A Postcard from Topaz Partners’ Adam Zand

Hey Strumpetters!

Greetings from the recovery ward following New Comm Forum in Las Vegas – a few thoughts to get you pumped about attending the next Society for New Communication Research event this December in “Boston, you’re my home.”

If the Venetian Hotel -- mall/money drop -- is meant to represent Venice, why isn’t it pigeon-infested or smelly, containing fewer German tourists and way too many “Phantom of Opera”-singing glee club-Gondoleers, who while limited by indoor canel distances still get big tips. Side note: the striking Kristin Sattenwhite is an amazing singer as featured in the real “Phantom” performance downstairs.

An early scandal was the hotel running out of bagels during breakfast the on first day - lame. I recovered by going down the hall and getting a full breakfast at a traffic association gathering. Hey, I wait in traffic - they owe me.

I’m a bit steamed at my drinking buddy Brian Solis. This followed a brief fruitless discussion about the “real” identity of Strumpette that goes nowhere and sidesteps the existence of great content that occasionally antagonizes him and others like Kami Watson Huyse, Susan Getgood and the more deserving of abuse brain trust 2.0 at Edelman. That discussion didn't piss me off as much as when Brian wouldn't use his good looks to walk up to some hot female night clubbers that would have got me, him and Tom Foremski into Tao dance club in the Venetian. Even with passes (and help from a new friend/club opener and possible natural blond and maybe other natural body parts, Crissi), we needed to bring in ladies - how goofy as it was a sausage factory inside on the whole. I was so upset that I had to stay dancing until 3 a.m. to make up for my 50 minute wait. It’s the same place that Britney puked the night she passed out at another club. They should have shellacked the floor as a memento but that might have drawn attention away from the two women with pasties in a tub and the women above the dance floor in a cage and writhing on a mini bed.

I leveled abuse (well just an antagonistic question or three) to BusinessWire's Laura Sturaitis and PR Newswire's George Vazquez during the social media panel. My biggest new PR gripe is why these firms charge so much for some social media services like EON or tagging, and really how they get away with charging $400 for a wire photo when Flickr seems to be free. Seems to go against the ethos of social media environment, but I guess they have bills to pay too (or large corporate owners that need some payback). I await the entry of Google or a useful/reliable open source distribution service soon – everybody is allowed to charge what they want, but my entrepreneurial client deserve some choices.

Good gossip to share about Debbie Weil being nasty to employees of Ragan, SNCR and the moderator at her Corporate Blogging panel by saying "that's not the question we discussed before," and she meant it. Oh, and she raffled her book during the panel and then was pissed when another book went missing - she should have taken it as a compliment as her message seems a bit tired.

Finalé

The scene: late afternoon at one of a seemingly endless Wolfgang Puck-branded Vegas restaurants. I'm having end-of-event celebration drinks (an amzing Pear Drop martini for me) with SNCR's Executive Director Jen McClure, Closing Keynoter Shel Holtz and the VP of Ragans - I reached over a booth to get my laptop bag and heard a loud rip. Rip was isolated to my crotchal region of six-year old Banana Republic lightweight kahkis.

So you'll retort, "no big deal," many folks in Vegas are adept at showing their nether regions to the paparazzi - ("Britney, Lindsey and Paris, please mind the step when exiting the limo"). True, but I am representing Topaz Partners and by proxy my Web 2.7 clients - it's hard to blend in with the other exhibitionistas in this town.

Happy ending (get it Amanda?) - I purchased new pants from a hot young retailer (side note: Vegas is now funding the engineering and mass distribution of these sexy robots at Area 51), changed into my bathing suit and flip flops (already in my computer bag) to sneak into the 10th floor pool at the Venetian. So, naturally this tale comes to a glorious end with a naked jacuzzi experience. My tranquility (and BlackBerry use on the deck for event thank you notes, SMS and calls) is broken by four bachelorette party bathers.

And that, my friends is where this telling ends, because what happens in Vegas stays in Woburn (non-Jacuzzi, but dirty water home of Topaz Partners).

P.S. I had a blast at this event (great job Jen McClure!!!) and we’ll distribute some interview podcasts soon.

Warm Regards,

Adam