The part about an initiative to look up visitors phones and social media is BS. This measure was introduced in June last year when the president wasn't Trump. Went into effect in December, when Trump already won but had no authority.
One random link from google: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/foreign-travelers-soci...
Virtually all of what Trump is being called out on has been consistent bipartisan policy, or at the least supported consistently by recent Republican administrations and by every Republican primary candidate, all of whom were openly racist, xenophobic and anti-science. I think it's a good thing. Finally an ugly, stupid face on ugly, stupid policies.
It will net only the most retarded entrapment arrests possible. It's tantamount to searching people's bags for postcards and magazines, because there might be terrorist postcards or terrorist magazines.
Yes, there may be terrorists who send postcards and read magazines (even newspapers!) but, ah... how does that prevent violent actions?
I think one good criterion (among others) for deciding in what country to hold a conference is the number of countries whose citizen can enter without visa. There's a list on Wikipedia that you can sort by that criterion [1].
For the USA, it's 42 (what else). Canada, 52. For Schengen area (most of EU), 92. Hong Kong, 148, Indonesia, Cambodia even more. China only 12.
So, South East Asia or Europe seem reasonable on that score.
While they are likely accurate for simply attending a conference, they might not be for presenting at a conference (that often changes the reason for the visit from "education" to "paid work" which can impact the need for a visa).
That said, Schengen area is probably still easier than the US for attending AND presenting.
Having organised a pretty large student conference in the past, here are some further considerations:
- Obviously the specific countries behind those numbers matter. If you're organising a conference on 14th century Flemish literature, the Netherlands will be more important than North Korea
- Not all restrictions are created equal. Specifically, the activity I was involved in (University Debating) has a sizeable Israeli community, who would argue that travel restrictions that jews encounter across the muslim world should be considered more harshly than most other travel restrictions, which tend to emanate from a fear of economic migration.
- beware self-fulfilling prophecies: If you chose a location that is hard for sub-saharan african nationals to reach because they're underrepresented in your audience, you are also perpetuating that underrepresentation.
Self-centered American here, but wouldn't it make sense to weight it by population, or even population of likely attendees? Not clear why, say, Suriname (to pick a country out of a hat) should rank equally with Japan.
That said, I think the point of your post (and the original post) is just to call out how ridiculous and sad the US's sudden policy swerve is. I hate how often the US compares unfavorably with the rest of the developed world on all sorts of indices; we're so strange. Strangely illiberal, even before November. (I mean 'illiberal' in the political theory sense of the word, not left/right political sense of the word.)
Seems to me "proportion of your target community that can attend without a visa" would be a more valid metric than "number of countries from which people can enter without a visa".
But even better would be to also factor in the difficulty of getting the necessary visa for others.
I fear this is the warning shot across the bow of those tech executives who supported this president. First, they come for your conferences. Then, your H1B visa-holding employees. Then...?
Innovation thrives on freedom. Freedom of expression, freedom of movement, freedom of markets. And tech, in its best form, is about freedom, rather than market-capture and rent-seeking. Needless to say, none of these recent developments are good.
Innovation thrives on the rule of law, independent courts and neutral arbiters of contracts, habeas corpus and due process, the right to a lawyer, and the right to uncoerced testimony.
Consider Jethro Tull, the farmer. In 1700 he was 26 and he was taking over the family farm. He hired some local hands to seed the fields that spring. As had happened for thousands of years, the workers took bags of seed and cast handfuls on the ground. Jethro Tull became angry, because there were patches of ground that had too much seed, and other patches of ground that had too little seed. He went over to the workers and asked them to be more careful. But they proceeded as before. Tull became more angry, and went to speak with them again. But they still ignored him, and kept doing their work in the traditional manner, as they had since they were children, and as had their parents before them, and their parents before that. Tull was in a rage, but saw he could not change how the workers did their work. Instead, he decided to build a machine that would plant seeds at regular intervals. This was the beginning of the Agricultural Revolution.
But now ask, why did this happen in 1700, and not in 1680 or 1660 or 1500, for that matter? Was Tull simply smarter than any farmer that had ever lived before that time? Or was their a new legal system on his side?
In the time of Tull's father, England was still burning witches. The last great spasm of irrational fear and witch burning swept over Britain in the mid 1600s. But then Britain passed the Bill Of Rights, in 1688. Now everyone had the right to a fair trial, and a right to a lawyer, and no one could be tortured into confessing to a crime, such as witchcraft. And Tull belonged to the first generation of entrepreneurs in history knowing that they could depend on the rule of law -- the government could not take arbitrary action against him, but was constrained by its own processes. Therefore Tull could shatter tradition, and do completely new things, without the threat of being burned as a witch.
I could cite an endless number of examples. Galileo made brilliant discoveries in an illiberal nation, and was put under house arrest, Newtown made discoveries in a nation of laws, and he became a national hero. Simply knowing that laws will be enforced fairly defeats a lot of the kinds of evil scheming that spring up under authoritarian regimes.
"Freedom" is an empty word. When talking about the kinds of environments that cultivate innovation, it's best to try to be specific about that environment. History teach us the raw ingredients: the rule of law, fair and independent courts, habeas corpus and due process, the right to a lawyer, the right to uncoerced testimony.
I agree with your basic points, but on a practical level, how much does this actually affect things for H1 companies? We are talking 7 countries very few of which produce many H1 employees.
Just the first ripples against the shore of what I expect to be a tsunami of unexpected consequences.
Seems like a golden opportunity for another country to step up and become the "conference center of the world". I'd LOL extra hard if it turned out to be Mexico.
Seems like a golden opportunity for another country to step up and become the "conference center of the world". I'd LOL extra hard if it turned out to be Mexico.
Can I suggest Canada for this purpose? We're a cheaper conference destination than the USA, Europe, or Japan; have a fluently English-speaking population anywhere conferences would be held (most people in Montreal are bilingual); have good infrastructure; and most international visitors to the USA already fly over Canada anyway.
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.
A few years ago I raised the idea (on Twitter) of Iceland being a nice "neutral" venue that's equally (in)convenient for both US and European attendees, very liberal and progressive, and, at the time, cheap for a Nordic country.
I have since seen a handful of industry conferences take place there, but it hasn't really blown up (one reason, I suspect, is it's reasonably expensive to stay there now - Iceland's decline did not last long!)
No one has mentioned Singapore yet. It's easier for most people to get there than to Australasia. And, in the scheme of hereditary fascist dictators, the Lees are comparatively sane ;-)
This is a great opportunity for Canadian, Australian and top European universities to step up their game.
Some universities in these regions have solid reputations but lacked the star-power of top US univs. Hosting a few ACM conferences will shoot them on top of global map.
Do universities that don't have to rely on the money they get form international students have the same incentives as US universities?
From what I read that's a major consideration for US universities why they want to attract foreign students. For German universities that would only be of marginal concern, even if/when they take some money from foreign students it's just pocket change and not nearly enough to finance the institution to a substantial extend. Sure they still have an incentive, but it's much less and not monetary.
I think, that's what I get from what I've been reading in comments over the years.
I'm a bit amazed by the panic here on HN about the blocked Visa's. I mean, I do agree that the initiative is retarded, but it's not like under Obama residents from Iran or Sudan could get in an out of the USA whenever they wanted.
In my last job in the Netherlands I had an Iranian colleague who tried for seven years in a row to get a Visum to go to the USA, without success. The situation was already very difficult under Obama, Trump's recent initiative is not as big a change as some make it appear.
Situation B: I have been a permanent resident for years, own a house and a cat, my family are citizens, I went to Europe for a few days and now the border authorities detain me and want to send me to Iran.
My colleague is from Iran but live and work in my country (in the EU). Last year my company were sponsoring a tech conference in the US and him and a few of my other colleagues were going to attend the conference (he's the lead engeener on a product that we were going to publicise at the conference). He was denied entry to the US simply because he was from Iran, so it hasn't been all roses. But now it has just reached insane levels.
I agree this is overlooked. I know of a research group at a high-profile university in Europe that had to hide the fact they had a key team member from Iran when they applied for using a large US supercomputer. IIRC this was back in 2013. So they got a user account for one European-born team member, who gave the login details to the Iranian person who then did the actual work on the supercomputer.
The funny story is after friday's EO this is a case of "damned if you do, damned if you don't": if you hold the conference in the US, people with links to banned countries can not attend (and anyone arab-looking will get hassled), if you hold it outside US residents with links to banned countries can not attend either as there's a significant chance they would not be able to return.
I suspect the latter population is much smaller than the former, but still a shit situation for a conference organiser, no matter how you do it you will effectively prevent a fraction of possible attendees out, unless you have your conf' right on a border I guess but I doubt that's really possible.
What is the "border status" of Puerto Rico, could that be an option? Or maybe a nearby carribean island which US residents could reach by board from Puerto Rico without hassle going back?
You're right that it's an unpleasant situation to be in, but I think it's a fairly easy decision. One option excludes attendees, condones racist border policies, and brings business to the US, the other option does not condone the policies, makes it clear that inclusivity matters to the conference organisers, and to a small extent, boycotts US business.
Wouldn't hosting in the US still make the most practical sense because it has by far the most software developers, and the middle Eastern countries involved don't really contain many at all?
I don't like the EO, but doesn't this just ignore reality?
Agree, like it or not, America is still the center of technology. The best of the best is still here. Other countries need to chill out for at least 20 more years
The EO is cruel and irrational and is something I'm firmly against. It makes sense to not host your conference in the USA for moral reasons.
But, on the other hand, a lot of Americans don't have passports or their employment contracts will only reimburse a number of domestic (non-international) conferences a year. The set of those people who would be excluded probably exceeds the set of attendees from the 7 countries in question. So I'm not convinced it makes sense to do this just from a conference attendance standpoint.
> a lot of Americans don't have passports [...] set of people who would be excluded
Let's keep it real: The contributors to a global science conference are unlikely to be people who don't have passports - and in case that happens, getting passports in the US is as easy as filling in a form and driving down to the local post office.
Whereas even getting a business travel visa to the US is a month-long bureaucratic nightmare for 80% of the world's population (basically everyone bar EU, Japan, Korea and AU/NZ/CA).
Every country should have their own primary tech conference, in a de-globalizing world.
It's pretty clear. The return of nation state sovereignty and de-globalization is on the rise from the brexit, trump, le pen, modi, duarte, putin are all anti-globalists.
This isn't some abstract thing, it already affects participation of key people right now ([1]). Tragedy is, the chair/hoster of eg. the Balisage conference (what [1] is about) is as much opposed against Trump policies as could be (eg. [2] which is really devastating). This doesn't look well for US cloud ventures, at all.
Im heading to a US security conference in a couple weeks. I really dont want to go but have to meet with a client there. If i am given any guff at the boarder im going to tell that client why we can no longer do business.
So... It's impossible to just hold two conferences? One in the States and one outside? Call me unreasonable, but it seems like then you could just go to the one that's safe for you.
Side note: Could the mods remove "?m=1" from the URL? On a mobile device, the URL without that GET parameter redirects to the URL with that parameter to show the mobile site. On a non-mobile device, the URL with the parameter looks rather different from the URL without the parameter.
[+] [-] kika|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wodenokoto|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pessimizer|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tritosomal|9 years ago|reply
It will net only the most retarded entrapment arrests possible. It's tantamount to searching people's bags for postcards and magazines, because there might be terrorist postcards or terrorist magazines.
Yes, there may be terrorists who send postcards and read magazines (even newspapers!) but, ah... how does that prevent violent actions?
[+] [-] FabHK|9 years ago|reply
For the USA, it's 42 (what else). Canada, 52. For Schengen area (most of EU), 92. Hong Kong, 148, Indonesia, Cambodia even more. China only 12.
So, South East Asia or Europe seem reasonable on that score.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travel_visa#Visa_policies
[+] [-] alistairSH|9 years ago|reply
While they are likely accurate for simply attending a conference, they might not be for presenting at a conference (that often changes the reason for the visit from "education" to "paid work" which can impact the need for a visa).
That said, Schengen area is probably still easier than the US for attending AND presenting.
[+] [-] matt4077|9 years ago|reply
- Obviously the specific countries behind those numbers matter. If you're organising a conference on 14th century Flemish literature, the Netherlands will be more important than North Korea
- Not all restrictions are created equal. Specifically, the activity I was involved in (University Debating) has a sizeable Israeli community, who would argue that travel restrictions that jews encounter across the muslim world should be considered more harshly than most other travel restrictions, which tend to emanate from a fear of economic migration.
- beware self-fulfilling prophecies: If you chose a location that is hard for sub-saharan african nationals to reach because they're underrepresented in your audience, you are also perpetuating that underrepresentation.
[+] [-] ryandamm|9 years ago|reply
That said, I think the point of your post (and the original post) is just to call out how ridiculous and sad the US's sudden policy swerve is. I hate how often the US compares unfavorably with the rest of the developed world on all sorts of indices; we're so strange. Strangely illiberal, even before November. (I mean 'illiberal' in the political theory sense of the word, not left/right political sense of the word.)
[+] [-] Spooky23|9 years ago|reply
The probability of most US based people attending an international conference is dramatically lower.
[+] [-] dragonwriter|9 years ago|reply
But even better would be to also factor in the difficulty of getting the necessary visa for others.
[+] [-] deerpig|9 years ago|reply
It's time for Americans to stop thinking all roads lead to them.
[+] [-] ryandamm|9 years ago|reply
Innovation thrives on freedom. Freedom of expression, freedom of movement, freedom of markets. And tech, in its best form, is about freedom, rather than market-capture and rent-seeking. Needless to say, none of these recent developments are good.
[+] [-] lkrubner|9 years ago|reply
Consider Jethro Tull, the farmer. In 1700 he was 26 and he was taking over the family farm. He hired some local hands to seed the fields that spring. As had happened for thousands of years, the workers took bags of seed and cast handfuls on the ground. Jethro Tull became angry, because there were patches of ground that had too much seed, and other patches of ground that had too little seed. He went over to the workers and asked them to be more careful. But they proceeded as before. Tull became more angry, and went to speak with them again. But they still ignored him, and kept doing their work in the traditional manner, as they had since they were children, and as had their parents before them, and their parents before that. Tull was in a rage, but saw he could not change how the workers did their work. Instead, he decided to build a machine that would plant seeds at regular intervals. This was the beginning of the Agricultural Revolution.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jethro_Tull_(agriculturist)
But now ask, why did this happen in 1700, and not in 1680 or 1660 or 1500, for that matter? Was Tull simply smarter than any farmer that had ever lived before that time? Or was their a new legal system on his side?
In the time of Tull's father, England was still burning witches. The last great spasm of irrational fear and witch burning swept over Britain in the mid 1600s. But then Britain passed the Bill Of Rights, in 1688. Now everyone had the right to a fair trial, and a right to a lawyer, and no one could be tortured into confessing to a crime, such as witchcraft. And Tull belonged to the first generation of entrepreneurs in history knowing that they could depend on the rule of law -- the government could not take arbitrary action against him, but was constrained by its own processes. Therefore Tull could shatter tradition, and do completely new things, without the threat of being burned as a witch.
I could cite an endless number of examples. Galileo made brilliant discoveries in an illiberal nation, and was put under house arrest, Newtown made discoveries in a nation of laws, and he became a national hero. Simply knowing that laws will be enforced fairly defeats a lot of the kinds of evil scheming that spring up under authoritarian regimes.
"Freedom" is an empty word. When talking about the kinds of environments that cultivate innovation, it's best to try to be specific about that environment. History teach us the raw ingredients: the rule of law, fair and independent courts, habeas corpus and due process, the right to a lawyer, the right to uncoerced testimony.
[+] [-] briandear|9 years ago|reply
I agree with your basic points, but on a practical level, how much does this actually affect things for H1 companies? We are talking 7 countries very few of which produce many H1 employees.
[+] [-] noonespecial|9 years ago|reply
Seems like a golden opportunity for another country to step up and become the "conference center of the world". I'd LOL extra hard if it turned out to be Mexico.
[+] [-] cperciva|9 years ago|reply
Can I suggest Canada for this purpose? We're a cheaper conference destination than the USA, Europe, or Japan; have a fluently English-speaking population anywhere conferences would be held (most people in Montreal are bilingual); have good infrastructure; and most international visitors to the USA already fly over Canada anyway.
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.
[+] [-] petercooper|9 years ago|reply
I have since seen a handful of industry conferences take place there, but it hasn't really blown up (one reason, I suspect, is it's reasonably expensive to stay there now - Iceland's decline did not last long!)
[+] [-] thisrod|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mirimir|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] astrodust|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] NTDF9|9 years ago|reply
Some universities in these regions have solid reputations but lacked the star-power of top US univs. Hosting a few ACM conferences will shoot them on top of global map.
Just checked, ACM is already on it: https://www.acm.org/conferences
[+] [-] Noseshine|9 years ago|reply
From what I read that's a major consideration for US universities why they want to attract foreign students. For German universities that would only be of marginal concern, even if/when they take some money from foreign students it's just pocket change and not nearly enough to finance the institution to a substantial extend. Sure they still have an incentive, but it's much less and not monetary.
I think, that's what I get from what I've been reading in comments over the years.
[+] [-] misja111|9 years ago|reply
In my last job in the Netherlands I had an Iranian colleague who tried for seven years in a row to get a Visum to go to the USA, without success. The situation was already very difficult under Obama, Trump's recent initiative is not as big a change as some make it appear.
[+] [-] Jare|9 years ago|reply
Situation B: I have been a permanent resident for years, own a house and a cat, my family are citizens, I went to Europe for a few days and now the border authorities detain me and want to send me to Iran.
How big does it have to be?
[+] [-] watson|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] semi-extrinsic|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] baby|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nodamage|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] masklinn|9 years ago|reply
I suspect the latter population is much smaller than the former, but still a shit situation for a conference organiser, no matter how you do it you will effectively prevent a fraction of possible attendees out, unless you have your conf' right on a border I guess but I doubt that's really possible.
What is the "border status" of Puerto Rico, could that be an option? Or maybe a nearby carribean island which US residents could reach by board from Puerto Rico without hassle going back?
[+] [-] danpalmer|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jimjimjim|9 years ago|reply
That way if the world ends while you're away you'll be able to read about it in the morning
[+] [-] nickpeterson|9 years ago|reply
I don't like the EO, but doesn't this just ignore reality?
[+] [-] ntelson1s|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jza00425|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dragonzooord|9 years ago|reply
But, on the other hand, a lot of Americans don't have passports or their employment contracts will only reimburse a number of domestic (non-international) conferences a year. The set of those people who would be excluded probably exceeds the set of attendees from the 7 countries in question. So I'm not convinced it makes sense to do this just from a conference attendance standpoint.
[+] [-] MagnumOpus|9 years ago|reply
Let's keep it real: The contributors to a global science conference are unlikely to be people who don't have passports - and in case that happens, getting passports in the US is as easy as filling in a form and driving down to the local post office.
Whereas even getting a business travel visa to the US is a month-long bureaucratic nightmare for 80% of the world's population (basically everyone bar EU, Japan, Korea and AU/NZ/CA).
[+] [-] Beltiras|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] chopin|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MollyR|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tannhaeuser|9 years ago|reply
[1]: http://lists.xml.org/archives/xml-dev/201701/maillist.html
[2]: https://norman.walsh.name/
[+] [-] sandworm101|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] peterwwillis|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] uiri|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] flukus|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kapauldo|9 years ago|reply