DNCruise Changes Course To Avoid Hurricane! Plus Summary of Day 1-3!

The first three days of DNCruise have been a blast and even though I can’t blog every day I wanted to fill all of you in on what’s been happening. First things first – our boat was re-routed due to the Hurricane heading from Cozumel to Key West. For me I found this to be good news given that DNCruise is now headed towards the Bahamas!

Right now we’re off the coast of Florida and after a full day at Sea and tomorrow morning we’ll wake-up in the Bahamas – how cool is that?

So what’s happened the first three days? Below is my very quick summary, since the Internet connection is $0.75/minute I can’t upload many photos or videos…but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been taking a ton so stay-tuned!

Day One The first day we boarded the boat and by 3:00PM I had a drink in my hand and was enjoying networking with other Domainers. At 5:00PM the opening night cocktail party started. The party was a blast and pretty much every single Domainer on the boat was there. You can see some videos from the party at http://www.youtube.com/domainflipper

Following the party we all headed to dinner. This is one of my favorite things about having a conference on a cruise ship – we all eat together. At most conferences people break-into groups of 4-6 people for dinner and you don’t see everyone until the next morning. Instantly the group became a community and now that it’s day three we’re practically family 🙂

Day Two

On Day Two we woke-up docked in Key West. Unfortunately the forces of nature were against us and by the end of the day I looked like a wet dog. In Key West I had a chance to visit the Shipwreck museum and then enjoy some great cuban food and margaritas.

Getting back on the boat our first session began. After a great introduction by Patrick (video to follow) we began an incredible networking session. Everyone introduced themselves in front of the group and then we all mingled now armed with the information of who does what. With so many new Domainers on the boat this presented really a once in a lifetime opportunity. The feedback from this session was stellar with a very seasoned Domainer commenting that it was one of the most useful and impactful networking sessions he’s ever been to!

After the networking session we all ate dinner and then regrouped at 10:30PM for Game Night! We picked between a few different games and Taboo quickly emerged as the winner. Splitting into groups we were soon screaming, yelling, and buzzing each other in a epic battle to win some excellent prizes.

Once the game had eliminated all but one team, the winners then duked it out in Jenga for winners within the winning team. First place was a Kindle which went to Adam who I’m convinced is the luckiest guy in the world since he also won a free cruise and airfare! However after meeting Adam I can honestly say he’s one of the nicest people I’ve met and you can expect to learn more about him in a future post.

The night ended with a party in GGG’s room – it was a blast and as you know I don’t blog about nightlife so I’ll have to leave it at that.

Day Three

Now we’re getting close to realtime since today is day three. Originally today was supposed to take place chilling on the beach in Cozumel but given the re-routing of our boat today became a day at sea. This changed the conference schedule turning today into a full day of sessions.

In the first session Craig Snyder from Oversee gave a phenomenal presentation about Drop Catching. While I’ve been doing Drop Catching for years now I still learned some great things from this presentation. Alan Dunn even shared some of his secrets…which you’ll only know if you were here – sorry can’t give this kind of information away!

I moderated the next session which focused on ccTLDs and some unique adventages that .CO and .ME have. For anyone that wanted to learn about ccTLDs you couldn’t pick a better panel of experts.

The third panel focused on parking and alternative monetization methods. The panel featured Donny from Parked, Dan from Domain Advertising and the one and only Gregg from PPX Interactive. For anyone that thinks parking is dead – you should have seen this panel. These guys are all innovating like crazy and they’re getting results!

Now we’re completely realtime. I’m sitting at lunch with Patrick, Ze, Gene (one of Patrick’s close friends), Mike (NameTalent.com) and Alan. We went from wolfing-down sandwiches to talking Domains. This is far more than an industry folks – this is a passion for all of us and hopefully for you too!

Okay – now I’ve got about five minutes to get back down to the conference room – my presentation is next! Tomorrow morning we’ll wake-up in the Bahamas!

To see some videos from the first two days make sure to check-out http://www.youtube.com/domainflipper

Thanks for reading and stay-tuned, more updates, photos, and videos to come! (P.S. Due to limited time I cannot proof read this post so I’ll apologize in advance for any typos and grammatical disasters).

Morgan Linton

Morgan Linton