DConf 2019: Shepherd's Pie Edition

[Nicholas Wilson]

On Tuesday, 25 December 2018 at 18:54:25 UTC, Joakim wrote:
> Simply repeating over and over again that you're not 
> "convinced" is not an argument, nor do your own personal 
> reasons above argue for one format over another.

I don't mean to stoke the flames on this anymore, but I do: I've 
been to past conferences and now that I'm not a poor student 
anymore I'd pay to go to them. I happen to still have plenty of 
free time so watching pre-recorded talks, while not a problem for 
me a) does not apply to everyone and b) loses interactivity.

> I asked for a rationale above and got none from Mike and a very 
> weak, confused one from Walter. It's fairly obvious that there 
> was never any real deliberation on the DConf format, and that 
> you guys have dug in and decided to cut off your nose to spite 
> your face.

I can't speak for other but the rationale or deliberation of not 
doing what you have suggested is the it has worked well in the 
past, and I see no reason for that to cease to be the case.

> Fine with me, your loss.

On the contrary, I think it will (continue to be) a massive 
success.

> I see, so you're arguing that DConf shouldn't be doing 
> in-person talks because it's larger than most D meetups? Don't 
> answer that, scale as a reason makes no sense and there's no 
> way you can make it.

You have that backwards again, As Iain said, watching one 
pre-recorded talk takes an hour, which I'm sure many enthusiasts 
will be able and wiling to spend, scale that up to 20 and they 
may not be able to even if they are willing.

>> To do something very different from a "traditional" conference 
>> would be a significant risk when what we have works well.
>
> I see no "risk" whatsoever in change when the status quo is 
> dying, and what you're already doing isn't having much impact.

and that comes down to an apparently fundament disagreement that 
the status quo is not good enough, In our experience the current 
format work very well. I hope you agree that a major change to 
the way things are done will likely have a major impact on the 
quality of the conference: if you think it is bad enough that 
changing it can only improve it then you would, rightly, come to 
the conclusion that the expected value (in the statistical sense) 
of changing the format is positive. However, if you think that 
the change may cause the quality to degrade then the expected 
value of the change of format drops significantly...

>> As noted previously your opinions would carry more weight if 
>> you had actually attended a past DConf.
>
> Heh, this is the dumbest possible argument anyone can put forth 
> and you guys repeatedly make it: "I have no arguments so 
> 'Magic! You had to be there!'"

...and the change becomes much more risky. The argument of "your 
opinions would carry more weight if  you had actually attended a 
past DConf" stems from the fact that we have experienced the 
conference as a positive well worthwhile to attend event and we 
see the potential for this to get worse in the face of change.