Kit! Your post is great! And I enjoyed getting to know you at the PyLadies auction, too.
PyCon is overwhelming and delightful in every way -- and it just gets more so every time I attend. That said, you managed to see a ton of amazing stuff and people, which is quite impressive.
Thank you. I try to write these for major conferences that I attend. It is a good way to absorb what I learned and remember what I did. I see myself building on these experiences over time.
Hi, this was such a delightful post to read. Im currently a comp sci college student and I had no clue there was even an event called pycon lol. But reading your blog makes me think it was so much fun. Quick question, is there a criteria to attend the event such as part of a specific company or organization? Or is it for anyone who uses python?
Glad you enjoyed it! Anyone can attend PyCon US. There are people from all walks of life and skill levels. If cost is an issue, PyCon US has a generous financial aid program. A caveat: some prospective attendees in other countries have difficulty getting visas.
I was wondering the same thing. In fact when I saw this post (the top-level) about PyCon 2024 I went and re-checked to see if they had published any videos.
Like you I see "144 unavailable videos are hidden" and only 9 videos available to watch.
I'm looking forward to watching some of the content when they do publish :)
So some actually did a talk about knitting and obviously knitting has looping (repetition) and possibly conditional evaluation. They have a way to make an "open space" or use some meeting rooms for whatever you want. I made one for "advanced knitting theory" and I was having trouble understanding if you could do conditional branching that would break a loop because the stopping of knitting is used to end the knitting. More about knitting notation can be found at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knitting_abbreviations
There's been a no-GIL Python for about a decade, and it's still OSS on BitBucket somewhere with a PSF license (I used it for quite a while), but at the time, the community didn't want to wrestle with some of the issues, like, do you want to forego atomicity for list appends, or do you want to slow them down (Skython took the former route)?
I'm amazed at how many people she met. It was my first PyCon and I was happy with trying to chat with like 5 people. The conference was huge and very physically and socially exhausting.
Same. I love the idea of being involved in the software community, but find it intimidatingly difficult to know how to "break in". Plenty of the names dropped here are people I admire and follow on social media, but I would think myself terribly rude to introduce myself to them as I'm just an irrelevant developer.
I have something of a following (newsletters, social media), gave two talks at PyCon, and even had a booth advertising my training services. So at the risk of sounding like a total egomaniac just for responding, let me say a few things:
1. I absolutely, positively love meeting new people at PyCon, regardless of their background, level, etc. I learn new things from just about everyone I meet, and that's a huge part of the fun for me. I'm frustrated that I don't get a chance to just meet and chat with more people during the conference, and actively try to eat meals with people I don't yet know so that I can get to know them.
2. Part of the greatness of the Python community is that we realize other people, regardless of their fame, are just that -- people. They were unknown at some point, and people were nice to them. So they'll probably be nice to you, too.
3. Every community has jerks, Python included. If someone famous isn't nice to you, then just ignore them from that point on, and concentrate on the numerous nice people. It's not worth getting riled up or upset about it.
Al Sweigart, Eric Matthes, Reuven Lerner (also in this comment section), and so many folks who've made blog posts, books, code, or something else that's inspired you really do love it when you tell them. I know I'm always please when someone who likes something I've done introduces themselves and says so.
We're all just people. Meeting someone in-person who enjoys something you've done is enjoyable for nearly everyone. Fawning is a bit much, but a "thank you for what you do" is really lovely.
If you're not sure how to "break in": keep the Pac-Man rule that's often embraced at PyCon in mind. If there's an open spot in a huddled group or if the group seems to notice you eyeing them and make a spot for you, join the group. Feel free to just fish bowl the conversation. Most of the time I've seen this happen, eventually someone chats with whoever just joined the conversation. Don't be afraid to either keep fish bowling or walk away if the conversation isn't what you were expecting. Either are acceptable.
You noted that you're afraid of being rude. That means you're exactly the person most folks would love to chat with since you're probably both humble and kind. :)
You shouldn't feel that way at all. I don't think I've ever had a bad experience meeting people at a conference. It has actually been the opposite. Many people are there to make connections (and have their own doubts as well). You might be surprised at how receptive they will be. Also, many conferences actively promote inclusion. See the "Pac Man Rule" attributed to Eric Holscher which was referenced at PyCon US. https://www.ericholscher.com/blog/2017/aug/2/pacman-rule-con...
I think this post will be great for PyCon newcomers. Getting the chance to experience a play-by-play of a past PyCon before attending your first PyCon might be even more useful than reading the various "how to have a great first PyCon" posts that many of us have written.
This does not mention PyCon US 2024 was one of the extremely, extremely few conferences which did the right thing and had a mask mandate.
> We are nice people and many of us and our fellow community members can’t attend without health and safety guidelines in place. We want PyCon US to be an event that everyone feels safe attending. PyCon US is exceptional in that we have people attending from all over the world—last year we had people attending from 75 different countries! We love that people bring their unique perspectives… but they also bring their local germs and Covid strains. We’re masking to keep our immuno-compromised friends safe at PyCon US and to ensure that those of us who share their homes with immuno-compromised people can also consider joining us without quarantining when they return home.
I salute you. I wish more conferences did this. I am quite bitter about how after all the inclusion and diversity talk over the years most open source conferences do not do this. Even Fosdem didn't have one despite
1. volunteer driven so free from financial pressure from anti vaxxer owned companies (not all communities were so lucky)
2. famous for being crowded
3. is not in the US -- where this is most politicized
I think we can all agree that masking is super annoying. We can also agree that if everyone were to mask 100% of the time, then we would be in a safer world, with less spread of disease.
But we all live with some level of risk. Keeping the risk level at or near zero isn't realistic, or something that most people want. We cross the street, travel in cars, etc.
I find it weird that PyCon had a mandatory masking policy, when medical conferences staffed by doctors and disease experts don't have such a policy any more. And I'm guessing that PyCon's policy was made by well-meaning people who aren't doctors or medical experts.
My suggestion -- and yes, I wrote this in my PyCon follow-up survey -- is that our masking policy follow whatever the CDC, AMA, or a similar body is doing for its conferences at the time PyCon takes place. If the experts require masking, then we should do so, also. And if they don't, then we should encourage people to mask if they need or want to, but we shouldn't force it upon everyone.
In other words: PyCon should make decisions about the conference and Python-related things. Medical decisions should be left to outside experts.
how much did people actually follow the mandate? I looked through the pictures, and it seems to be ~not at all for picture/social situation, and maye 50% for general?
In talks, in hallways, and at the expo (i.e., company booths), I'd say adherence was at least 90 percent.
But whenever there was a chance to take the mask off, people did. If there was food around, people immediately ditched the masks and stayed with food or drink in their hand to justify keeping the masks off. I was at one small (10-person) session where everyone agreed to keep masks off, gingerly making sure that no one objected. We then all made sure to have drinks in front of us to "justify" doing so.
And when people went outside, the masks were off. At the PSF member lunch, where we ate together, masks were off as soon as we got food. At the PyLadies auction, where we (again) ate together, people were also without masks. I'll note that the auction took place in the same room where talks had taken place several hours earlier, with strict mask enforcement (and adherence).
Bottom line, people were generally willing to follow the rules. But there was a lot of grumbling about why there should be a mask mandate in 2024, and what the justification was for having one.
I attended and I would say there was 98% compliance. The policy was that masks off was OK outside, while presenting, while eating, and briefly when posing for photos.
If you are immuno-compromised or living with someone who is, shouldn't you not be travelling thousands of miles to a large, packed conference anyway? Since masks are not 100% effective.
To each their own, but I personally will not be attending PyCon next year because it was exhausting to wear a mask for 5 days straight.
So let's exclude those people from society, that's what you are saying. It's not just traveling thousands of miles, it's boarding a bus or entering any indoor space with unmasked people. And yes, that exclusion is the reality most of us face.
This has echoes of how people with AIDS were considered back then.
But even with a mask mandate, a large conference is probably not an acceptable risk for someone in that position. Masks help, but they aren’t a complete solution, especially when folks remove them to eat and take photos.
I guess you have to find a balance between being able to have a “normal” event where people can meet each other without special medical precautions and accommodating immuno-compromised and health-anxious people. I’m really glad there’s a sense of normalcy after the pandemic again and I would not be willing to wear a mask to all such events all the time, I don’t mind wearing one to accommodate people in smaller groups or when having closer contact though.
> I’m really glad there’s a sense of normalcy after the pandemic again
Except we are not after the pandemic, it's made up by politicians and the rich. The second highest measured covid ratio in wastewater across the United States was in 2023 December-January. It's just the virus now kills a lot less people but its long term effects, named "long covid" is a debilitating disability that people prefer to pretend not existing.
To each their own but I'm pretty glad masks are on their way out. I wore one when I had to during the pandemic and I'm quite happy that I didn't have to wear one to any of the conferences I've been to since the pandemic ended.
Thanks for excluding me from the conferences you attend.
I am astounded that four years in we still need to explain that a) masks are effective in stopping community transmission b) masks worn by the source are more effective or, in other words, your mask protects me while my mask protects you. How is this new?
No, your stance is absolutely selfish -- not uncommon of course, but it is selfish.
There is no need to label him selfish. You don’t know him.
He isn’t any more selfish than you are, traveling to a crowded conference while living with an immuno-compromised person, and on top of that expecting people to bend over to your requirements.
What's selfish is actually demanding that society changes for you (or a minority of immuno-compromised individuals). COVID was one thing, but we're way past it now and society had to go back to the normal way of things.
You do realize the spanish flu is still around and found in wastewater samples too? According to your metrics, we should still be worried about the spanish flu...
Fair enough, but you just shot down your own argument. The disadvantage of Sweden's strategy was the elderly. For adults and younger people, the difference was negligible or even better than most other European countries. I'm willing to bet that you are in the elderly category and also that PyCon 24 didn't have many elderly people joining. Sorry man!
The point is that I don't want to wear a mask. I tolerated it during the pandemic because it was an extreme situation. The pandemic is now over, so I no longer wear a mask. If that makes me selfish, then I'm OK with that. It is arguably no less selfish to force everyone else to wear a mask. I am not going to argue that point though because I don't even particularly care, I just don't want to wear a mask, that's all.
Idk man life feels pretty normal to me and has felt pretty normal for about 2 years now. I guess you can try and convince me to care, but I just don't. I go days or even weeks without thinking about this pandemic tbh. Feels good.
So if the wastewater is telling you something, but life is so normal, maybe the wastewater statistics don't mean what you think they mean.
Funny because it seems you're the one parroting lines in this thread... you literally copy and pasted this exact response multiple times. Maybe you shouldn't be spamming?
I find your stance to be quite selfish actually. You're trying to force your will on an entire community. Why don't you take action within your own life to mitigate risk? Like e.g. taking a vaccine, or other ways of building immunity, or if you feel the risk is too great, then maybe you can choose to attend virtually instead of selfishly demanding others conform to your will?
Something important to note: many folks take their masks off for a picture, then put their masks back on. This leads non-candid photos having far few masks in them.
I would have completely agreed with you two+ years ago but not any longer.
With vaccines and other ways of dealing with Covid infections it does not seem reasonable to have to do this anymore. And I doubt it’s very effective anyway, people are notorious terrible at wearing masks.
There is zero mask wearing in my country now and it’s mandated until nearly everyone was vaccinated. Now it’s no longer used as a Covid prevention measure here.
I felt pretty disappointed going to the conference. Though it’s a pivotal and awesome time to be a Python dev and historic to remove the GIL. I found the talks to be very low information and sometimes not really relevant to the title and description of the talk. For example the “Blender integration” talk was 40 minutes with 8 minutes of blender discussion. The talk on Mocking was extremely basic and spent most of the time describing the concept of unit testing.
Talks during the end of the day tended to be better than the morning ones. They need more web development experts of this committee, most of the web dev talks were rehashing online tutorials or felt that way.
I attended, and one thing I learned is that being good at giving talks is often more important than the subject matter of the talk. It's all about keeping it slow and digestible and making sure you don't lose your audience. "Computational Origami" is an example of a talk I loved because of how well it was executed, not necessarily because of the subject matter.
We might just be at peak webdev. Everything will seem new to someone and old to someone else.
There were so many bad talks at All Things Open in 2022 I didnt go last year. I will try it again this year, though.
The worst offenders are always 25 min talks with 10-15 min "why I am great" self-intros. I am in the minority, perhaps, but I dont really care what you have done / where you work if you have something interesting to say. But we all default to appeals to authority.
The two talks about the Gil removal were great. Also pyscript is great though they had 3 talks for some reason and only one really explained it. I did not watch the keynotes, but I heard they were bad and not technical. The general friendliness was good, masks didn’t feel annoying to me as it was okay outside and when eating and it was easy to just go outside.
The two talks about the Gil removal were great. Also pyscript is great though they had 3 talks for some reason and only one really explained it. I did not watch the keynotes, but I heard they were bad and not technical. The general friendliness was good, masks didn’t feel annoying to me as it was okay outside and when eating and it was easy to just go outside.
PyCon is overwhelming and delightful in every way -- and it just gets more so every time I attend. That said, you managed to see a ton of amazing stuff and people, which is quite impressive.
I hope to see you back in Pittsburgh next year!