It's not that BitCoin is unreliable, it's that it is still a currency in its infancy. It cannot be used to value things on its own, yet. No matter how much Bruce would like to have a set price in BTC that stays from the start of ticket sales to the end, it won't change the fact that there is still a good deal of volatility in the value of bitcoins. Volatility = a huge amount of risk when you are talking about playing with money you are borrowing (which is essentially what is happening when you accept payments up front for expenses in the future).
You keep saying how Bruce has malicious intentions to mislead and speculate, when that simply isn't true. Now, you seem to have backed down to a statement regarding the volatility of Bitcoins, which I think everyone here can agree with. Just don't blame Bruce for Bitcoin's volatility.
And yes, I agree, the media probably will latch on to the fact that most things for the conference are being paid for in USD. So? Is there anything that could be done about that? Not really...
actually, for the record our bill last night was ~600(total) dollars at the Hudson Eatery, only ~250 was paid in cash/credit.
the real issue was there was and still has a certain amount of money needed to cover the venue due in the "future" and you can't really predict the market in the sense to accept bitcoin now and hope it'll hold the same value you accepted them at few weeks ago, this is why the ticket has been changed to 26 dollars as oppose to 2 bitcoin, (which at the time of the original writing, were the same price).
now to pay instantly e.g. Dinner at Hudson Eatery this is not really a problem since you simply pick the lowest price enough to meet your volume and make an transaction, then it's up to the merchant / restaurant to keep bitcoins or sale them instantly and get dollars.
;)