# Key Points from IRC Discussions on Conferences and Neurotechnology

• Kanzure criticized the inefficiency of conferences, noting that attendees collectively spend around $100k on travel while often just working on laptops, suggesting this money could be better invested in collaborative projects with remote communication.

• A proposal emerged to hire subject matter experts (like advanced optics specialists) for direct IRC tutoring at reasonable rates ($50/hour) as a cost-effective alternative to expensive conferences.

• Several participants discussed the value of real-time conference transcription, with some noting they would pay extra for conference tickets that included transcription services, as transcripts provide more lasting value than videos.

• The conversation highlighted multiple open-source neuroimaging tools, including DIPY (a Python package for diffusion MRI analysis), nibabel (for neuroimaging file conversion), and TrackVis (for visualizing fiber track data from diffusion imaging).

• Participants discussed transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), specifically questioning whether pulsing tDCS changes its effects and if time-domain multiplexing could be used to target multiple brain regions differently.

• An innovative idea was proposed to develop a scientific-visualization-rendering-as-a-service using phantomjs + d3.js to create beautiful but inexpensive figures for academic papers.