Defcon is hosted in a desert. This is exclusionary to people from cold regions, who cannot handle the heat.
Defcon is in Las Vegas. This is exclusionary to people who have gambling problems.
Defcon provides attendees with open bars. This is exclusionary to people who don’t drink.
Defcon wifi will get you hacked. This is exclusionary to technically-ignorant people who don’t understand the risks.
Defcon attendees will try to hack your phone. This is exclusionary to people who can’t afford burner phones.
Defcon ATMs are probably being skimmed. This is exclusionary to people who don’t have credit cards and must use cash to pay for things.
Defcon attendees have poor hygiene. This is exclusionary to people who are sensitive to scents.
Defcon goons walk around with sticks of deodorant to give to people who have poor hygiene. This is exclusionary to people who are sensitive to scents.
Many Defcon events are put on by, and marketed to, specific groups. This is exclusionary to people attending alone.
People attending alone can get in to events through social engineering. This is exclusionary to people with poor social skills.
Defcon is attended by 15,000 people. This is exclusionary to people overwhelmed by crowds.
Many employers pay for people to attend Defcon. This is exclusionary to people who work at startups with limited budgets.
Defcon is in North America. This is exclusionary to people who live in South America, Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, and Antarctica.
The food in Las Vegas is fairly generic. This is exclusionary to people with dietary concerns such as vegetarianism or gluten free.
People accuse Defcon of being hostile to newcomers, and demand changes to make it more welcoming. This is exclusionary to the old-timers who made it what it is, and just want to have a good time with their good friends.
Status 451 
Actually, Las Vegas is extremely vegan-friendly, so one problem solved.
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After that conversation the elite decided that BlackHat is much better. I do not know of many people (other than being provided by their employer) who can afford the 1800-2600 dollar entry fee (+ flights/accommodation/etc).
A lot of companies (and not just budget constrained startups) do not pay for most of their employees to attend to conferences. Mine doesn’t. In fact one of my Indian team members could only attend Defcon because she used her bonus. It must be a nice world where you can virtue signal on twitter from your ivory tower while avoiding the “rabble” in BlackHat and skipping the lines in Defcon. For every one of the elite, there are 10 who have to save to attend and another 10 who cannot. And guess who bring in revenue that enables this compensation.
But “stop working your shitty employer and work for my progressive company!!” Well, my “shitty employer” will transfer me (as they have done for quite a few of my co-workers) to Europe when I cannot get an H1B after 3 tries. I’d rather stay here where my future at least has a worst case scenario which does not involve going back my 3rd world country on the other side of the world. How’s that for promoting diversity?
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