> an email after getting a badge scan as spam And IMO they are totally right to do so. That behaviour is so ludicrously dumb that I can't believe people do it.

> an email after getting a badge scan as spam And IMO they are totally right to do so. That behaviour is so ludicrously dumb that I can't believe people do it. Your company is exhibiting in a room full of potential customers. If someone doesn't come and talk to you then you have no right to reach out to them IMO. > a lot of people still get mad at emails that are the result of casual interactions Hey, if I gave someone my email address that's fine. I expect them to contact me. If I gave a conference organiser my email address, I do not expect the exhibitors to be able to contact me. > And then some company would figure out… For sure. But OP's point seemed to be that money stops being spent in a world without sales people. It's an interesting thought experiment. My hunch is that the same money is spent: sales people are not, in general, getting more spend out of customers overall. Salesman X might get Customer Y to spend more money with _their particular company_, but not money that would not have been deployed in the market anyway.