Not the Best Night I've Spent in San Francisco....

The Engadget reader party was definitely not the highlight of my week, but I suppose it's a little unfair to criticize it since it was a free, open to the public event. But that said, I found myself standing at the end of a considerably long line to get into a building that was on the UCSF Mission Bay campus (read: BFE) on Wednesday evening, even though I was fairly certain that I was behind the 500th person in line (the first 500 guests received a door prize consisting of either a Sansa MP3 player or a Flickr Pro account. Why were either of those a draw for me? Ummmm....).

Despite the line I decided to tough it out and see what was to see inside the venue. But, as you might expect from a publicly-announced open 'reader party' for a fairly well-known website, there were far more people at the event than I think Engadget expected (or they are just horrible event planners all). Inside of a fairly sterile room that was probably designed to hold 500 people there were, by my estimates, more than 700 of the great unwashed masses in attendance (note, according to Engadget, over 1,000 showed). This fact led to a rather uncomfortable, largely disappointing experience.

Still though, I have to give Engadget credit for pulling the event off, even if it was a poorly disguised attempt to gain a few event marketing dollars and/or favor from the few consumer electronics companies that were provided a folding table from which they earnestly pitched the hordes of tech-geeks who shuffled past en route to a (likely unsuccessful) trip to the bar.

But as an aside, as I was walking away from the party a short while later, I couldn't help but notice that a nearby celebration for the grand opening of a Subway restaurant close to the venue - replete with a cover band and light show - was far more rocking than the Engadget party. Yet, it had far fewer (albeit seemingly happier) attendees. Made me wonder what would happen if they joined forces....hoagies and gadgets for all??? Oh my!!

If that happens, call me and I'll line up again in hopes of a Sansa and a 6" cold cut combo. Otherwise, there are better ways to spend a Wednesday night in this city.