The academic publishing and research landscape globally has undergone significant disruption in the last few years, particularly with the launch of Plan S, the rising number of preprints and preprint servers, the growing popularity of open science and data sharing, etc. Publishers have realized that their traditional business strategies need to be adapted to the changing market, and are actively exploring new revenue streams, including new markets internationally. The move toward localization is also spurred by the gradually declining Western dominance in research output; for example, in the 2022 Nature Index tables, 7 of the top 15 research institutes were based in China.

Virtual conferences are one way of reducing many of the barriers posed by in-person conferences, especially travel costs. To make virtual conferences even more accessible to less-privileged groups, organizers can look at making the conference content more inclusive.