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SXSW Cancelled Due to Coronavirus

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Re: SXSW Cancelled Due to Coronavirus

#61

Post by murgindrag »

nostrademons wrote: post #52
tapatio wrote: post #40

The average American will die of cardiovascular disease, not the coronavirus. Rather than stock up on rice and masks and cancel events, people should address what’s most likely to kill them.

Over a lifetime perhaps, but COVID-19 has the potential to kill about a million Americans within the next year, which would make it the leading cause of death by a large margin (surpassing heart disease by 50%). That's assuming a conservative death rate of 1% more inline with South Korea or Diamond Princess rather than the 3.4% the WHO currently estimates or the 5% seen in Wuhan, and assuming a 33% infection rate rat…

And that, in turn, is assuming a mutated version won't come back the next year, and the year after that, and the year after that one.

The worst-case here gets really bad really quickly.

Re: SXSW Cancelled Due to Coronavirus

#62

Post by ajross »

tapatio wrote: post #40

The average American will die of cardiovascular disease, not the coronavirus. Rather than stock up on rice and masks and cancel events, people should address what’s most likely to kill them.

Cardiovascular disease doesn't sweep through an entire population in weeks to months, overwhelming the supply of blood pressure medications, EKG monitors, defibrillators and heart transplant facilities, leaving millions to die of otherwise treatable infarctions.

A well-managed pandemic spread that contains the rate of growth under what the health care infrastructure can manage can be the difference between tens of thousands and millions of deaths. You seriously don't think we should be trying save millions of people?

I remain horrified by the innumerate crazy talk being spread about this thing.

Re: SXSW Cancelled Due to Coronavirus

#63

Post by _ph_ »

xwdv wrote: post #3

WWDC will also be cancelled.

WWDC would have to be announced first to be cancelled. Of course, everyone expects it for June, so also the likelyhood is large, that it is "cancelled" or rather converted (as it never got officially announced) into a on-line event.

Re: SXSW Cancelled Due to Coronavirus

#64

Post by wuunderbar »

jmvoodoo wrote: post #44
cryptozeus wrote: post #39

No refunds will be given “#SXSW replied me saying they won't refund me Frowning face or exchange for 2021. For Brazilian standards the price of the ticket is VERY expensive and I'm cancelling my trip due to concerns related to coronavirus. I think they should refund me and the participants that decided not to attend”

I'm sure if you used a credit card you'd have no problem getting an involuntary refund from SXSW. After a few thousand of those I'm sure their stance would change.

You only have a 3-6 month window with most credit card providers to be able to initiate charge backs.

So it very much depends on when you bought the retail ticket.

Re: SXSW Cancelled Due to Coronavirus

#65

Post by zaroth »

ncallaway wrote: post #42
tapatio wrote: post #40

The average American will die of cardiovascular disease, not the coronavirus. Rather than stock up on rice and masks and cancel events, people should address what’s most likely to kill them.

This makes absolutely no sense at all. Given this line of reasoning, wouldn't it make sense to also not put seatbelts in automobiles? After all, it's not the most likely way to die. Should we bother looking both ways before crossing a street just because there is a low volume of pedestrian deaths? No, that's patently absurd because we have the capacity in this world to prepare for more than just the modal outcome. To…

I think the strongest possible interpretation of the comment is more along the lines of... does the cost/benefit of this decision really line up?

Cancelling a $350 million event means people are not getting paid, maybe those people will not be able to afford rent next month, or groceries next week. Eventually, the cost is borne by those who are least able to shoulder the burden.

It's flu season, but we still hold events because the cost/benefit of forbidding any large gathering for several months out of the year is also "preposterous".

COVID is worse than the flu, perhaps even by 1 order of magnitude, but COVID is also many, many orders of magnitude less prevalent than the flu. We are talking about 310 cases in the US, versus 32 million cases of the flu. So five order of magnitude less prevalent. Secondary flu infection of elderly patients related to SXSW attendees who catch the flu at SXSW result in some number of deaths every year.

In the end the decision isn't being made totally rationally, it's largely being made emotionally and politically. But there is a significant cost in the aggregate which rationally could totally outweigh the benefit.

Re: SXSW Cancelled Due to Coronavirus

#66

Post by chipotle_coyote »

AdamJacobMuller wrote: post #23
xwdv wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing will happen in 2 months that suddenly makes it safe to hold an event of that size attended by developers from all across the world. It’s over.

Of course it could. China could easily develop and push to humans a vaccine at a pace which would make our FDA cringe, but, once its out there and tested on humans in China there's a very small chance the FDA won't be effectively forced to allow it in the USA. Our containment efforts could prevent any significant self-sustaining communities in the USA. This seems plausible. Testing could advance to a point where Appl…

Apple tends to announce dates 2–3 months out from WWDC. Last year's were announced on March 14th; 2018's were announced March 13th; 2016's weren't announced until April 18th. (2017's dates were announced February 16th, but that was the first year in San Jose.)

So they haven't cancelled it yet because they haven't announced it yet. They have the luxury of waiting up to another month to see how it seems things are going -- and if things go the way it seems everyone is predicting, that's absolutely what they're going to do.

Personally, "WWDC moves online for 2020" seems way more likely to me than "Apple will go ahead and announce WWDC and then wait until two weeks out to see if they have to say 'sorry, everybody, see if you can get refunds for your hotel rooms and flights.'"

Re: SXSW Cancelled Due to Coronavirus

#67

Post by pcurve »

adamiscool8 wrote: post #58
pcurve wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's pretty disrespectful considering its much higher mortality rate. People aren't panicking for fun. https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-compared-to-flu-...

But many countries have stopped counting mild cases, and how many asymptomatic cases are out there already? I don't know if any modelling has been done, but the true mortality rate could be much, much lower -- perhaps even lower than a pandemic flu. [0] [0] https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe2002387?query=rec...

But in South Korea, they didn't just test people with symptoms; they tested anybody and everybody suspected of having contacts in certain region. Mortality rate is still significantly higher than common flu.

Re: SXSW Cancelled Due to Coronavirus

#69

Post by adamiscool8 »

pcurve wrote: post #67
adamiscool8 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But many countries have stopped counting mild cases, and how many asymptomatic cases are out there already? I don't know if any modelling has been done, but the true mortality rate could be much, much lower -- perhaps even lower than a pandemic flu. [0] [0] https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe2002387?query=rec...

But in South Korea, they didn't just test people with symptoms; they tested anybody and everybody suspected of having contacts in certain region. Mortality rate is still significantly higher than common flu.

It's 0.6% based on 42 deaths out of 6,284 confirmed cases out of 158,000 tests out of a population of 51 million. The flu is 0.1%, but COVID-19's mortality rate very easily could still be significantly overstated.

Re: SXSW Cancelled Due to Coronavirus

#70

Post by godzillabrennus »

TrueDuality wrote: post #55
excerionsforte wrote: post #28

SXSW was really bent on going through with this massive event even though smaller events were being cancelled. The spread would likely happen through multiple contacts in airports and since there is a delay in symptoms if any, SXSW woould, in the worst case, been a super spreader event. You could bet lawsuits would have rained on them and likely the City of Austin. Sometimes, you just got to say no, we will not contr…

I suspect they waited too long to do it. I suspect a very large percentage of the people that were going to attend have non-refundable plane tickets, have already arranged time off from their jobs, etc and will still be coming to Austin... I guess time will tell.

All airlines are refunding penalty free as credits toward a future flight.

Everyone on Wall Street is preparing for a catastrophic economic collapse from this.

American Airlines is likely to go bankrupt.

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