Cannes

Pronounced "can", not "cans" or "con", is a lovely city in the French Riviera that is famous for hosting the Film Festival and the advertising week.  Adweek actual generates 80% of the city's annual revenue, above and beyond film fest because the latter normally attracts locals and tourists on a budget.  Adweek on the other hand, is a week where all the advertising channels, technology companies are there to impress partners and advertiser brands, wining and dining them to endless bottles of rosé and seafood, building massive areas on the beach for their events (FB is said to have spent $2 Million on the beach/pier), and every yacht is rented all week for parties.  Yes, it is a boondoggle and I got to join the small 25+ oracle data cloud folks this year.

My main reasons for going, other than the obvious ones is to be with my friend Yvette.  She and I known each other way before our current jobs, where our teams work together.  She runs global partnerships at Facebook and has folks that work on managing our partnership.  She had know my Datalogix CEO for years.  I run all audience and data products, and FB is an important partner.  So, last year, Yvette and David (my boss) as they were in Cannes said "you need to be here next year).  So David made it happen by putting me on the list.  Yvette got us a room, which is super hard to find for the week.

I actually flew in the opposite direction (SFO) to hop on the same flight as Yvette and David.  Yvette left Cannes to join her boyfriend Kevin in Amsterdam and headed to Africa for 2 weeks as she starts her 2 month sabbatical.  

Here are some pictures from our room at the Majestic, our ODC "tent" (3,000 sq ft 2 story), FB party and more.  Lovely week!  I can't say if I would go back next year, that party scene is not my scene.  Getting too old for this and don't need to have another rosé for a while.