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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" if u want to booze...

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No, it isn't. As organizer of http://scaleconf.org/ I can tell you that almost all of the money goes towards venue hire, lunch/coffee/daytime refreshments, internet and AV equipment, and depending on the conference, flying speakers in.

Then, at the end, you've got a couple of thousand dollars left over, and that goes on the bar tab.

Think about how many dollars worth of alcohol you would drink during a two day conference, then drop the amount because there's a lot of buying in bulk and people who don't go to the parties or drink. It doesn't come anywhere near "most part of a $650 conf ticket".

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.

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