How To Crash A Party

So you were dishonest and bragged about it in a blog post with your name and picture. Some of the very people you tricked may even be reading it now that it made the front page of Hacker News.<p>You'd think that you would have learned something after spending so much time with so many successful people. Apparently not.

This guy is definitely a hustler... but something doesn't sit right with me about crashing events for charity. Every drink or meal he consumes is money taken directly out of the charity's pocket. He tries to justify his unethical actions by saying that crashing these events will make him much more likely to become successful (rich), and therefore he'll be able to buy lots of charity tickets in the future.<p>Sorry dude, crashing parties and ripping off charities is not going to make you successful.

It's funny. These kind of guys think they're badasses, while in reality, to an attentive eye, they're the opposite: people with an attention seeking disorder.<p>Aside that the attention seeking is very obvious from the formatting of the text, the interesting thing is that he did really nothing special. Naturally, credits for getting the right attitude that let him enter, but for the rest, what he's describing is not different from a socially comfortable (skilled, for the nerds) person.

I assume the author realizes that the term 'conman' is short for 'Confidence Man' which is a very, very, old gambit. One conman I knew told me that being a conman was the second oldest profession, because as soon as there were hookers there were guys who worked to convince the hookers that they didn't need to pay.<p>Of course these days we call them con-artists since the sex of the person is irrelevant. The motivation for being a con artist is the adrenaline thrill of knowing at any moment you can be 'caught out.' Sure that makes you feel alive, but when you are 'caught' you may not have broken any laws but you have really pissed someone off. When you shoplift from a store they call the cops to charge you, when you make someone feel stupid for having believed you, they call their friends to come over and beat the shit out of you.

Besides being entertaining, some of these tactics could also be ethically and practically useful. How many times have you been made to feel uncomfortable being somewhere you had a right to be?<p>Maybe you really are meeting friends at an exclusive restaurant, but the host is eyeing you suspiciously as you walk in.<p>Maybe you left your conference badge at the hotel, but didn't realize it was required for the afterparty.<p>Maybe you were asked to speak at a meetup, but the doorperson is asking for $10 in pizza money even though you already ate.<p>Learning how to look and act like you own the place can save you confrontation, keep things running smoothly, and lead to the same kinds of awesome as in the article - without swindling any charities.

This article is a bit dramatic. It's really easy to crash a party. You just walk in. Unless you are causing a problem, or you really don't look like you belong there, nobody will notice. As party crashing is sort of a pointless activity, not many people actually do it. Thus, parties aren't really prepared for it, and it's pretty easy.

Regardless of whether or not these practices were ethical (I don’t think they were) or had a point (I don’t think they did), the article was a fun enough read. If that’s how this guy wants to get his kicks and meet new and interesting people (who seem to be interesting to him only because they have money), then that’s fine by me. But if I ever see him at an event I host, he’s getting kicked out whether he deserves to be there or not.

In my experience the best events to crash are art exhibit openings. You can do it with any attire (so long as you <i>are</i> the attire) and it's not hard at all to fake an appreciation for whatever art they may be showing.<p>Furthermore, the faster you drink the less people care about how you act. People at exhibit openings tend to get positively sloshed.

This is written with the rhythmic style and aggressively varied typography of ad copy.

Here it is in Google's cache: <a href="http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:CiuHx3i_sooJ:www.nevblog.com/how-to-crash-a-party/+&#38;cd=1&#38;hl=en&#38;ct=clnk&#38;gl=us" rel="nofollow">http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:CiuHx3i...</a>

Though I might not like what he did, I admire the skill itself, and more honest applications of it. Anyone who finds the article interesting should watch "Catch Me if You Can" a movie about a criminal who uses these techniques to steal money.

i used to work in a movie theater in high school, same theory applies. you can actually walk right in without a ticket and no tricks, just confidence and a sense of entitlement. my coworkers would never stop people with the balls to do it and it happened many times.<p>walk close behind a group of at least 2 other customers. as their tickets are being ripped just keep walking past them at a normal pace, head facing forward, and without making eye contact. they will notice you but do nothing.<p>go ahead and try it with a legit ticket in your pocket you can show them if they do stop you.

I may not ever have the gumption to actually do something like this, but I'll say its admirable. At a base level, he's really mastered social engineering.

Love this sentence: Think about it, every event likes press coverage….and I was a quote on quote…“member of the press”!<p>Cheesy formatting, total misunderstanding of "quote unquote" - the use of quotation marks afterwards is priceless, and an attitude of having discovered and revealed some great secret which is in actuality a ploy so tired it has been in bad movies for decades. This guy is passing, right. Definitely a dancing monkey.

Come back when you've made and used your own grappling hook, dodged barbed wire using carpet samplers, hidden in a ditch for two hours and blended into a samba procession in order to save £180 to get into a music festival.<p>NB: Not all of the above were necessarily my exploits.

The funny thing is, if James Bond would do something similar in a movie, everybody would fall in love with the technique. But if somebody really breaks this down for you, it's wrong and "attention-seeking". As he says in the last part of the post, this is just another tactic of being scrappy and wanting to learn from other people. Why not use it for your advantage?

I found his characterization of the people getting paid to check tickets -- "I'm scared of Mr. Rich person" -- a bit naive.

Sometimes, doing things like this can get "blown way out of proportion": <a href="http://www.wtae.com/r/23653787/detail.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.wtae.com/r/23653787/detail.html</a> (The blog writer was arrested along with 2 others for breaking into Pittsburgh Steelers' stadium in 2010.)

If you found his party hacking admirable or maybe just entertaining, you'd probably like the movie, "Wedding Crashers":<p><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BchoV-6UHI8" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BchoV-6UHI8</a>

This is the guy: <a href="http://www.nevblog.com/images/prime-minister-of-malaysia.jpg" rel="nofollow">http://www.nevblog.com/images/prime-minister-of-malaysia.jpg</a>

So has anyone here crashed a conference or convention? I've wanted to but haven't for fear of someone recognizing me.

&#62; <i>HEY. Hey you. Studies show if you don't read NevBlog.com everyday, you might die</i><p>Really? Excellent! Because after reading that post, I will definitely never ever read that blog again on purpose, it makes me feel like dieing.<p>This so reeks of the same annoying "openess" and impertinence I have only come to experience from typically Indian and Pakistani hagglers on the street trying to lure you into their clothes store.<p>Congratulations, you played the monkey for an educated business crowd and they gave you attention. How surprising, educated and intelligent people are actually friendlier and forgiving than you thought! But still you were a dancing monkey, nothing more. You really feel proud of yourself?<p>Here is a hint: these people are getting approached by the likes of you ever single day, you really think they didn't see through your "genius" charade you came up with in 2 seconds? I think rich people can't stand anything less than people who talk to them just because they "admire" their wealth.<p>Your demeanor and actions very clearly show... you wouldn't stop at anything just to get some money and attention. You are the last person on earth I want to see coming into money because your borderline-religious fascination with it is dangerous and worrying.<p>&#62; <i>Often out of the ghettoness and scrappiness, emerges something more refined.</i><p>You are not ghetto nor do you accomplish anything actually pretty cool or worthwhile through shady means... you are just cheap and greedy. And you wrote a whole blog entry full of proof for that.<p>And all those "genius" methods of being a cheap, greedy wannabe and what do you have to show for it? You talked to a couple of people... congratulations.

you got to admit, the recording makes it like a fairy tale, i've done crashing parties (just for the free booze) and will do it in the future!

How to crash a blog.

How to crash a blog.<p>[link doesn't work]

Getting HTTP500. How to crash a webserver?