In addition to our annual research day, the ABSURD team coordinates a few other activities focused on building the usable security and privacy community in and around Boston.

ABSURDists

The first of our Beyond ABSURD activities is a clearinghouse for research talk organizing we call the ABUSRDists list. We all know it's important to share our research as academics. Conferences are great, but they're getting so big and becoming impersonal. Also, it can be hard to travel right now, so more local talks would be great. However, we know it can be awkward to make your own connections and invite yourself to give a talk and it can be a lot of overhead for everyone to try to do this one-on-one.

This is why we created the ABSURDists list! Anyone can register their interest as a speaker or talk host by completing our short survey below and we will work to help you find a match.

Should I become an ABSURDist? (and answers to other FAQs)

Anyone doing or interested in hosting talks about research in usable security and privacy, broadly construed, is welcome to join. We want to stress that this is not purely a venture for academic researchers. If you work in an industry or government lab and would like to present your research or host a talk, we would love to have you! However, we plan to prioritize the following:

Junior presenters - Please feel free to add your name if you are a senior researchers, but just know our primary goal is to help create opportunities for junior members of the community who do not have the same name ID.
Northeastern US - Again, anyone is welcome to join, but as the goal of ABSURD is to create a community in the Boston area, we will primarily focus on presenters and hosts in this region.

With those points in mind and the fact that we have finite resources, if you register as a presenter we cannot guarantee you will be invited to give a talk. The ABSURD orgnizers do not make decisions regarding talk offers beyond their own institutions.

Similarly, for hosts, we ask that you consider the full pool of candidates when making talk offers, but joining the ABSURDists list does not place any requirements on you. Who you invite, the format of the talk, and any other details of the visit are up to you. We are happy to offer our thoughts if you would find them helpful, but our primary role is to facilitate connections.

Finally, for anyone who chooses to register for the ABUSRDist list, we will reach out to you directly to provide more details about the talk coordination process.

pre-ABSURD

More to come...once we figure out what we're doing!