James, it was great to meet you as well, looking forward to our next conversation.

Thanks for coming to my presentation on “Science Friction” — compatibility tetsing present and future. It was great and long over due to finally meet you in person as well and catch up on your projects. I look forward to what the future will bring!

Cheers,

James Houran, Ph.D.
http://www.OnlineDatingMagazine.com

Thanks for this very comprehensive review and thank you for mentioning the Userplane situation. To confirm for you, Userplane is not, repeat not, shutting down and will continue to offer its market leading chat and IM services. We are excited about the future and still see the online dating space as a critical component of our customer base. The conference gave us a great forum for clarifying Userplane’s status. But more importantly, it was an excellent opportunity to meet with our customers and partners directly. Userplane has previously attended and supported the iDate conferences and will continue to do so, given its high value within the online dating space.

We ALL care about the industry, but many of us are not going to continue to pay $1000 to hear the same old platitudes over the same old beer and chips.

Evan Marc Katz

I’ve only spoken at iDate once because years ago I made a total “in-joke” on this blog about an attendee who never showed up again.

After being invited to speak in Miami this year, my consulting business grew accordingly. I understand the value of iDate and I want the show to get better, be awesome and inspiring. Net result: the dating Industry gets smarter and stronger and so does my business. I’m also responsible for a portion of the exhibitors and attendees over the years, but that’s neither here or there.

Mark responded with a spot-on remark. He knows exactly what the deal is with iDate and owned up to the shortcomings and promised to do better. That awareness is exactly what I was hoping for.

As the strategist for Courtland Brooks, I expected different behavior from you. Is this your normal way of commenting on anything that might reflect negatively on your organization?

FYI, social dating is not social media.

Glad to hear the payment processing session went well. It should probably be a Wednesday workshop, you simply can’t get to the level of detail required in an hour.

The final panel: If that session encapsulated how the online dating industry expects to get to $5 billion, I think we’re all in a lot of trouble. You mistake my play-acting for something else, I’m a vodka man myself. You saw an opening and you were shallow enough to take it, which says as much about your character as your lone comment during the session did about your capabilities as a strategic thinker.

The point of my comment was that looking backwards at Google Trends doesn’t get us anywhere, the whole point of the session was to look *forward*.

I guess you didn’t hear the 20 or so people agree with me out loud. I just wanted to get things back on track instead of wasting time screwing around on Google when there was the potential for substantial discussion.

You are absolutely correct, my review was biased and based on personal motivations.

My motivations: I advise a select group of companies related to the online dating space. They hire me for my knowledge, talent, objectivity, resources and straight talk. In my mind, If the industry grows, iDate grows (and hopefully improves) and my business grows. I’m more of an industry observer than an insider. I’m not all chummy with everyone like your organization. I’m the guy that points out what’s wrong and how to fix it, on this blog and at conferences. Sometimes hearing the truth is hard, but in the end it helps us grow.

My bias is towards cooperation, sharing business and helping companies succeed. I often send Courtland Brooks new business and Mark sends it to me as well. I don’t see us as competitors, especially when we’re heading towards a $5 billion industry and we’re pretty much the only consultants in the market that do what we do.

Or just keep the conference the same and people will still fill the coffers with cash but the respect and the “must attend at all costs” value won’t be as strong as it could be. It’s up to you to decide which way you’re going to go.

This was without a doubt the best venue we have had yet. Many top executives were present, along with budding entrepreneurs and we more than double the attendance of the last California iDate.

Ultimately, as regards the agenda, I know we can do better, and I will make sure the next one is stronger. Thanks for your feedback Dave. Your feedback really helps to motivate me to do better, and make the conference as strong as it can possibly be.

Usually when one reviews a show, they attend most of the sessions. You admit you skipped many of the key sessions. So how can you possibly begin to offer a fair critique? Would I hold a restaurant reviewer in high esteem if they gave a restaurant review by looking in the window?

This year you apparently were not asked to be on any panels, nor be a speaker in any capacity. One must wonder what your motivations were in giving such a bad review of the conference.

Personally, I found many of the sessions I attended highly informative and well worth the time and money to be there. Along with some excellent dating sessions, I attended two great social networking sessions on social media marketing by two brilliant speakers. If you are in the dating industry and not fully aware what is going on in social media, you are behind the curve. As you said, Alex Mehr showed what can happen when you combine the two.

I find it curious that you completely ignored the payment processing session even though it was specifically put in there because previous attendees asked for it. However, since I was the speaker, if you were disinterested, I am glad you didn’t attend. Many sites are very concerned about payment processing this year and they wanted an unbiased view rather than a lecture from an credit card industry insider. That’s what they got.

The final session, in my opinion, did what it was supposed to do – it got people thinking and talking. The room was crowded and lots of people had vocal comments and questions – a sign of success in a forum like that. What I noticed from you was that, without being recognized, you yelled out one comment that we should get off the current topic. Frankly, you sounded a bit tipsy, as you did in the final session of IDate Miami. Your comment seemed to be ignored by the crowd as they continued to stay on the topic for awhile. You then left the room early. Not exactly the behavior one would expect from somebody who is giving a professional review.

Sorry Dave. Your review seems to be wholly biased and based on personal motivations.

Glenn G. Millar