Our Culture of Exclusion (or, why I'm not at JSConf this year) • Hacker News Board

Re: Our Culture of Exclusion (or, why I'm not at JSConf this year)

#91

Post by thenduks » Thu, Apr 12, 2012, 1:45 PM UTC

Scobleizer wrote: post #77

Even those of us who are almost professional conference goers get tired of this stuff eventually. I know I far prefer having a couple of awesome programmers over my house for a great conversation. Just did that this morning, actually, when the folks behind FluidInfo came over. No beers were consumed. What Ryan should do is focus on hackathons and other, smaller, places where code actually gets written, shared, and di…

Hi Robert, thanks for your comments! I think you're right that most conferences just aren't the place for me. Fortunately I can often watch the talks afterwards, so I should probably just focus on doing other things. It's a shame, though, because other than the focus on alcohol and parties I actually do really enjoy the conference atmosphere.

Re: Our Culture of Exclusion (or, why I'm not at JSConf this year)

#92

Post by look_lookatme » Fri, Apr 13, 2012, 6:09 PM UTC

DrillBitterMan wrote: post #89

It's hard to argue with the points of the author's article. It's very easy, however, to argue with a simplistic misunderstanding of the author's article. Basically, if you think this is about not liking drinking, you are wrong (in my opinion). If, on the other hand, you think this is about exclusion, and tailoring fora for a particular demographic, and then failing to acknowledge that tailoring, then you are correct…

Good points, let's go to the bar and talk it out.

Re: Our Culture of Exclusion (or, why I'm not at JSConf this year)

#93

Post by antihero » Sun, Apr 15, 2012, 3:37 PM UTC

jigarashah wrote: post #44

ctide wrote: post #3

Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but unfortunately for you, lots of people drink. It's not just a programmer thing. It's one of the most prominent ways people socialize. Not programmers, people. I'm sorry that you feel uncomfortable going to conferences because of the drinking, but unfortunately, it's something you should probably learn to accept. You can move cities, change careers, do whatever you want, but unfor…

I don't think guy has problem with drinking...Its about focus. And he is right, people go to these conference just 4 drinking and partying hard. Actual talks just get over shadowed with these booze parties. Its not "necessary" to make them part of culture...It should be optional. Come-on, most part of a 650$ conf ticket is for booze ...isn't it.. ? I think it should be like paid (and discounted..) "buy extra coupon"…

I can understand that he might get annoyed with the culture of trying to make programming "cool" by having everything at bars, but seriously, he needs to get over himself. That said, I'm quitting drinking/smoking for a month so it will be interesting to see things from his perspective.