I'll spoiler my direct reply to that because I don't think it's very relevant to the real issue, making i49 the best TF2 LAN there ever will be:

The whole idea that it's somehow good that there was a contest for who could be the Multiplay-sponsored stream saddens me. Our community is too small to be split between these two 'rival' orgs, at least for an event like this. There should have been a joint proposal from the start.

This could well be the last EU-NA TF2 LAN (and we're just at #2) and instead of two orgs getting ready to make the most out of it together we have this shit.

I'd love to work with the tf.tv guys, but they might not show due to not getting the slot. And even if they do show, they might not get to cast/help because Arx won't work with them.
We'll have amazing people spanning a whole bunch of timezones investing all this time and money and some bullshit between basically three of them makes the whole thing incredibly difficult.
Can you imagine a NA - EU grand final with just brits/euros casting, while we have fucking salamancer in the audience? We lose.

I'm hoping that when i52 comes around, we'll have this thread on the biggest fucking beamer projecting inside the TF2 area while we're all laughing our asses off and drinking that digusting English beer.

I can't express in words how frustrated I am that the personal interaction of ~4 EU-tf.tv/VTV people is making this whole i49 thing so needlessly complicated.

We have Arx saying he would not work with anyone from the tf.tv proposal, ot even those who we were so happy to work with at i46, not even the ones that have never wronged VTV.
We have Comedian saying he'll never work with Byte again, Byte saying he'll never work with skyride again.

We have a tiny scene, you'll be running into eachother until TF2 dies or until you quit. Get over it.

I'm pretty sure there's also going to be a EU server.

I've added the ESEA configs and whitelist.

I would love for some people to test the system and gameserver: http://na.fakkelbrigade.eu

You might have seen the server reservation system that I run in the EU: http://server.fakkelbrigade.eu

The reasons why I think it's cool:

* Many different server locations, so you can find a server with a good ping for most players
* Automatically loads the config and whitelist for your reservation
* Instant zip with the logs/demos of a match when you end your reservation
* Automatic uploads to logs.tf when you enter your API key
* Manual upload to logs.tf, for those without a logs.tf account

The system is free to use, but donations are encouraged. Based on the amount of hours played on the servers the donations get split between the server providers.

Currently, I'm trying to make a North American version of this system, and for this I need your help. The site for the North American version is up , and there's 1 Chicago-based server in there, generously provided by wezlyyy. But since I'm from the Netherlands it's not really practical to try it out myself, so maybe some of you can use it in a scrim or lobby game.
Add me on steam for the URL if you want to try it. http://steamcommunity.com/id/ariekanarie

Secondly, I'm looking for more servers for the system. In the EU version it's mostly community heroes providing the servers. They rent a dedicated server anyway which they would already allow people to use, so putting a server in the reservation system just makes life easier for those guys.
Exception to this rule is Fog, who's currently the only commercial server provider sponsoring a server <3

Thirdly, I could use some info on the NA comp scene. Especially about configs, whitelists and maps that I should put on the servers. Also, if you are or know someone willing to sponsor such a server (bsd/linux only atm), please get in touch.

Some links:
My steam profile: http://steamcommunity.com/id/ariekanarie
ETF2L thread: http://etf2l.org/forum/community/topic-23191/?recent=448779
Reddit post: http://www.reddit.com/r/truetf2/comments/1dqctw/free_server_reservation_system/
EU server providers <3: http://server.fakkelbrigade.eu/pages/server_providers
US server provider <3: http://www.wezlyyy.com/

You're supposed to have the tftrue_api_thingy in your server.cfg

The only plugin worth running. Auto-updating and only adding good things. Thanks a lot Anakin!