[extrapickles]

I only went as a sponsor a few times as part of a small 4 person company, but each year the fees increased to the point that you almost had to sell stuff with obscene markups (not low volume hobbyist stuff) and they started only caring about the very large sponsors.

Our last year there (somewhere around 2012), they had this fancy "sponsors only area" that had free food/beer/etc and took up a large amount of floor space (it was at least 20'x20') that otherwise could have gone to actual makers exhibits.

I think what happened is that they started chasing sponsors, when they should have been focusing on the makers, and vetting that the sponsors were doing something attendees would be interested in directly (eg: no large java booths).