Attending a Conference, Looking for an Exit

The following article almost goes as far as to make recommendations, but holds back from the 'and now what?' approach. Still, the writer raises interesting issues about the unquestioned givens of ritual at conferences.

Attending a Conference, Looking for an Exit
by Terry Caesar

What would constitute a good example of the nadir of experience at an academic conference? Halfway through reading your paper, you get a coughing fit and can’t continue? Outside in the corridor you bump into someone and it’s your ex-spouse? (Or the ex-chair from your ex-university where you were denied tenure.) But these are exceptional, individual moments. Recently I experienced a more routine, structural one. ... http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2008/03/27/caesar