Hacker News Reader

Comment by toothbrush | Hacker News Reader

> This would be unfortunate for conference attendees from Central and South America, but they're far outnumbered by the conference attendees from Europe and Asia.

Then surely, somewhere in Europe or Asia or perhaps wherever the centre of mass of the conference participants happened to fall would be the cheapest destination? I, for one, do not live in the USA, so Canada would definitely not be cheaper than Europe to visit.

View on HN

Maybe it's just a matter of which conferences I attend, but my impression is that "conference attendees per capita" is highest for the USA, lower for Europe, and much lower for Asia. If you want to be closest to people in general you'd probably aim for somewhere around Nepal (mind you, it doesn't have very good connectivity for air travel); but being closest to conference attendees is probably going to be between the USA, Europe, and Asia... in other words, Canada.

(As for the cost, when I said "cheaper" I meant in terms of the cost of conference facilities, food, and hotels. Obviously the cost of travel will depend on where someone is starting their trip.)

How much of that is a product of it being much more expensive for someone from Asia to travel to US conferences? I'm in the often forgotten pool of people who can't just expense conference travel with their employer, and that means I don't even consider conferences outside Europe as they'll be prohibitively expensive.

Asia is on the opposite side of the world from the USA. Their cost to attend is highest, when the conference is in the USA.

Check the distances on a globe -- "between the USA, Europe and Asia" is actually the Middle East. If we need to account for additional attendance from North America, then somewhere in Europe is better -- and the south or east cheaper than the north or west.

Check the distances on a globe -- "between the USA, Europe and Asia" is actually the Middle East

You sure about that? Let's take Denver, Frankfurt, and Hong Kong as representatives of USA, Europe, and Asia, since they're somewhat central to the regions and have major airports.

    DEN-YEG: 1019 miles
    FRA-YEG: 4559 miles
    HKG-YEG: 6504 miles
    Total distances to Edmonton: 12531 miles

    DEN-DXB: 7771 miles
    FRA-DXB: 3012 miles
    HKG-DXB: 3684 miles
    Total distances to Dubai: 14467 miles

The most "central" point between the USA, Europe, and Asia is actually pretty close to the North Pole: http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=FRA-DEN-HKG-FRA&MS=wls&MP=p&DU=...

LOL @ Edmonton vs Dubai comparison.

A big chunk of Edmonton internatonal connections route through the US airports -- SEA, MSP, DEN, ORD, SFO, etc. Unless Edmonton airport becomes a major global air hub like Dubai, this is just plain laughable. The actual distance in miles is not the primary concern by far. Not to mention the sheer uncompetitiveness of Canadian airline industry and airports in general. Canada is the most expensive air destination in the world.

http://globalnews.ca/news/2931748/international-flights-from...

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/rob-commen...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com