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It depends on the conference. I've spoken at a lot of conferences. This is my experience, both from my own presentations and from chatting with other speakers:

It depends on the conference. I've spoken at a lot of conferences. This is my experience, both from my own presentations and from chatting with other speakers: Very few conferences pay speakers - even keynote speakers. The exceptions seem to be conferences explicitly organized around a particular proprietary technology, and sponsored fully by the company that makes that technology. Most community-organized conferences or conferences around a particular language or piece of software do not. I only know of one exception to that rule. Some will, however, cover your hotel and airfare. You may have to ask for this, and they may only cover it if your company does not already. (Airfare may be capped, or may be limited to people traveling from the same country/continent). As for whether work sponsors your or not, it depends entirely on your company and their relationship with speaking. I've been pretty lucky - even though I'm not in a role that explicitly requires speaking as part of my responsibilities[0], I don't have to use my vacation time when speaking at conferences. Not all companies take this same approach, though. > How do you keep earning money when giving talks all the time ? This is the main reason why I feel that all conferences should pay speakers, even a small amount. Preparing properly for a talk takes a lot of time, and providing speakers some share of the proceeds from a conference is a way of offsetting the amount of time it takes to prepare and give a good talk. If more conferences paid speakers, the quality of talks would go up dramatically. However, I only know of one community-organized conference that pays speakers a share of the proceeds. [0] ie, "Developer Advocate"

ValentineC 9y ago
> This is the main reason why I feel that all conferences should pay speakers, even a small amount. Preparing properly for a talk takes a lot of time, and providing speakers some share of the proceeds from a conference is a way of offsetting the amount of time it takes to prepare and give a good talk. I've organised a few conferences covering different languages and platforms, and there's two things which prevent organisers from giving more than a token sum to speakers. 1) Most of the "proceeds" from a conference come from an abundance of sponsorship for that year. For the community-organised, non-profit conferences I've been involved in, the per-attendee cost is often much more than what we charge for tickets. (This also depends on the overall sentiment within the organising team. Personally, I'm for charging as high as reasonably possible and offering scholarships and discounts where needed.) 2) The sponsorship climate changes every year, depending on the marketing budget of the various local companies, and the conferences that are taking place in that year. It's very important for conference organisers to maintain a healthy balance for the next year, if only to cover the large deposits that we have to put down for the various vendors.
- chimeracoder 9y ago
  > Most of the "proceeds" from a conference come from an abundance of sponsorship for that year. For the community-organised, non-profit conferences I've been involved in, the per-attendee cost is often much more than what we charge for tickets. (This also depends on the overall sentiment within the organising team. Personally, I'm for charging as high as reasonably possible and offering scholarships and discounts where needed.) While I'm sympathetic to that, I'll note that the one conference I'm aware of that does do this, on a matter of principle, is also the most generous with scholarships and assistance, and also the most diverse in both speaker lineup and conference attendees. It's not easy, but definitely possible to run a conference this way; the main problem is that very few actually try.
wainstead 9y ago
> Very few conferences pay speakers - even keynote speakers. This I would expect, but doesn't the speaker typically get a pass to the conference in compensation? For some conferences that can mean quite a lot. I've seen conference prices in the thousands. Are the passes typically single-day or for the whole event?
- grkvlt 9y ago
  When I have spoken at conferences, usually the pass is for the whole event, and you are right that this could sometimes be multiple thousands of dollars, so it is a good way for me to get to these conferences and hear other speakers without my employer having to pay a lot for my personal development. And, usually, there will be a speakers dinner or after-party during the conference, which is a great way to meet and talk with other like minded people in your field. But, it can be hard work - even for a 5-minute lightning talk, the amount of preparation is vastly out of proportion to the 'live' time in front of an audience, however it is definitely worth it. At the beginning of my career I would never have thought it would be something I would be doing, but if your work is interesting then it should be interesting and informative to tell people about it, which is all one of these talks really is, at base...

ValentineC 9y ago

> This is the main reason why I feel that all conferences should pay speakers, even a small amount. Preparing properly for a talk takes a lot of time, and providing speakers some share of the proceeds from a conference is a way of offsetting the amount of time it takes to prepare and give a good talk. I've organised a few conferences covering different languages and platforms, and there's two things which prevent organisers from giving more than a token sum to speakers. 1) Most of the "proceeds" from a conference come from an abundance of sponsorship for that year. For the community-organised, non-profit conferences I've been involved in, the per-attendee cost is often much more than what we charge for tickets. (This also depends on the overall sentiment within the organising team. Personally, I'm for charging as high as reasonably possible and offering scholarships and discounts where needed.) 2) The sponsorship climate changes every year, depending on the marketing budget of the various local companies, and the conferences that are taking place in that year. It's very important for conference organisers to maintain a healthy balance for the next year, if only to cover the large deposits that we have to put down for the various vendors.

chimeracoder 9y ago
> Most of the "proceeds" from a conference come from an abundance of sponsorship for that year. For the community-organised, non-profit conferences I've been involved in, the per-attendee cost is often much more than what we charge for tickets. (This also depends on the overall sentiment within the organising team. Personally, I'm for charging as high as reasonably possible and offering scholarships and discounts where needed.) While I'm sympathetic to that, I'll note that the one conference I'm aware of that does do this, on a matter of principle, is also the most generous with scholarships and assistance, and also the most diverse in both speaker lineup and conference attendees. It's not easy, but definitely possible to run a conference this way; the main problem is that very few actually try.

wainstead 9y ago

> Very few conferences pay speakers - even keynote speakers. This I would expect, but doesn't the speaker typically get a pass to the conference in compensation? For some conferences that can mean quite a lot. I've seen conference prices in the thousands. Are the passes typically single-day or for the whole event?

grkvlt 9y ago
When I have spoken at conferences, usually the pass is for the whole event, and you are right that this could sometimes be multiple thousands of dollars, so it is a good way for me to get to these conferences and hear other speakers without my employer having to pay a lot for my personal development. And, usually, there will be a speakers dinner or after-party during the conference, which is a great way to meet and talk with other like minded people in your field. But, it can be hard work - even for a 5-minute lightning talk, the amount of preparation is vastly out of proportion to the 'live' time in front of an audience, however it is definitely worth it. At the beginning of my career I would never have thought it would be something I would be doing, but if your work is interesting then it should be interesting and informative to tell people about it, which is all one of these talks really is, at base...