The free tickets offered in this article have all been distributed now and the giveaway is over. Congratulations to the five winners!

The 5th annual  NamesCon conference gets underway a week from Sunday (January 28, 2018) at the Tropicana Hotel in Las Vegas. The show attracts industry veterans from around the world but organizers of the event also go out of their way to welcome newcomers - knowing their energy and fresh ideas are critical to  continued growth and innovation in this business.  Toward that end NamesCon has given us five free tickets to the upcoming show (currently priced at $799 each) with the provision that they can go only to people who have never been to NamesCon before. 

The tickets cover show admission only - winners will have to take care of their own transportation and lodging needs. NamesCon left it up

to us to decide how to hand them out. I wanted to keep it simple and also reward regular readers (who will be the ones most likely to see this offer before all of the tickets are claimed). The method I settled on will also give me a chance to show you the kind of daily show coverage we post from NamesCon in this column every year (the kind we will be providing again during its 2018 run from January 28-31. 

Here is how it will work. I am going to give you a link to our closing day coverage of the 2017 edition of NamesCon last January. After you click the link, scroll through the photos and highlights from that day until you reach the final photo on the page. Read the text above the photo and that will give you the name of the person in the photo who is having their head shaved to raise money for the Water School (nearly $90,000 was raised that night)! Then just send that person's name and your name to me via email to Editor at DNJournal.com. The senders of the first five emails I receive with the correct name will get the tickets. 

A scene from the 2017 NamesCon conference in Las Vegas last January.

Again, remember you will only be able to use this ticket if this would be your first NamesCon and show organizers will verify that is the case when I send them the list of winners. As soon as I have the first five in I will add a message to the beginning of this post (in bold red) to let you know all of the tickets have been claimed. If anyone does not redeem their free ticket or NamesCon determines it is not their first show, I will go down the line of emails received and offer the ticket to the next person in line). 

So here we go - this is the link that will take you to the page where you will find the name you need to know: http://www.dnjournal.com/archive/lowdown/2017/dailyposts/20170127.htm  - Good luck and I hope to see you at NamesCon!