Conference tickets are overpriced

true or false?

Do you attend any without being sponsored?

Only ones I’ve been to were paid by my employer.

Pretty much al conferences I've been at were paid by me. I choose the ones where I think the price is reasonable only. Of course, most are over the threshold. Not because I cannot afford them but because I'm not willing to pay this much for a conference ticket.

They're expensive these days because they're usually designed for employers to pay. That works for the conference organisers to a point, as they get a whole load of people already employed in the field (a better audience) - and it works for employees, as they get to go for free on work time.

Well, they're expensive but most of the time there's quite a bit to be supported by that price

Don't get me wrong, conferences are great and I don't think they necessarily could lower their prices.

I guess I just wish large companies would much more intensely sponsor these conferences so that ticket prices would be more reasonable and freelancers could attend happily too.

Often you can even watch the lectures on Youtube. So why would you pay 1000$ to attend?
And if the speaker turns out to be an SJW talking about how ethnic background matters in programming, you can just close the youtube’s tab.

Lol, whem the price is so high that you fear for your wallet.