Interesting discussion. May I suggest we level the playing field by moving next year's conference to South Central Europe, say Pristina, Kosovo, or Sarajevo, or Zagreb? We'd reach a whole new level of inclusiveness.
Carol Bean On Nov 25, 2013, at 9:46 PM, Jonathan Rochkind wrote: >> Finances are a limiting factor on conference attendance for people of all >> demographic groups, and I would endorse plans to surmount that. > > Code4Lib is, of course, one of the least expensive conferences you'll find. > And the community and organizers care a lot about keeping it so -- there are > sometimes disputes in a given year about whether the organizers could have > kept it even less expensive. But it's still, every year, one of the most > affordable conferences around. > > Which is pretty darn awesome, and important. > > That's pretty much what we do try and increase financial accessibility for > people of all demographic groups. We also try to switch the regional location > around the country every year, to even out transportation costs for for > people in different parts of the country. > > If you can afford to go to any conference at all, you can afford for Code4Lib > to be that conference. Of course, there are people who can't afford to go to > any conference. Which is unfortunate. But I'm not sure what, if anything, is > being suggested we could do about that? > > If you have or can find a source of funding willing to pay registration, > hotel, and transportation for anyone who can't afford it, then please feel > free to organize it to happen. > > That's what the people who organized, and continue to organize, the diversity > scholarships did. They just organized it. > > Jonathan
