IDG World Expo Launches Conference

Staff -- Tradeshow Week, 6/28/2004

IDG World Expo has hired publishing veteran Gene Gable to launch Context, an event intended to help companies add relevance to their data.

The inaugural event is scheduled Jan. 10–13 at San Francisco's Moscone Center. It is timed to coincide with IDG's Macworld Conference & Expo, expected to draw up to 90,000 attendees to Moscone Center Jan. 10–14.

Context will be comprised of three separate conferences. The Creative Professional Conference is geared to graphic designers and advertising professionals. The Automated Publishing Conference is aimed at production managers, publishing executives and information technology professionals. And the Intelligent Market Conference will focus on the marketing community.

"It's not just a commerce issue; it's how we're going to filter through the too-much information that's out there. The way we're going to do that is through context," said Gable, executive producer and founder of Context.

"Information is only valuable in context with other data. The more you can make things relevant, the more successful you'll be."

Gable was president of Seybold Seminars and Publications.

Context will feature sponsors and a small exhibit area. "We want to keep it focused," said Gable, adding that he'll be satisfied with 1,000 attendees the first year.