First They Ignore You, Then They Invite You To Pay Them Large Sums of Money for Five Minutes of "Fame", Then They Fight You, Then You Win. Or Something Like That.

Here's the email, fully fisked for your enlightenment:

We'd like to invite you to demo EDVB at our large conference. (((It's been Eventful since September 2005.)))

You'll be able to get the entire audience of 900+ people excited about EDVB. (((It's Eventful. And how many of those "900+" people are not techie early adopters?))) It's going to be a powerful marketing and PR opportunity. (((Translation: you'll get a chance, just a chance, mind you, of getting Michael Arrington's attention.))) With companies like Google, Yahoo, Digg, IBM, Sun, Technorati (and more) attending, you'll be able to get your message out to the people who are shaping the industry. (((Have you noticed that the "shape" they're "shaping" this "industry" into is rather quite spherical, and rather quite fragile, shiny and translucent? I think it's called a, oh, what's the term... "bubble", yes, that is the term I was thinking of.)))

Our conference is called "The Future of Web Apps" and more info can be found at [http link removed] (((This conference actually is "The Current State of Web Apps", and doesn't really represent the future, in my humble opinion.)))

There are only five demo spots left (Sxip, Adobe, MercuryGrove, ThinkFree and Celum Imagine are already signed up), so please let me know if you'd like to be involved. (((What, no Kiko demo? Oh, wait, there's no more Kiko.))) The fee is $4500, but if you get back to me by Friday (Aug 25th), we'll knock $500 off that. (((Let me get this straight. For four thousand five hundred dollars, er, four thousand dollars if I act quickly, I could buy a five-minute ride on the TechCrunch Vortex Machine? Think of the fame! Think of the riches! Think of the nausea afterwards!)))

Hope to hear from you soon! (((Are you hearing me now?)))

Kind regards,
Ryan