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Dear Jens Palsberg (and types-list), In my previous email, I asked for budget summaries for past online SIGPLAN conferences (PLDI and ICFP, for example; more data is always welcome). Could SIGPLAN do it? One inspiring example of financial transparency would be Andreas Zeller's budget summary for the ISSTA'16 conference (organized by SIGSOFT): https://andreas-zeller.info/2018/02/01/where-your-conference-fees-go-to.html On the SIGPLAN blog you mentioned costs and fees as the "elephant in the room" ( https://blog.sigplan.org/2020/09/15/virtual-conferences-and-sigplan/ ). We may have different perspectives looking at different parts of the elephant; but the "blind men and an elephant" parable relies on the blind men openly sharing their information. Best On Tue, Aug 25, 2020 at 10:24 PM Gabriel Scherer <gabriel.sche...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Sun, Aug 23, 2020 at 4:54 PM Michael Hicks <m...@cs.umd.edu> wrote: > >> Beyond the modest fees to run an online conference, which Talia mentions, >> conference registration payments serve other purposes. Any surplus goes to >> SIGPLAN, which turns around this surplus as good works, e.g., paying the >> open access fees for PACMPL, which ICFP benefits from. It also makes >> donations to CRA-W, OPLSS, etc. and provides scholarships for PLMW. >> > > On this point I have a simple request: could SIGPLAN release a budget > summary for ICFP and PLDI this year? To have an informed discussion on > online conference fees, we should know the amounts of the varied costs > (including the "good works"), how much money comes in from sponsoring, and > how much comes from conference fees. > > Since I raised the question of conference fees I have heard varied > explanations from various people, for example the idea that PLDI was > decided to have free registration before the actual conference-running > costs were known, and that the $100 fee for ICFP adjusts to cover direct > costs better. Your message rather suggests that the direct costs use only a > modest fraction of the $100 (or maybe they can be covered entirely by > sponsorship ?), but we cannot tell without any actual data. Others > suggested that making the conference free was maybe doable for flagship > conferences with an industrial presence such as ICFP or PLDI, but that this > expectation could be problematic for more theoretical conferences with less > sponsors. But then, FSCD and IJCAR reportedly ran fine without registration > costs. > > (I don't think this is an outlandish or surprising request, for example I > remember Adam Chlipala making exactly this request during a conference Town > Hall a few years ago.) > > On Tue, Aug 25, 2020 at 10:07 PM Gabriel Scherer < > gabriel.sche...@gmail.com> wrote: > >> Thanks Mike for bringing clear arguments in favor. >> >> There was an interesting discussion with Nicolai, Henning and Stefan on >> the argument of registration fees helping engagement. I have some short >> points to make on this topic: >> >> 1. This exact argument (price signals value) is given by some high-ranked >> universities in the English-speaking part of the world that charge tens of >> thousands of dollars of tuition fee and *could* relatively easily cover the >> corresponding costs on their endowment money. >> >> 2. Just like for tuition fees, the slope is slippery. Mike mentioned $25 >> (for non-students) to help engagement by making the conference feel >> valuable, but now ICFP cost $100; one could argue for POPL'21 registration >> fees of $1000 for non-students, to make it *very* valuable as a conference. >> (As long as the people making pricing decisions are getting reimbursed for >> their registration fees, I guess we could pull this off? >> >> However, I think that this discussion on engagement is somewhat of a >> distraction. Having conference where people participate actively is >> certainly a good thing, it is *nice*. But sharing our knowledge and results >> in the most open way possible is *a core tenet of our duty as researchers*. >> For me it is clear that we should find *other* ways to help engagement that >> do not raise the barrier to entry to our conference, because the later is >> sensibly more important than the former. >> >> >> >> >> >> On Sun, Aug 23, 2020 at 4:54 PM Michael Hicks <m...@cs.umd.edu> wrote: >> >>> Thanks for raising this issue. Just a few points about the other side of >>> the argument: >>> >>> It’s well known that things that are free are not valued (by humans) as >>> much as those that cost something, even a small amount. For example, see >>> Dan Ariely’s “Predictably Irrational” which presents the results of several >>> experiments that demonstrate this. As a relevant case: Free MOOCs tended to >>> have lots of “sign ups” but far fewer attendees, and even fewer completers. >>> >>> As such, if the goal is to have engaged attendees, trying to come closer >>> to the experience of traditional conferences, it might make sense to charge >>> something, even a small amount like $25, for at least some of the >>> population. This population might be people who have lots of social capital >>> already, and are generally busy, so they are more likely to blow off the >>> conference if they paid nothing for signing up. Such people might be those >>> that more junior attendees wish to meet. >>> >>> I note that engaged attendance was a goal when we had in-person >>> conferences, so I don’t see why we’d want to drop it now. Indeed, if people >>> don’t want to be engaged the videos will be available for free, afterward. >>> >>> Beyond the modest fees to run an online conference, which Talia >>> mentions, conference registration payments serve other purposes. Any >>> surplus goes to SIGPLAN, which turns around this surplus as good works, >>> e.g., paying the open access fees for PACMPL, which ICFP benefits from. It >>> also makes donations to CRA-W, OPLSS, etc. and provides scholarships for >>> PLMW. >>> >>> Corporate sponsors can indeed pay some costs, but they also have >>> downsides. We are finding that many sponsors are not interested in >>> necessarily giving that much, and some are starting to make demands on how >>> the conference is run for their modest donation. This is a slippery slope >>> that the SIGPLAN EC is trying to avoid. >>> >>> Given that PLDI was completely free and ICFP followed a progressive fee >>> schedule, I’ll be curious to compare the ICFP outbrief with that of PLDI’s, >>> to see how the registration fee affected attendance. >>> >>> Thanks, >>> -Mike >>> >>> On Sun, Aug 23, 2020 at 10:25 AM Talia Ringer <trin...@cs.washington.edu> >>> wrote: >>> >>>> [ The Types Forum, >>>> http://lists.seas.upenn.edu/mailman/listinfo/types-list ] >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> I don't know about PLDI, but there are some costs associated with online >>>> >>>> events. For example, automatic captioning software is still not very >>>> good >>>> >>>> (Google's always turns "proofs" into "fruits" for me). Live captioning >>>> is >>>> >>>> really expensive! But it's also hugely important for disability >>>> >>>> accessibility. >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> For students, ICFP was essentially free. I do agree that in principle, >>>> >>>> online conferences should be free, and online components of hybrid >>>> >>>> conferences should be free or strongly discounted. In practice, though, >>>> I >>>> >>>> do think that will mean finding sponsors for hidden costs that really >>>> are >>>> >>>> necessary. >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> On Sun, Aug 23, 2020 at 7:07 AM Gabriel Scherer < >>>> gabriel.sche...@gmail.com> >>>> >>>> wrote: >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> > [ The Types Forum, >>>> http://lists.seas.upenn.edu/mailman/listinfo/types-list >>>> >>>> > ] >>>> >>>> > >>>> >>>> > Dear types-list, >>>> >>>> > >>>> >>>> > Going on a tangent from Flavien's earlier post: I really think that >>>> online >>>> >>>> > conferences should be free. >>>> >>>> > >>>> >>>> > Several conferences (PLDI for example) managed to run free-of-charge >>>> since >>>> >>>> > the pandemic started, and they reported broader attendance and a >>>> strong >>>> >>>> > diversity of attendants, which sounds great. I don't think we can >>>> achieve >>>> >>>> > this with for-pay online conferences. >>>> >>>> > >>>> >>>> > ICFP is coming up shortly with a $100 registration price tag, and I >>>> did not >>>> >>>> > register. >>>> >>>> > >>>> >>>> > I'm aware that running a large virtual conference requires computing >>>> >>>> > resources that do have a cost. For PLDI for example, the report only >>>> says >>>> >>>> > that the cost was covered by industrial sponsors. Are numbers publicly >>>> >>>> > available on the cost of running a virtual conference? Note that if we >>>> >>>> > managed to run a conference on free software, I'm sure that >>>> institutions >>>> >>>> > and volunteers could be convinced to help hosting and monitoring the >>>> >>>> > conference services during the event. >>>> >>>> > >>>> >>>>