DEFCON 29 link
Progress
- Booked my room for the week; @ the ELLIS ISLAND CASINO, HOTEL & BREWERY; $250 cheaper than I expected
- I'll start looking for plane tickets after this post; I wanted to take the train, but there isn't a connection yet; I have no intention of taking Amtrak to LA, and then connecting to Vegas on Greyhound
- Pre-registration isn't open yet; had to look all over the net til I found the note in their "What's New" section
For the first time ever, we will have conference pre-registration for the in-person conference. It is simply too risky both from a space planning and financial perspective to try and guess how many people may attend. We need hard numbers to make decisions so we will need people to pre-register. How to do this? We will try and incentivize you. If you pre-register we will be able to ensure you get a real badge and if attendance gets restricted you will know your space is reserved.
- Following from that, I have about 4 tabs pinned, including the twitter pages for https://twitter.com/defcon and https://twitter.com/thedarktangent; in addition, there is the planning forum. I've wanted to attend one of these since '12.
Some changes from last year's Def Con affecting my plans
You can see what I was planning to do in the my section below; not everything I was going to do, based on the last Def Con schedule. is going to be available.
The Villages for this year are tentatively the following (the ones I'm interested in will be bolded and italicized):
- (hybrid) Aerospace Village
- (hybrid) Appsec Village
- (hybrid) Career Hacking
- (hybrid) Hack the Sea
- (hybrid) Ham Radio Village
- (hybrid) Hardware Hacking & Soldering Skills
- (hybrid) Lock Bypass Village
- (hybrid) Packet Hacking Village
- (hybrid) Rogues Village
- (in-person) Car Hacking Village
- (in-person) Crypto Currency Village
- (in-person) Data Duplication Village
- (virt) Bio Hacking
- (virt) Blue Team Village
- (virt) Crypto & Privacy Village
- (virt) ICS Village
- (virt) IoT Village
- (virt) RF Village
- (virt) Social Engineering Village
I don't see either the DroneWarz Village, or the Monero/Blockchain & Cryptocurrency Open Security Village listed, and the call for Villages has closed. Too bad for me. I think that the Recon Village has been replaced by the Rogues Village, which is described as...
Rogues Village is a place to explore alternative approaches and uses for security concepts, tools, and techniques by looking to non-traditional areas of knowledge. Incorporating expertise from the worlds of magic, sleight of hand, con games, and advantage play, this village has a special emphasis on the overlap between Social Engineering, Physical Security, and Playful Mischief.
Because we specialize in non-traditional approaches, Rogues Village can be an excellent entry point for people with a less established background in the security space. By introducing and engaging with existing topics in innovative, relatable, and frequently hands-on ways, they can become easier for people to approach and pick up for the first time.
Additionally, we are one of the few villages with a view that explicitly extends beyond the security space, meaning our perspective will necessarily include influences, ideas, and inspirations that are unique to Rogues Village.
Also see their Twitter, https://twitter.com/RoguesVillage.
HOWEVER, and this is a big HOWEVER, I haven't even started looking at Presentations and Workshops, and the call for these end tomorrow. I expect that a lot of what I wanted to see in the Villages will be covered in that fashion.
The sad thing is that I had considered submitting a presentation, but dilley dallied around until I realized tomorrow is the deadline.
Crowdsourcing
In this post, What would you want from me in return for crowdfunding my DEFCON trip?, I started brainstorming ways to be of value to those who help me make this trip.
I am happy to say that the Hero of Hive, 
Thanks, Rich!
In addition to the potential means of repayment I suggested in that last post, I could also:
- buy
shares for donators
- place bets for donators; I would have to get permission from the casino to film those bets, and I think it is doubtful I'd get permission, I think it would be cool...virtual gambling lol
If someone wanted to donate directly, my Monero addy (specifically for DefCon) is
monero:89wbBiLGAF1UhsFCvA72UCT9TcKHew1PjC1aDJkC7L7NgywptJ8ufgBXFPvNa3pSmXKU3ZZScvzbdUuuwnCwXHjMSm55bin
-or-
Just make sure you comment on these DefCon posts if you donate this way for credit.
And like I said last post, I'm going regardless.
Next section..."or what I wished I had thought of last week"
HIVE should be represented in some way
I don't mean me, screaming INFORMATION WAR! at con attendees. I mean the people here who have helped build HIVE though tech or community development. People that can address the utility of blockchain in a social network, or can explain the HIVE coin. Tomorrow, I'll look up ways to submit proposals to the powers that be here to send someone or multiple someones to next year's Def Con, and I'll see if there is anything we can do officially at this years by shooting them(DC) an email.
Pklease ignore all below the line
Swear allegiance to the flag
Whatever flag they offer
Never hint at what you really feel
Teach the children quietly
For some day sons and daughters
Will rise up and fight while we stood still
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