Last week i was at Mix 06 in Las Vegas. Big props/thanks to Lynda.com and Microsoft for bringing the usual suspects together to play Halo and party in Vegas. Flash has taken me to see quite a few places in the world, but Vegas is something else.
I didnt see much of the conference, after 3 weeks of late nights and flying in and out of Sydney, Hong Kong and Washington D.C i was pretty wiped out, so some serious sleeping had to be done. I did manage to keep up with the rest of the crowd in the Adobe suite (as it came to be known in the Microsoft camp) thanks mainly to a bathtub full of red bull, alot of which was consumed by me 
As always it was great fun to hang out with Mike C, Mike D, Danny, Chafic, Grant, Beau, Hoss and Andries. I will of course make a more serious post about my thoughts on the new Microsoft Expression suite very shortly but for now, id like to talk about the fun that was had.
Many hours were spent glued to one of two plasma screens in the Adobe suite, playing multiplayer Halo 2 and PGR 3. One night in particular we had a Halo 2 tournament and a PGR3 tournament, complete with prizes for first and second place. After 3 rounds of 8 player slayer, myself and Grant went head to head to see who would win the grand prize. After what seemed like an eternity i came up on top, Grant coming close second in a tense battle, that left us both shaking. I won a PSP and Grant won an Ipod Nano.
I managed to see a little of what Las Vegas had to offer, we checked out the malls, ceasers palace, a couple of the other hotels and casinos, the sirens of ti show (which was terrible) and the billagio water fountains (which was amazing) but we spent most of our time in the Venetian resort (which can only be described as a small town). This is probably the best hotel i have ever stayed in, it was lush to say the least!
Me, Grant and Chafic also managed to check out the Blue Man Group show in the Venetian one evening, and it was awesome, i was absolutley blown away by it all, definetley worth checking out if your in that neck of the desert.
Naturally we also managed to party a little, one night in particular was party night (two parties, then an after part). The exclusive V.I.P party was held on the top floor of the Palms in the Kingpin suite, a large 4240-sq.ft retro-styled suite complete with two fully-automated bowling alleys (dont ask why, i have no idea either), a bar, pool table and view to die for. This is were we got to mingle with the Microsoft crowd on a more drunken personal level, apparently the Microsoft employees were given a memo with a list of things they were not allowed to talk about (which is understandable i guess with all the lawsuits they have thrown at them). We arrived to the party in style in a Limousine, again courtesy of Microsoft.
After that party died down, the remainder of the crowd headed across to the Ghost Bar also in the Palms, which again had a view to die for, 55 floors high with a balcony looking out over Vegas at night, complete with DJ giving it large in the background. At this party i achieved the unthinkable, i actually persuaded Mike C to dance, i also have photographic evidence, which proves that both him and Grant were dancing. Danny even swayed a little
Max will be held in Vegas around October time, which is a great excuse for me to both attend my first Max conference and visit Vegas again to check out what i missed this time around. Clearly four/five days isnt all that much time in Vegas.
As always my trusty digital camera captured some of the action. Checkout my photos from Las Vegas here.
Tags: conferences