Most do it for free for one or more of the following reasons:

* To get that iconic/cliche Steve Jobs style posed photo on stage, with your hands arranged in some sort of Tai Chi move - https://image.cnbcfm.com/api/v1/image/104673638-GettyImages-...

* To get the LinkedIn/Twitter/Social media humble bragging points

* To get yourself known to recruiters or other tech platforms for career opportunities

* To get the free swag

* To network with other techie folks

* Free hotel / travel expenses (paid by your company or the host)

Also - the talk in some way functions as marketing for the company they work for, either as

marketing to buy some product the company has

marketing to want to come work for the company that is doing this cool stuff.

Some of the speakers I've met at conferences were people on who's contribution in form of articles/tutorials/videos I relied on (and still do) to learn and develop my craft. I was so glad to be able to thank them in person. They all turned out to be great people in real life as well. What I'm trying to say is that, sometimes, some people do it for free just because they care about others and love what they do.

edit: spelling, missed a ".".

Guilty. I also find tech conferences more rewarding if you can build a profile by giving a talk, rather than being a passive consumer.

They can cost several thousand dollars a pair.

Hell, Henry Rollins has a pair that's 200k [1].

[1] https://imgur.com/gallery/VMJ8B

It's absurdly expensive to be an audophile, I couldn't get into it.

The used market is very lacking in my area unfortunately.

I was about to say the opposite (thankfully used equipment is abundant & cheap where I'm at).

There's also the DIY route.

The good stuff is not prohibitively expensive

The stuff built for the "audiophiles" who worry about cosmic energy and theta crystals and chips in vaccines is. And it's not even that well built.

If I just want to spend mindlessly amounts of money there are better ways like buying fancy watches or buying a boat, etc

I've never seen a difference above a few hundred bucks a pair. It's diminishing returns above that.

I think you all misunderstand, I believe @augustk means a person to speak at an event.

That was my first thought as well, but then I noticed the "a pair" bit :)

I meant the original post, "depends on the person" was the clue. Not the most straight forward language ever devised though.

We have a LogiTech setup at my work and work really well. We have problems on connecting sometimes but I don't know if to blame the macbooks or the speaker itself.

Underrated comment

You'd better get in touch with the person you want and ask directly.

I would speak for free, if needed :P

This is hilarious :D

Love both discussions but I actually wanted to now about people speaking on stages about tech topics. Or in the current situation speaking on virtual conferences via video chat.

A few thousand bucks buys you a professional conference speaker. Most of that is expenses.

I had a friend who did conferences for verticals that would attract 500-2000 people. People who write books, former generals/admirals/nasa people, B-list celebrities, people associated with past news events, tech celebrities, etc all do keynotes.

A remote event should be much cheaper as these people have no work. I’d offer $500 and go as high as $2000.

Can we fix the title of this thread, please? It's pretty ambiguous.

It's clear enough from the text.

You overestimate people.

I can't change it :'D

I didn’t find anything confusing about it.

A local tech meetup I go to has managed to get some very well-known and accomplished speakers. They don't pay speakers fees, so having a large personal network is really useful. The local tech community is large, and a few senior tech leaders are involved with the meetups.

The meetup is also involved in running a conference. And some companies are willing to pay travel expenses for their employees to come out and speak. It's good for marketing and recruiting.

Two completely disconnected yet valid, and even useful, interpretations of the question. This is good fun!

Some will pay 10k to speak if it is a famous conference