by Rodney H. Brown

Despite the recent news about the alleged hacker that tried to steal the code of an unreleased game at the recent PAX East show at the Hynes Convention Center, the show itself should be a model of how to run an enormous event for any planners out there.

The credit for keeping 60,000 game-crazed nerds in line and happy goes in no small measure to the 400 or so volunteers that the PAX founders call “Enforcers.” Anywhere you went in the Hynes this past weekend you could see at least two or three red T-shirted men or women helping answer questions, clearing congestion spots or — most importantly — keeping the long lines for specific events orderly and at least content if not happy. And, good folks, those lines were very, very long.

The two founders of the Penny Arcade Expo and the Penny Arcade web comic that spawned the show, Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik, said in their Sunday morning press briefing that they understood that the lines for panels and events were long, but that was their choice. One way some shows keep lines down is to charge extra for attendance of each individual panel or event.

“People with money think that’s a good idea and other people maybe with less money don’t like it,” Holkins said. “In general we decided to say that you can invest time, which everyone has, instead of money to go to see the panels that you want.”

With the knowledge that lines are just a given fact of life at PAX, Holkins, Krahulik and, more directly, Robert Khoo, the director of PAX, enlisted the Enforcers who had very strict guidelines they had to enforce, which applied equally to media as to the general public. That was a jarring lesson to learn for someone who had never covered a PAX show before.

At first it rankled to have to talk past the Enforcers simply to stand at the edge of the main theater to hear and take pictures of the keynote address by actor and gamer Wil Wheaton. After all, press is always accorded special access to trade shows, right? Well, in an e-mail sent out to the press a few days before the show opened, it became clear that PAX was a different animal. For instance, it stated that having a media badge would get you access to any panel or event but did not give you the right to bypass the line – you had to stand and wait like everyone else. And if you didn’t get into that line early enough before the room filled up, tough.

After the second time a good bit of jawing was required to get into a panel for a few shots, it became clear that the Enforcers meant business. But it also started to become clear that what they were doing was keeping what could otherwise be a logistical nightmare humming along like clockwork. Nerdy, costumed clockwork, true, but clockwork nonetheless.

The upshot is that I got into every single panel or event I needed to, and I realize now that the Enforcers were simply very efficient gatekeepers. The gate could be opened but not by any casual attempt. And by the time the show ended, I welcomed the site of the Enforcers in their red T-shirts (and often kilts for some reason), whether they were standing guard over a closed door, or walking up and down a hallway with a sign held up like Lloyd Dobler with a boombox, saying “The X-Play panel is full!”

Any large show should be so lucky to have people willing to do such jobs for nothing but occasional access to the show and some schwag.