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Cybersecurity Conferences: Local vs National and Talks vs Vendors · CYBR.Signal

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Hey everybody, Michael Farnum here.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: Happy Cyber Sunday.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: Hope you're doing well.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: Today is Sunday, August the something.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know, August 8th or 7th, I guess.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I am going to be going out to Black Hat tomorrow, Black Hat conference.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: If you're there and you see me, hopefully we can say hello.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: But I've been thinking about kind of doing this little cyber Sunday here for a little bit about conferences in general.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: Got a couple of thoughts on it, and I'm going to be really non-committal as to what I prefer on each one.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: And just if you want to bring up your comments down below, that that'd be great.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: Just kind of a discussion, but it's always in my brain.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: Which the two things are one, what do you like best?
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: Local con or large national con.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: And two, do you go to conferences for the talks more or do you go for the comp do the conferences for uh to see vendors?
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: And large con, small con, local con, and other ones affect that differently as to what you're talking, you know, what you're thinking.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: I think anyway.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so let me start with the first one local con our large national con.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: I may be a little biased on this.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: If you don't know, I run a conference uh down here in Houston, it's coming up in October, um, October 20th and 21st, by the way, called HUSECCON stands for Houston Security Conference.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's local.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: We get anywhere between you know seven to nine hundred people that come out.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: We're hoping for more this year.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, local to Texas more, we're starting to get a lot of the crowd from outside.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: So, but there's a lot of value to that, I think, because you got a local uh folks who are doing stuff with that conference, and you got the local community who are getting together, seeing each other.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: So that's all well and good.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: You got a lot of people who are local that uh submit talks for it as well, so that's all good.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: So you get that community feel um and get some leadership in the community that you know they really are developing their leadership skills and developing talking skills and everything else, so it's good for their career, but the national conferences can do that as well.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: They don't have the local feel, but they really can help develop careers and actually get on the national stage can really boost your career.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I I kind of go back and forth.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know which one I like best.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: Again, I might be biased because of the local conferences.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: I hear people say there are too many local conferences.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: I I I mean, unless it just gets ridiculous, I don't agree with that because there's a lot of people who can't make those big national conferences, and local conferences are the best.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um that's one question I got there.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: Again, I'm going back and forth.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: If I had to give an opinion on that, I would probably say local con, but the large conferences definitely have their pluses.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um, on the second question, do you go for vendor show to see what new vendors are coming up are and kind of see the trends there, or do you go to see the talks?
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: I think most people who are attending the full thing, that's why they pay for the full thing.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: Excuse the cop going by, um, because they want to see the talk, so they pay for the whole thing.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: That's why they're going there to see the latest and greatest stuff.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: I I'll be honest, I don't get to go to very many talks anymore just because most of the time when I go to the national conferences, I'm going to uh to meetings and stuff like that to talk to customers and vendors, so I don't even get the full ticket, it's just where I am in my career, unfortunately.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: I there are a couple of conferences of the past where I just focus on seeing talks and getting to do stuff, and I'll watch stuff later as much as I can.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but then the other side of the coin is a lot of people go to see vendors because they want to get the latest trends and see what the latest folks are doing and go to that kind of innovation-y type area to see what new vendors are coming up, something they haven't thought of.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, there's a lot of new stuff that gets in there, you know, the API vendors and all of those, all kind of launched in those spaces, either at RSA or Black Hat.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm I'm I I'm dithering a little bit there too.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: I think if I had again, if I had to give an opinion there, I'd probably say the talks because that's what I want to see.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: I want to see what people are saying, give any, you know, any really cool projects that are going on.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: But on the other hand, my job as CTO is to daily talk to these vendors and to see what they've got going on, and going there helps me get sometimes at even uh kind of a deeper level with those vendors.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: So, anyway, feel free to say, you know, can me tell me what you think down below and kind of start a discussion.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, on the one side, do you go, do you like local cons or large national cons better?
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: And two, do you go for the talks or do you go for the vendors?
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: And uh that's it.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: Let us know what you think.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: If you're at Black Hat, I'll see you there.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: Hopefully, please stop by, say hello.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: I'll be walking around the floor probably Thursday.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: Wednesday's a all day meeting, so Thursday I'll probably be walking around.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so anyway, happy Cyber Sunday.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: See you next time.