[Tccc] The Case for Lean IEEE Meetings

Folks:

We can argue ad infinitum about which share of the total revenue of a
meeting should return to the IEEE. I propose that we focus instead on
the way each meeting is run.

I will attend IPCCC next week. The symposium will take place in
Scottsdale, a very nice suburb of Scottsdale. The weather there will be
mostly pleasant with temperatures in the sixties (17-20 Celsius). IEEE
members who registered on time will pay $525 and the special rate for
the hotel is $119 per night. There are many cheaper hotels and motels
nearby and car rentals in Phoenix are very inexpensive at this time of
the year. In all likelihood, parking at the symposium hotel will be
free.

To give you another example, I attended P2P last year in Aachen, a
lovely German city close to the Dutch and Belgian borders. The
conference venue was one of the big auditoriums of RTWH University.
The registration fee included all lunches and a banquet in the main room
of the Aachen City Hall and all that for only 395 Euros.

Frankly, I cannot understand why some conference organizers are willing
to budget $50 per lunch. On this side of the Ocean, big hotels are
normally willing to sell sandwich lunch packs for less than a third of
that price. The same goes with the bags and other tchotkes I often get.
They tend to be poor quality and rarely fit my needs. In other words,
attendees should not have to pay for what they do not want.

I submit that the Communication Society should define and advertise one
of its yearly conferences as a LEAN meeting. This would mean keeping
the registration fee below $600 and holding the meeting in a city with
cheap airline connections and less expensive venues. It does not
necessarily means dull locations. Holding ICC in Anchorage, AK in early
May gave attendees a big break on lodging costs, which compensated the
higher air fares. Phoenix, San Antonio and New Orleans lodging costs
widely vary over the year as they do in may other cities.

Best regards,

--J.-F. Paris
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