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Tripling Down Against USA Conference Hosting

robert.ocallahan.org

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Re: Tripling Down Against USA Conference Hosting

#91

Post by misja111 »

I'm a bit amazed by the panic here on HN about the blocked Visa's. I mean, I do agree that the initiative is retarded, but it's not like under Obama residents from Iran or Sudan could get in an out of the USA whenever they wanted.

In my last job in the Netherlands I had an Iranian colleague who tried for seven years in a row to get a Visum to go to the USA, without success. The situation was already very difficult under Obama, Trump's recent initiative is not as big a change as some make it appear.

Re: Tripling Down Against USA Conference Hosting

#92

Post by oliwarner »

Noseshine wrote: post #49
NTDF9 wrote: post #43

This is a great opportunity for Canadian, Australian and top European universities to step up their game. Some universities in these regions have solid reputations but lacked the star-power of top US univs. Hosting a few ACM conferences will shoot them on top of global map. Just checked, ACM is already on it: https://www.acm.org/conferences

Do universities that don't have to rely on the money they get form international students have the same incentives as US universities? From what I read that's a major consideration for US universities why they want to attract foreign students. For German universities that would only be of marginal concern, even if/when they take some money from foreign students it's just pocket change and not nearly enough to finance…

It's not just tuition fees.

Consider that cities with top-league universities also have deep links with industry. Oxford and Cambridge —as examples I'm familiar with— both have off-site science parks, secondary research centres. Many tech companies host labs there and operate PhD programmes that link in with the universities.

That has driven the growth of these cities for a century.

All because these universities have the best and brightest. Take away those, and I can only imagine the business support will dwindle.

Re: Tripling Down Against USA Conference Hosting

#93

Post by semi-extrinsic »

misja111 wrote: post #91

I'm a bit amazed by the panic here on HN about the blocked Visa's. I mean, I do agree that the initiative is retarded, but it's not like under Obama residents from Iran or Sudan could get in an out of the USA whenever they wanted. In my last job in the Netherlands I had an Iranian colleague who tried for seven years in a row to get a Visum to go to the USA, without success. The situation was already very difficult un…

I agree this is overlooked. I know of a research group at a high-profile university in Europe that had to hide the fact they had a key team member from Iran when they applied for using a large US supercomputer. IIRC this was back in 2013. So they got a user account for one European-born team member, who gave the login details to the Iranian person who then did the actual work on the supercomputer.

Re: Tripling Down Against USA Conference Hosting

#94

Post by Jare »

misja111 wrote: post #91

I'm a bit amazed by the panic here on HN about the blocked Visa's. I mean, I do agree that the initiative is retarded, but it's not like under Obama residents from Iran or Sudan could get in an out of the USA whenever they wanted. In my last job in the Netherlands I had an Iranian colleague who tried for seven years in a row to get a Visum to go to the USA, without success. The situation was already very difficult un…

Situation A: it's hard for me to get a VISA.

Situation B: I have been a permanent resident for years, own a house and a cat, my family are citizens, I went to Europe for a few days and now the border authorities detain me and want to send me to Iran.

How big does it have to be?

Re: Tripling Down Against USA Conference Hosting

#95

Post by dragandj »

NTDF9 wrote: post #79
Noseshine wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do universities that don't have to rely on the money they get form international students have the same incentives as US universities? From what I read that's a major consideration for US universities why they want to attract foreign students. For German universities that would only be of marginal concern, even if/when they take some money from foreign students it's just pocket change and not nearly enough to finance…

For top schools, money is secondary to building and maintaining reputation and leadership in research. Money comes as a consequence of being leaders, Think of Carnegie Mellon Robotics professors and grad students poached by Uber. Think of top graph computer scientists who joined Facebook and Google early on. A lot of this men and women were bright international students/professors flocking to top US univs. These brig…

> For top schools, money is secondary to building and maintaining reputation and leadership in research. Money comes as a consequence of being leaders,

This is not quite exactly how it works in Europe, though. Money is channeled through national/EU government, one way or another.

Re: Tripling Down Against USA Conference Hosting

#96

Post by watson »

misja111 wrote: post #91

I'm a bit amazed by the panic here on HN about the blocked Visa's. I mean, I do agree that the initiative is retarded, but it's not like under Obama residents from Iran or Sudan could get in an out of the USA whenever they wanted. In my last job in the Netherlands I had an Iranian colleague who tried for seven years in a row to get a Visum to go to the USA, without success. The situation was already very difficult un…

My colleague is from Iran but live and work in my country (in the EU). Last year my company were sponsoring a tech conference in the US and him and a few of my other colleagues were going to attend the conference (he's the lead engeener on a product that we were going to publicise at the conference). He was denied entry to the US simply because he was from Iran, so it hasn't been all roses. But now it has just reached insane levels.

Re: Tripling Down Against USA Conference Hosting

#97

Post by MagnumOpus »

dragonzooord wrote: post #77

The EO is cruel and irrational and is something I'm firmly against. It makes sense to not host your conference in the USA for moral reasons. But, on the other hand, a lot of Americans don't have passports or their employment contracts will only reimburse a number of domestic (non-international) conferences a year. The set of those people who would be excluded probably exceeds the set of attendees from the 7 countries…

> a lot of Americans don't have passports [...] set of people who would be excluded

Let's keep it real: The contributors to a global science conference are unlikely to be people who don't have passports - and in case that happens, getting passports in the US is as easy as filling in a form and driving down to the local post office.

Whereas even getting a business travel visa to the US is a month-long bureaucratic nightmare for 80% of the world's population (basically everyone bar EU, Japan, Korea and AU/NZ/CA).

Re: Tripling Down Against USA Conference Hosting

#98

Post by danpalmer »

masklinn wrote: post #76

The funny story is after friday's EO this is a case of "damned if you do, damned if you don't": if you hold the conference in the US, people with links to banned countries can not attend (and anyone arab-looking will get hassled), if you hold it outside US residents with links to banned countries can not attend either as there's a significant chance they would not be able to return. I suspect the latter population is…

You're right that it's an unpleasant situation to be in, but I think it's a fairly easy decision. One option excludes attendees, condones racist border policies, and brings business to the US, the other option does not condone the policies, makes it clear that inclusivity matters to the conference organisers, and to a small extent, boycotts US business.

Re: Tripling Down Against USA Conference Hosting

#99

Post by baby »

misja111 wrote: post #91

I'm a bit amazed by the panic here on HN about the blocked Visa's. I mean, I do agree that the initiative is retarded, but it's not like under Obama residents from Iran or Sudan could get in an out of the USA whenever they wanted. In my last job in the Netherlands I had an Iranian colleague who tried for seven years in a row to get a Visum to go to the USA, without success. The situation was already very difficult un…

Even coming from Europe it can be hard getting in the US (source: romanian gf).

Re: Tripling Down Against USA Conference Hosting

#100

Post by chopin »

ganeshkrishnan wrote: post #46
Canada wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The TSA are just the goons who search passengers at the airport. They have nothing to do with what you've talking about.

The TSA are not goons. They are just doing their job. If you have a problem with what they do, talk to their boss or vote for the right person. Most of the TSA people I know are normal people and have families,kids and stressful job with passengers being aggressive at them for no fault of theirs.

> They are just doing their job

The US does not regard this as a valid excuse. Cf. the Nuremberg trials.

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