So if the announcements were for something important, and you MISSED it cause it was too quiet, would you still be griping?
Define important. Aside from the announcements that the exhibit hall was closing soon, I don't think any qualified as important.
After more thought, I'd be fine with 6pm announcements for events happening that night, since it's right when the hall closes, and therefore shouldn't interrupt anything.
They are likely here to stay as companies paid to have the announcements.
Just because companies paid to have the announcements doesn't mean that Gen Con has to continue offering them as part of sponsorship packages in the future. Complaining about it will hopefully convince Gen Con to no longer offer them.
Working in a factory that mandates ear plugs due to noise level I can tell you from personal experience that the frequency and volume of those announcements are just as loud as the machinery I work with and considering some of the people who man those booths have to hear those announcements happening for hours over four days, Gencon could potentially cause hearing problems for those who are yearly exhibitors in the long run if this is a trend they decide to keep.
Not to mention they likely will lose exhibitors who don't want to be forced to deal with such just to set up a booth, let alone get volunteers if people don't want to spend however many hours in the exhibit hall not only listening to such constantly while also trying to converse/sell/demo/do business in general with a crowd already producing a lot of noise just from the sheer volume of people in one space.
I personally did not even browse half of the hall because those announcements were giving me a migraine since I have noise sensitivity issues. So the constant bombardment of basically obnoxious radio commercials were enough in a short dose to cause me health issues. I don't come to a convention with my work earplugs, but if this is a trend then I either need to bring them with me, just never go into the dealers hall, or stop going to the convention; because browsing the booths for games to demo and/or buy is not worth being miserable the rest of the weekend and spending the majority of the con in my hotel room sick as a dog due to said migraine.
Wow, I didn't realize that stuff could cause hearing problems. They really need to rethink this, then - save the loudspeakers for the truly necessary announcements and leave them alone otherwise.
The announcements in the main gaming hall were also annoying and disruptive.
+1
Yeah it is mostly a store code but it's one of the more universal codes people know regarding a child being lost in a building.
Yup - way too loud period, but doubly annoying since they were advertisements.
My complaint is that I could rarely understand what was being said. If the purpose was to advertise something, it should behoove you to make those understandable. It was much like a Charlie Brown adult to me (whah, whah, wah wah wahwah)...