I'm kind of confused by where conferences (particularly large/government/etc. focused conferences) choose to be. Paris isn't really my first choice for a cost-effective place for a tech conference.
It's not as bad as the ICANN meetings, which were deliberately held in obscure/expensive places around the world just to keep people from attending, in the guise of "being globally representative". The funny/sad thing is that this isn't one of the worst decisions ICANN has made.
There is a world outside of the US. Most participants of IETF conferences are not from the US or from North America at all.
In fact, the IETF came close to deciding not to hold conferences in the US anymore due to increasing visa US from many foreign visitors[0].
Paris is quite cost-effective for Europeans; a quick train ride from London, Brussels or a 1 hour and a half flight from capitals of western europe.
I'm not especially defending the choice of Paris. Brussels or London or Berlin would have been at least as good. Sometimes it's nice to hold engineering meetings elsewhere than in the Valley.
It's not as bad as the ICANN meetings, which were deliberately held in obscure/expensive places around the world just to keep people from attending, in the guise of "being globally representative". The funny/sad thing is that this isn't one of the worst decisions ICANN has made.