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In the era of AI, our network is what makes us valuable, and the work more enjoyable. (The work is mysterious and important). Go to more conferences.

Yeah, but, people's conf budgets are being cut to pay for more tokens.

I had the same sort of reaction: I agree that having friends is a requirement, but needing to attend conferences to gain them gates on ability to pay

Also, "just get a talk accepted" isn't a sustainable answer either, for a whole bunch of reasons.