The Smoking Situation revisited

Nobody likes bans and regulations. Some people smoke at the Congress, some don’t. Almost all people hate the smell of cold smoke everywhere after four days at the Congress. So here we are again, asking you to understand and trying to make things acceptable for dislikers of bans and regulations, like ourselves. Here’s what we wrote last year:

Quite an issue last year. Smoking situation was so bad that even heavy smokers complained about the bad air. Of course, smoking is forbidden in the art&beauty-area, the lecture halls and in the Hackcenter, as it was last year.

But for the rings we want to improve the situation and discussed many suggestions in the last months.
As the technical solution for this problem is way to expensive for us – as nerds, we would prefer that of course – we had to find a social one. So here it is: We kindly ask everyone not to smoke in the building. If you really have to smoke, do so, but keep in mind that you show everyone that you are an addict with no sense of social behavior and someone might remind you on our social solution for the smoking situation. We hope you do understand.

Now for the good news: It worked last year, so we don’t see why it shouldn’t work this year, too. Almost everyone who had to went outside and the air was fine indoors. Although it might sound harsh to throw out people and have them bear with the arctic winter of Berlin (they don’t call it German Siberia for no reason!), smokers soon discovered something. There’s a grill just outside of the building with a vent blowing up nice warm air, making your cigarette break both nice and stylish. Basically, you’ll look like this:

That said, thank you again for your understanding this year.