PyCon US 2020 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania is cancelled | Hacker News Reader

PyCon US 2020 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania is cancelled

pycon.blogspot.com

50 pointsobi1kenobi6 comments

> “Even though the in-person event isn’t happening in 2020, our staff and volunteers are already planning to deliver several PyCon US components remotely throughout April.”

I hope the remote paradigm will stay even after the crisis, in addition to normal attending. It's great to be able to stream conferences, but even more interactivity would be great.

I recently watched an impressive TED talk about volumetric video¹. I can see us moving fast into a hybrid reality with such "UX".

____

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwUkbi4_wWo

Just recently they were shouting that they'll proceed with the conference[1]. Seen too many of those who were just few weeks ago advocating that COVID-19 is not a threat and it will be BAU. Finally everyone stopped ignoring and taking it seriously.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22471162

By all accounts I've heard, the organizers have wanted to cancel the event for a while now, but for liability and financial reasons, couldn't afford to until they were "forced" to. Eg, venue contracts, sponsorship agreements, etc, generally stipulate that if the conference cancels without good reason, they owe large fees or penalties to the venue, sponsors, etc. The PSF does not have the operational budget to absorb these penalties while also refunding the money for everyone who was planning to attend.

So they had to act as if everything was going ahead as normal while also hoping and planning for any contingency that would allow them to cancel the event without suffering financial ruin.

Conference organizers are liable for cancelled contracts, unless the cancellation is due to a larger force.

Did you read the March 12th blog post? https://pycon.blogspot.com/2020/03/march-12-update-on-covid-...

Last time their argument was: "Currently, there have not been any COVID-19 cases in Pennsylvania".

So despite their blog post explaining why it took so long to cancel, you believe something nefarious or incompetent was going on?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com