At a recent computer conference, a colleague of
mine from a conservative academic institution chatted
congenially with another conference attendee. At a typical conference such a conversation would be nothing particularly
revealing, but this was DEFCON, and the young lady he was speaking with had a stainless steel spike tipped with a blinking green LED protruding from her lower lip. While some security researchers have described such conferences as “going to a graffiti convention expecting to see those who design spray cans”, I beg to differ.

I'm surprised that this is only getting memed now. Memestreams has one real academic reference, one recipricol reference, and one viewpoint reference, referenced here.

Why Computer Scientists Should Attend Hacker Conferences... (PDF)