Speaker Rider

I love speaking at events, and am so grateful to organizers who ask me to participate! I feel so honored to be considered, and want to use speaking as an opportunity to help the tech community be as inclusive as possible. I understand that smaller meetups and community events might not be able to meet all the requirements, but this rider does apply to all commercial conferences. If you’re running a smaller event I’d love to hear from you!

💰 Honorarium

  • I ask for a speaker fee because I value my time (and hope you do too). I often have to take time away from work or projects to travel and attend.
  • For non-profit events, I may choose to waive this based on ticket pricing, scholarship programs, etc.
  • I’m not putting a number here because it varies depending on the event. Please don’t make it awkward and be like “uh, we don’t normally pay speakers, but you get exposure,” because I can’t pay my bills with exposure. <3 I understand that some events don’t have budget to pay speakers, and I’ll address this on a case-by-case basis (but also, you should have budget to pay your speakers).

🛩️ Travel

  • I ask that travel to and from the event is provided (assuming it is not local, I’m currently based in the Washington, D.C area).
  • Business Class is preferred.
  • I am a member of a bunch of airlines and hotel rewards things. If organizers of an event are booking on my behalf, I ask that you use one of those if possible!
  • I do ask too that if I’m booking my own travel/lodging, that I be reimbursed quickly.

🏨 Lodging

  • I ask that lodging is provided for the full length of the event, unless the event is local!
  • For events outside of the US (or just far away from Washington, D.C), I ask for at least one full day of lodging before the event since I’ll likely be flying in a day or two before.

🎟 Ticket

  • I expect to receive a ticket to the full conference as a speaker. I love participating in conferences, engaging with other attendees, and attending talks!

📜 Code of Conduct

  • Long story short, you gotta have one of these. And please don’t make it be something like “don’t be a jerk,” and that’s it!
  • Here’s a couple great CoC examples: JSConfEu and Rust Community

👩🏾‍💻 Representation

  • I will only consider participating events with diverse lineups.
  • My talks generally focus on my technical expertise as opposed to my experience being a member of several underrepresented groups in technology.LG professional

🎥 Recordings/Intellectual Property

  • I retain intellectual property and ownership of my content
  • Please let me know ahead of time if you are interested in recording my talk.
  • I guarantee that everything I do is rated “PG” with no swearing or inappropriate/explicit remarks.

📆 Stage Logistics

In-person

  • Confidence monitor viewable from stage
  • Timer viewable from stage
  • The ability to use my own computer/setup is preferred. I’ve been to some events where they require me to use their machines, which works if I’m just using slides, but I often live-code in my talks and unfamiliar keyboard layouts can lead to a less fluid presentation. This is also important for those who need to use assistive technologies on a given machine!

Virtual

  • I personally prefer live talks rather than pre-recording videos. Pre-recording involves a lot of editing time because of the nature of the medium. If you highly prefer pre-recording, please consider the time commitment with speaker honorariums, or have an editor on your team who can do those edits.
  • During talks, please include some sort of moderation of comments (preferably before they go live for the audience to see). Internet trolls unfortunately exist, and have ruined talk playbacks in the past.

✨ Bonus points

  • Live captioning is incredibly beneficial to those who are hard of hearing, struggle with focus, or prefer to process written information.
  • A scholarship program for those who can’t otherwise afford to attend is huge! Also, to note, be careful about your wording of the scholarship program. I’ve seen some rough ones where the conferences strongly imply that “diverse candidates need charity,” which is not a good stereotype to push out there.

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Reaching Out

Thank you so much for reading through all of this! I hope none of it is particularly surprising, and that it’s reasonable for you. I want to speak at events that are inclusive, diverse, and accessible to everyone, and hope to contribute to the community surrounding them

To help things go smoothly, when you reach out please confirm that you’ve reviewed this rider and let me know if you have any questions. I’d also like as much information as you’re able to provide about your conference or event (i.e., name, dates, location), potential topics you’d like me to cover and your budget for the speaker honorarium.

  • This rider was last updated August 15, 2024.
  • This rider was adapted from: cass.run/rider.