After the kickoff party, I rode the A3C shuttle to the Music Room for my first showcase of the festival. The room was packed to the rafters for an event that featured mostly local Atlanta rap artists. The other shuttle, which ran to the showcases in the Little Five Points and East Atlanta Village areas did not pick up from the Music Room, but rather from the Sound Table, two blocks to the east on Edgewood Avenue, so I walked the two blocks up to the Sound Table, where another showcase was in effect. But the two blocks of Edgewood Avenue in between were fairly dark, with a lot of abandoned storefronts, and conference attendees came in for harassment from junkies and beggars during the walk between the two shuttle stops. And the shuttle to take us from the Sound Table to the East Atlanta Village didn’t come for an hour.