Well, the hotel's nice. Nice, in a luxury way. However luxury comes with a price, and this includes not having any tea/coffee facilities in the room while charging us 8 Euros for the cup of the warm stuff via room service.
Irons are also banned from the room (laundry service available at a cost), the on-site swimming pool costs 30 Euros a day and a movie on the TV is 20 Euros. Hands up all those who said that commercial radio revenues are suffering.
So it was with some relief that the drinks at the Google-sponsored reception were free. We mingled and chatted, questioning whether Google were going to buy up the entire industry – they've already bought a playout system and rumour has it that they'll next be selling their "Ad-Words" ads in the states. Either way, the chicken was quite nice even if the cake was a little dry.
From the UK, the great and the good were out. From Virgin Radio's James Cridland to Emap's Mark Story, Phil Riley (Chrysalis) to Steve Martin (World Service) and plenty along the way. First viewings lead us to believe that there's not a great representation from the BBC, apart from the team at BBC Radio International who flog Pete Tong's show to foreign parts.
Don't panic. There's lots of good news in the delegates bag. It may not seal very securely at the top but it does included a range of free pens and notepaper. Our search-engine friends have also supplied a number of unlabeled tablets. They may be mints, they may be a hangover cure. Either way, maybe we'll consume them in the morning to be on the safe side.
In Monday's sessions – Phil Riley takes on David Goldberg from Yahoo Music as they wrestle each other for consumers in the 21st Century, James Cridland in a panel discussing the future of digital radio (DRB anyone?) and later in the afternoon, "Proven ways to project a powerful audio image" which we think means jingles.
We'll be breaking news as it happens, er, and also breaking the room tab. And here's our tip. Stay in the lift until it stops at the seventh floor. Then, you can use the free bar in the executive suite. We're not sure if it's true, but we'll be trying it out tomorrow.
Join us again for our next diary entry from the wonderful city of Rome, tomorrow.