Envisaging the future of academic conferences

As an early-career researcher from a developing country, I have found it hard to attend in-person academic conferences. A conference I attended as a PhD student in autumn 2019 made me pay around £860 for registration, hotel, local transport and local poster printing out of my own pocket. There were also several international conferences that I wanted to attend but could not because they were held in a global north country notorious for its troublesome visa application process.

By contrast, the online conferences that happened in 2020 and 2021 were much more enjoyable because of better accessibility – most of them charged no registration fees and there were absolutely no visa requirements.