EmberKiln — conference / booth shortlist
Status: research brief, not committed. Vetted, cited scan (2026-06-21) of conferences where EmberKiln could buy an exhibitor booth / startup package to demo. All dates + prices are time-sensitive — verify on each event's official exhibitor page before committing. Brand context: memory
project_graphene_studio_brand; name status: EMBERKILN_NAME_CLEARANCE.md.
What EmberKiln is selling, and to whom
EmberKiln = the creation/production studio (audiobook creator + Scene Studio +
Reverse Screenplay Engine) under graphene.fm distribution. Four possible
buyer audiences: (a) writers / indie self-published authors, (b) filmmakers +
video creators, (c) AI-creative-tool buyers / media-production tech, (d)
publishing / rights / audiobook buyers. The events below are ranked by
fit-to-cost for (a), since indie authors are the nearest paying buyer.
Fit/cost-ranked table
| Event | Fit | Boothable | When / Where | Cheapest entry | Deadline | Audience |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Author Nation (ex-20BooksTo50K) | HIGH | ✅ | Nov 10–13 2026 · Las Vegas (Horseshoe) | $450 vendor table | rolling | (a) authors |
| IBC — Future Tech IGNITE | HIGH | ✅ | Sep 11–14 2026 · Amsterdam (RAI) | £1,995 / 4 sqm | TBA | (b)(c) |
| TechCrunch Disrupt | MED | ✅ | Oct 13–15 2026 · SF (Moscone West) | $12,500 | Sep 25 2026 | press / investors |
| Web Summit — ALPHA | MED | ✅ | Nov 9–12 2026 · Lisbon | ~€1.5–3k | rolling | press / investors (EU) |
| CES — Eureka Park | MED | ✅ | early Jan · Las Vegas | ~$1,000 (turnkey) | gated eligibility | (c) / investors |
| NAB Show — Startup Pavilion | MED | ✅ | Apr 4–7 2027 · Las Vegas | ~$6,550 (10×10 turnkey) | rolls year-to-year | (b)(c) |
| Frankfurter Buchmesse | MED | ✅ | Oct 7–11 2026 · Frankfurt | per-day Workstation (PDF-only) | early-bird passed | (d) rights |
| London Book Fair | MED | ✅ | Mar 2026 (date conflict — verify) | enquiry-only | enquiry | (a partial)(d) |
| Cannes — AI for Talent Summit | — | ❌ invite-only talks | May 15–16 2026 · Cannes | n/a | n/a | — |
| Runway AI Film Festival | — | ❌ screening/awards only | 2026 (NYC/LA/Tokyo) | n/a | n/a | visibility only |
Top recommendations by goal
- Author/indie conversion (do this first): Author Nation, Las Vegas, Nov 10–13 2026. Real Industry Expo floor (Expo Day Nov 10), $450 vendor table, 1,400+ overwhelmingly-author attendees (50.5% published, 31.3% published-and-profitable). Best fit-to-cost by a wide margin — EmberKiln's exact buyer at the lowest entry price found.
- Film / media-tech buyers: IBC, Amsterdam, Sep 11–14 2026, via the brand-new Future Tech IGNITE startup zone — £1,995 for a 4 sqm shell scheme (eligibility: <5 yrs, <10 employees, <£1M revenue). NAB Show (Apr 2027, Las Vegas) is the bigger-budget alternative (~$6,550+).
- Press / launch: TechCrunch Disrupt, SF, Oct 13–15 2026 — $12,500 startup table, ~10,000 founders/VCs/press; application deadline Sep 25.
- Investor reach (Europe): Web Summit, Lisbon, Nov 9–12 2026 — ALPHA startup tier ~€1.5–3k.
Not boothable (don't chase a booth)
- Runway AI Film Festival — film submission / screening / awards only ("No Booth/Vendor Space… not a conference or trade show format"). Awards/ visibility play via finalist submission only.
- Cannes "AI for Talent Summit" — invitation-only, C-level, talks format. Any Cannes booth would need the separate Marché du Film / Village Innovation floor, whose buyable-booth status could not be confirmed.
Confidence + caveats
- Verify everything on the official exhibitor page before paying. Prices and dates shift year-to-year.
- NAB's next edition is April 2027, not 2026 (the 2026 edition already happened) — long lead time.
- Frankfurt's cheap early-bird (ended 30 Nov 2025) and stand-registration (31 Jan 2026) windows for 2026 have likely passed; euro prices are PDF-only.
- London Book Fair has a date/venue conflict across sources (Olympia Mar 10–12 2026 vs a cached Excel Mar 16–18 2027) and publishes no prices (enquiry-only). Reverify.
- IBC £1,995 is the cheapest stated price; an unpriced "Pod Stand Package" may undercut it, and the startup-package deadline isn't published yet.
- Web Summit ALPHA (
€1.5–3k) and CES Eureka Park ($1,000) entry prices come from secondary sources — pin them before committing. - Author Nation attendee percentages are self-reported marketing figures (one source said "1,100+" vs the headline "1,400").
Unresearched (flagged, not cleared)
These brief-listed candidates were not covered by surviving verified claims — treat boothability/cost as unknown: SXSW (Austin), VidCon (Anaheim), VidSummit, Tribeca / Sundance immersive-or-AI storytelling tracks, Audio Publishers Association APAC, GDC, NINC (Novelists Inc), IBPA Publishing University.
Sources
Primary exhibitor pages cited per row: authornation.live, show.ibc.org, techcrunch.com/events, websummit.com/startups, ces.tech, nabshow.com, buchmesse.de, londonbookfair.co.uk, marchedufilm.com, aif.runwayml.com. Full cited findings (23 confirmed / 2 refuted claims, 103-agent deep-research run): generated 2026-06-21.