3,3,5,2,3

These were the approximate times I crawled into my bed on this trip.

Barcelona is certainly different to Cannes. Much larger, making it much harder to find people and venues and also supporting an insane array of prostitutes and strip bars which the taxi drivers are overly keen to show off to visiting business people.

The event was brutal. I think it will be a week or more before I can walk properly again. There's nothing like walking 5+ miles a day and standing pretty much the whole time to make you feel bad. That and bad food, far far far far too much drinking and long days and it's a miserable experience.

The business side was, from my perspective, fantastic. Some excellent meetings with some seriously senior figures in the industry and a lot of business done. Unfortunately we still can't bloody tell anyone which is driving me completely nuts.

Anyway, now resting in the hotel M and I are staying over the weekend and a well deserved bit of R&R.

Oh, and we have a completion date for the house sale!!!!!! We will get the keys on March 1st.

YAY!!!!!

3GSM 2006 - Barcelona

3GSM is pretty much the telecoms industry's largest event. Until last year it was held in Cannes and would attract around 35,000 people - this year it was moved to Barcelona where they could support more people.

At the end of the day, dispite the external reputation, Cannes is a pretty sleep little place. Barcelona, on the other hand, is a pretty massive city with all the associated problems that come with that; crime, prostitution, large distances. In some respects the move to Barcelona is a little like a shift from an Eastercon to a Worldcon - same kind of thing, but many more people and much tougher logistics.

Not all was bad. It's been a pretty good year for the industry, the best for 4 years or so and that was reflected in the corporate entertainment. Again, like conventions, the first few times you go can be tough. You don't know many people, you don't know where to go and what you should be doing. It can be a lonely experience while you wait for co-workers to finish at parties and other events. After a few years you get invited to these yourself and after 5 years you're actively dodging them. The upside is you don't have to worry about buying many drinks. The down side is you don't have to worry about buying many drinks.

The drinking makes a British Con look like a mormon festival. As I mentioned elsewhere, the ealiest night I got to bed was 2am, the latest 5am, that night I had 2.5 hours sleep before I had to be in a meeting with my CEO.

That night, in particular, had been the key party night. For some reason the handset manufacturers and the chipset manufacturers vie for who can put on the best party. As I have more to do with the Silicon side of the business I got all the invites which for Tuesday night included Texas Instruments and Freescale.

The TI Party was in a major night club with a Mulan Rouge type theme. The men were given top hats, the women feather boas (not that there are many women at 3GSM). There were dancers doing the can-can, there was a vast array of Tapas, there was a completely free bar. From there onto the Bikini Club for the Freescale event with the Sugababes, who were actually not all that bad, but obviously non-plussed to be playing to 500 grey suits middle aged business men.

The Moet flowed like water and the 6GB Sony Walkman MP3 player they gave us on the way out when it ended at 3am was a surprise. The next few hours were a blur but, as I have said before, the Swedes should not be exposes to cheap alcohol. It makes them mad bad and dangerous to know.

Finally, last night, we got to stop. My feet are one enormous blister, I feel dreadful but it's been a good event for us and lots of stuff has happened. The problem is, there's stuff I'm busting to talk about and I can't.

Bloody NDAs.