The number of cancelled conferences due to COVID-19 is growing, SXSW is the latest big one to cancel. It’s not just the organizers that take a hit when a conference is cancelled or postponed, hotels and restaurants, tourism in general, and so forth suffer too.

I propose that all conferences and trade shows should be cancelled. Let’s reboot and restart, kill off the whole circuit and find something new. If you do business visiting these things, then you’ll find another way, because business will be done no matter what. And if you make your living on or around the shows, well, you’ll have to adapt. That’s the way of things.

Maybe I’m just channeling my inner hatred for crowds, and the fake importance of the stage, but I don’t feel that cancelled conferences is such a bad thing. Take this opportunity to find other ways to get what it is you get from conferences. Write down all the good things, and replace them with alternatives. I’m pretty sure that’ll be easier than you thought.