SXSW Cancelled Due to Coronavirus | Hacker News Reader

SXSW Cancelled Due to Coronavirus

techcrunch.com

188 pointsestreeper83 comments

One interesting tidbit here is that the mayor made the call to cancel the event, not SXSW themselves. I understand the organizers stand to lose _a lot_ from cancellations, but this still seems like bad optics.

Unrelated, but I have three big events I booked long ago that I'm either becoming weary of attending, or fear that they will be cancelled and I'll be on the hook for the hotel and other accommodations. One of them is at SF chase center (19K capacity) and SF recently announced infections. Not a good time to be a fan of live events.

EDIT: Here's an interesting twitter thread that gives an isight into what smaller event organizers are going through due to the coronavirus https://twitter.com/jessiechar/status/1235685514667126786

Here was SXSW's statement on the cancelation.

> The City of Austin has cancelled the March dates for SXSW and SXSW EDU. SXSW will faithfully follow the City’s directions. We are devastated to share this news with you. “The show must go on” is in our DNA, and this is the first time in 34 years that the March event will not take place. We are now working through the ramifications of this unprecedented situation. As recently as Wednesday, Austin Public Health stated that “there’s no evidence that closing SXSW or any other gatherings will make the community safer.” However, this situation evolved rapidly, and we honor and respect the City of Austin’s decision. We are committed to do our part to help protect our staff, attendees, and fellow Austinites.

https://www.sxsw.com/2020-event-update/

I find their statement a bit irritating...they're basically saying "if it weren't for the city, we would have still done it, screw any consequences".

If the public health authority that they're within the jurisdiction of says closing wont help, then it seems weird to say it's a "screw the consequences" move. More of a "we've been told there wont be consequences" move.

I think when it comes to public crisis, decisions like this should be made by the public as a whole, and in a democracy that means the elected government.

Private individuals shouldn’t have to parse health statistics or educate themselves to the level of virologists. Instead the government should do this work, and issue a decree. If not this, then when will government be useful?

Could the city announcing the cancellation yield the organizers a more favorable insurance payout? I've heard of some event insurance policies treating pandemics as Acts of God, and will not pay on a pandemic forcing a cancellation or closure. Would be very interested in hearing the insurance industry's justification for that position.

They normally justify it by requiring you to take out an additional premium for such coverage rather than just skip out on it by force majeure. At least that's the way it's done in other countries.

What I am hearing is SXSW cannot get the insurance payout if they unilaterally cancel the event. Thatswhy they have waited the city and Austin Public Health to make the decision for them. Same thing with SaaStr as well - They waited for the Santa Clara county to make the decision.

That's the rumor, but the statement they put out was absolutely ridiculous and in no way required for insurance. The organizers were willing to put people at risk for profit.

Well, there goes the theory of waiting to cancel to collect insurance [1]...

This makes the delays even more incomprehensible. Seems it wasn't greed after all; it was just sheer irresponsibility.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22509322

Just got this email from SXSW: https://www.airsend.io/images/sxsw_deferral.png

2020 registrants can opt to defer to 2021,2022 or 23

To the contrary, this is a decision that impacts the entire city, involving many, many people. The mayor is the right person to make that holistic, wide-ranging call.

It's not bad optics at all. This is a public decision that is most responsibly taken by public officials.

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 contribute to spreading this disease inadvertently and take the hit. SXSW organizers are unbelievable.

To the people only thinking of themselves about this just being a "flu", I read this yesterday: https://twitter.com/kumailn/status/1235015662117908481 It is not just about you. He pulled out of events because he wanted to limit contact to avoid spreading it to a vulnerable loved one.

What standing would an infected person have against SXSW or the city of Austin?

Your government at all levels are responsible for public safety. If you harm public safety (in)advertently, you can definitely expect lawsuits your way. Lawsuits are a matter of dispute. It does not matter if one "wins" or "lose".

That whether you've won or lost is subjective does not mean it doesn't matter.

I thought they were waiting for the city to cancel it for insurance reasons.

That will be what seems to have happened.

Thank you, Dan Streetmentioner.

If that has been confirmed. Do you have proof?

Nope. Apparently their insurance does not cover it.

https://www.austinchronicle.com/daily/news/2020-03-06/sxsw-c...

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.

Credits toward a future flight are not refunds and most people can't treat them that way.

“Cancelling SXSW represents about $350M in lost revenue for the city of Austin. This is an enormous act of civic responsibility”

I'm speculating their insurance coverage only kicked in if they were forced to close.

They're likely not covered at all - pandemics are usually considered to be acts of God.

> I'm speculating their insurance coverage only kicked in if they were forced to close.

SXSW was definitely not going to cancel until forced.

The more important piece than insurance, I suspect, is that they don't have to give full refunds now. It also probably means they can unilaterally cancel contracts.

An article from "Variety" (https://variety.com/2020/music/festivals/coronavirus-ultra-s...) covers exactly this and agrees:

> But he understands the hesitance to cancel — because even if most major promoters probably spent extra to have communicable disease provisions in their cancellation insurance, it wouldn’t likely kick in if they made a unilateral decision to cancel without the city forcing their hand to do so.

In the above, "he" refers to an "entertainment manager" at an insurance company. Doesn't sound like firsthand knowledge, but it's still a very educated guess.

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.

There's a myth that chargebacks are automatic or easy.

You have to make a chargeback complaint, have that investigated, get approval from your issuer, then wait for a refund.

Sometimes it is pretty easy (Chase). I did a charge back on my card with the click of a button 'Dispute Charge'. I received a refund almost immediately and the dispute was sustained

Did you try canceling before the official cancellation announcement?

If they're not issuing refund after the cancellation announcement, then they're finished. No more SXSW next year.

How could that possibly be legal? You don't get the thing you paid for.

There are often clauses in these type of agreements about natural disasters. Of course I’m speculating, but it’s entirely plausible something like this applies here. Especially if it was ordered by the city, rather than the organizers.

It was only a matter of time and happening all over the country. F8, GDC, HIMSS, Ultra Music Festival, etc etc. Its for the greater good.

It's all about the greater good.

The greater good...

Interesting that the official announcement makes no reference to refunds of tickets.

They are not refunding, saw few threads on twitter about that.

What? How can they do that?

Perhaps they will offer a choice between a voucher for next year's event, or some type of (partial) refund.

No refunds, no exchanges. I sense a class action lawsuit.

Can’t wait to buy hospitality stocks in a few months.

How does an article on _Techcrunch_ of all things get more upvotes than the official announcement?

WWDC will also be cancelled.

Very likely, but, I don't think they have to announce that yet. We're 2 months out.

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.

What about summmer? Honest question that I haven't seen discussed enough to form an opinion on. Flu and the common cold are drastically curtailed by late spring and it seems reasonable that coronavirus spread could also dramatically slow until the season starts again this fall.

The only answer you're going to get out of someone that isn't talking out their ass is: hopefully it will be curtailed by summer, but we don't really know. And keep in mind that summer in some places is winter in others.

Relevant: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/06/its-a-false-hope-coronavirus...

No one knows.

There is data on the flu and COVID-19 from parts of the world that are in summer vs. winter. As the situation evolves further this data should enable making a better educated guess:

Influenza: https://www.who.int/influenza/surveillance_monitoring/update...

COVID-19: https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/685d0ace521648f8a5b... (linked from https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2...)

It worked for sars and mers, its reasonable to think it would happen for covid, however we dont know.

There are cases in warm places like Singapore and Thailand. Yes, they think transmission could be slowed in warm humid weather, but most warm places in the world have air conditioning.

A friend of mine recently went Guangdong -> HK -> Thailand -> US. Their logic was along the lines of: Thailand has fewer cases than Singapore because Thailand has minimal air conditioning compared to places like Singapore or the US.

We'll see.

That’s a very speculative statement. It’s quite possible that the Virus spread will stop as the weather warms up.

>That’s a very speculative statement. It’s quite possible that the Virus spread will stop as the weather warms up.

Based on what data?

This is something that Trump said and was immediately shut down on. We simply don't know enough to make any statements about spread probability yet.

Based on prior coronavirus outbreaks, e.g. mers, sers, common cold. It and derivatives probably will be a winter cold for the next few years.

Keep in mind that a lot of us are not Americans and don’t know or care what trump is saying.

>Keep in mind that a lot of us are not Americans and don’t know or care what trump is saying.

I'm also "not American" (I'm Scottish) and so shall continue to keep the fact that a lot of us are "not Americans" in mind.

That being said, "it’s quite possible that the Virus spread will stop as the weather warms up" implies the weather is going to "warm up", which is only relevant in the northern hemisphere. Half the planet is going to cool down.

More importantly, the CDC (yes, a USAian source), recently stated ""At this time, it is not known whether the spread of COVID-19 [the illness caused by the coronavirus] will decrease when weather becomes warmer." so asking for data, or at least why this statement was claimed as "quite possible" is very reasonable.

Finally, you claim that things will die down "based on prior coronavirus outbreaks, e.g. mers, sars" - here is a (peer reviewed, with abundant data) paper claiming the exact opposite of what you are claiming, specifically: "This study provided some evidence that there is a higher possibility for SARS to reoccur in spring than that in autumn and winter."

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15709076

So again I have to ask: based on what data do you draw your conclusions?

Viruses don't care about the weather. The reason we catch more diseases in the winter is just that we spend more time indoors, physically nearer to other people. That will probably be true of COVID19 too, but the existing transmission numbers (which, to be fair, are still noisy and hard to say anything definitive about) are like an order of magnitude higher than you get for flu transmission. Summer isn't going to do squat, basically.

When "most" people have had some variant of a virus in the past and have working antibodies, it's harder for diseases to spread. When everyone is vulnerable, you need far (!) fewer transmission events to double the number of infections, and things explode.

This kind of misunderstanding is a big part of why so many people (including those at the top, sigh) aren't taking this seriously.

> The reason we catch more diseases in the winter is just that we spend more time indoors, physically nearer to other people.

I believe that is just one theory of several possible. We don't really know why respiratory infections go down in the summer.

There are lots of unknowns in this space, but no, that model is pretty well accepted. Surely there are lots of contributing factors.

But regardless, the point was that transmission of normal, already-circulating viruses is limited both by the number of transmission events and the much lower chance of infection. But a novel virus has a MUCH higher chance to hop on any given event, so in practice it's rate of spread is limited not by the chance of "catching" the bug but just by its own incubation period. Stuff like winter/summer changes on the margin aren't going to change anything.

How’s the weather in Iran right now?

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 Apple safely and effectively door tests attendees. This seems like something Apple would and will do, if they can (e.g. if testing advances far enough in the next month or so).

I think Apple will announce a decision between 30-15 days out from the event and by that time their choice will be an obvious one.

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.'"

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.

I think it's very interesting the disproportionate reaction that a virus or disease gets versus any other number of things that people risk their lives doing on a daily basis. Particularly for lesser known viruses or diseases which our brains haven't acclimated to.

The CDC estimates that 31 million Americans caught the flu this year, resulting in about 200,000 hospitalizations, and between 12,000 - 30,000 people have died this season from flu-related complications. So as a rule of thumb you could say 10% of America infected, ~1% of those people are hospitalized, and 10% of those people die. Every year.

Do we close events during the winter because of the flu? Of course not. We would never be able to have a winter-season event ever again. The flu vaccine is not particularly effective, some years it's even almost entirely ineffective, although most years about 50/50...

I'm still of the (clearly unpopular) opinion that the response to COVID is 1 part science, and 3 parts hysteria.

At the gym today I heard a great saying. Almost 3 million people die every year from obesity. Maybe instead of yelling at everyone to wash their hands, we should be yelling at everyone to eat a damn salad. SXSW is substantially less hazardous to the public health than McDonalds.

Why is the response to this coronavirus so hysterical? You could come up with any number of fatality stats that have taken more lives since January than COVID-19. Lower respiratory infections (not COVID related) kill approximately 200,000 people a month. Malaria kills 50,000 a month. Even just driving kills 100,000 people a month.

Rather than thinking SXSW organizers are unbelievable for not canceling, I think that the Mayor/City of Austin is unbelievable for canceling. Anyway, I just got back from a trip to Orlando, and Disney World and Universal, while not packed, certainly seemed busy.

The CDC should do what they are setup to do; ensure that testing is both cheap, accurate, and readily available, that people are educated about how to reasonably decrease their chances of catching a virus, teach how to manage a mild infection and self-quarantine, and when to seek medical attention. IMO, we don't need to tank the world economy in order to do this.

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