Boycott grows of Indiana Big Data conference over anti-gay law: Amazon leads pullout
The Indy Big Data conference set to be held in May in Indianapolis has been hit by cancellations from major firms since the state passed its Religious Freedom Restoration Act.
Boycott threat over anti-gay law
Amazon won't be there. "We are not participating in the conference," a spokeswoman told the magazine Ad Age. Business Development Manager Greg Khairallah was to speak about "Agile Big Data Analytics powered by Amazon Web Services."
The spokeswoman continued, "Nobody will present. Our speaker's photo will be gone by the end of the day. They are fielding multiple requests."
The state's so-called Religious Freedom Restoration Act allows businesses to refuse services to gay people on religious grounds or refuse to offer health insurance coverage for things like birth control.
Governors of New York, Connecticut and Washington said they would ban state-funded travel of state employees to Indiana.
As well as Amazon, data analytics software makers Cloudera and Pivotal, cloud computing firm EMC Corporation and data analytics firm Platfora have all quit the event.
Companies including Salesforce are to end employee business travel to the state as a result of the law.
The Indy Big Data host, Conference Ventures, an Indianapolis company, is hoping this situation doesn't kill the May 7 event, said AdAge.
The event firm called for "an immediate correction to the law," in a March 30 tweet.
Apple CEO Tim Cook, who revealed he was gay last year, has tweeted as the Drum reported earlier, “Apple is open for everyone. We are deeply disappointed in Indiana's new law”.