• by January 16, 2001

It seems the golden era of advertising tradeshows and conferences may be coming to an end. Gone are the days when wide-eyed 20-somethings, dressed in all black, listened breathlessly to thinly veiled PowerPoint pitches from web start-ups that had a slim chance of surviving the next 6 months. Gone are the days when they were willing to shell out thousands of dollars for a few days of "networking."

Simply put, at least in the ad media business, gone are the days of blind faith in the power of the Internet. The power is on its way back into the hands of traditional media players and webbies are again fighting for attention. Except this time, venture capital and cool ideas alone won't get the job done.

At least that seemed to be the overall feeling at today's Myers Forum in New York. Dubbed "The Future of Buying and Selling Media," the one-day event focused mainly on the concept of advertising exchanges and by the end of the day it was painfully obvious that ad exchanges are not the most popular topic with traditional media executives.

And to some degree that's understandable. With nearly 40 ad exchange-type firms out there, media buyers who don't already work with an ad exchange, are simply too confused to bother with figuring out exactly what differentiates them all.

And consolidation isn't helping that confusion. Case in point – with much fanfare at the show today, one ad exchange – Mediapassage - which just recently bought another ad exchange - broadcastspots.com - announced a merger with a third exchange - One Media Place (formerly AdAuction). The announcement drew cheers from the audience although I bet half the crowd didn't know what any of the above-mentioned companies actually do.

And even if the understanding is there, the timing just isn't right. At the show, no one dared even utter the word "online" until a few hours into the conference and the suit-and- necktie clad audience didn't seem to mind. As one panelist quipped on his way out of the building at the end of the day, "traditional media people are like doctors – they refuse to accept new technology."

The legacy systems are too firmly in place.

If it wasn't for the organizers pitting old and new media proponents against each other on all panels to force the education process and for Jack Myers himself, the best, most knowledgeable and well-prepared moderator any tradeshow or conference has ever seen, noone would have learned anything.