Conferences After COVID and Academics in Adversity: Physical Globalization is Fragile, But so Too is Internet Neutrality.

Abstract

In this issue, Kang Hao Cheong and Michael Jones paint a picture of a world after COVID-19 where recognition of the fundamental fragility and hyperconnectivity of our globalized economies and societies forces some big changes in the way humans live and manage socioeconomic development on this planet.[1] Research, and science in general, are not going to escape those changes. What we see today springing up in the way of virtual events will almost certainly be part of the norm in future. It will be good in the fight against pandemics, and for the environment at once. Will it also be good for academics in disadvantaged countries? A 2019 blog post[2] (based on a small study) by Seth Wynes from the University of British Columbia a somewhat predictable pattern of travel activity is seen amongst academics: younger ones and female ones fly less to scientific events than older ones. The skewing of the distribution is stark indeed: 12.5% (one eighth) of the academics is responsible for 50% of the total flight-related CO2 emissions that result from conference (or other academic event) attendance. OK, the study was based on 1000 academics at a single university (University of British Columbia). However, those of us* who have worked in academia and continue to stay in touch with academia have a pretty good intuitive feeling that the findings apply more generally. Even more concerning is the observation from the small study that above a certain academic level there was no correlation between the number of flight miles and the academic performance of the individuals (based on a measure similar to the h-index, i.e., taking into account quantity and quality of publications). A UK study, also from 2019,[3] opines that some academics regard being invited to far flung locations as a perk of the job, given the long hours spent in and around their research groups (If they travel business class, maybe…). That study also estimates that if the professional travel activity from the UK universities’ academics were extrapolated to all universities on the planet, it would produce a mass of CO2 equivalent to half the UK's entire CO2 emissions from all sources in 2017! So, whereas we (see above*) know of many high-level academics who travel internationally to four or more conferences a year (some even as many as 10), aren't we lucky that most professors in less advantaged countries of the world aren't invited to conferences (written with a tone of irony). I hope that there's another – more positive – irony in this, and it's related to the, admittedly also fragile, neutrality of the Internet. It would be nice to see more excellent scientists from disadvantaged countries presenting to international audiences via virtual events. As the Internet – providing detachment of a scientific publication from its venue of publication (journal) – is partly eroding the power of the Impact Factor in the eyes of readers searching for literature via Internet search engines, so too can an increasing “virtualization” of academic presence potentially compensate for certain inequalities. Naturally, there are many IT companies rubbing their hands at the thought of an increasing number of large conferences having to take place virtually for the foreseeable future. Realizing that conference organizers will be saving many tens of thousands of Euros/Dollars/whatever in not paying air fares for invited speakers, some companies are charging princely sums for their virtual conference services – sums that arguably have little relationship to the true cost of the “product”: whilst airlines lose billions, another business sector will earn billions. None of this, however, does research institutions in disadvantaged countries much good: they can't afford such services. Moreover, heavy-weight firms have the necessary power to hasten the attrition of Internet neutrality. Now, more than ever before, it is the responsibility of the global scientific community to work together to preserve Internet neutrality in the name of egalitarian global values in research, and cultural diversity – qualities from which science has always benefited. It will probably require individual institutes to set up their own – more affordable – technological solutions to virtual conferencing: they will need help from outside (other, more wealthy institutions), that is for sure. However, if they don't receive it, we will simply replace physical fragility with virtual fragility by allowing unbridled monopolization of live scientific discourse. The demise of important elements of antifragility in the Internet will lead to its own virtual pandemic in due course… Andrew Moore Editor-in-Chief