To argue that all developers out of work are incompetent is, well, incompetent in itself.
There are many different jobs, many different devs; some devs are required in greater quantity than others, some will have more work to do.
If someone was s**t at their job they would have been fired long before cuts had to be made.
Maybe your world is just black and white?
