Anyone wearing a formal suit to a technology event is 'way lower down the rank' than someone in jeans and a t-shirt.
That's according to Adrian Weckler, technology editor for the Irish and Sunday Independent.
He was speaking after an opening night dinner of the Dublin Tech Summit requested 'no jeans or sneakers'.
A tech conference’s opening night dinner in Dublin tomorrow is requesting ‘no jeans or sneakers’. 😃
— Adrian Weckler (@adrianweckler) June 13, 2022
But Adrian told Lunchtime Live this is completely backwards for the industry.
"It's pillar opening event - a dinner - had one very unusual request of people attending: that they not wear jeans or runners, and that ties 'were optional'.
"That is the first that I've heard of a tech event, in probably 15 years, not allowing jeans or runners.
"For those who haven't been aware jeans and runners are essentially now the uniform of the tech industry.
"It's how you often distinguish the billionaires and the millionaires from the junior lawyers and the junior accountants, who all wear shoes and suits.
"It got me thinking whether or not the sartorial code of the tech industry - which I've been covering for 20 years - whether it's evolving or not.
"And I'm not sure that it is; I think they may just have misjudged their audience".
'People who set the agenda'
Adrian says while the event was a formal dinner, it's not on a par with a political or banking event.
"If you take just a brief scan at the people who create the world we're living in at the moment - Tim Cook at Apple... Stripe's Patrick Collison, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos - these people are all wearing jeans, t-shirts, runners.
"They're all very smart and they may cost €300 for the pair of jeans and €100 for the t-shirt and €250 for the runners - but that has now become the uniform of the powerful, of the people who set the agenda.
"The sports jacket, the non-denim stuff, the collar, the traditional shoes - that's now the uniform of people who are way lower down the rank".
And he says anyone wearing a formal suit would be the stand out for him.
"We send out signals everyday, particularly in a work environment, as to our status - who we are, what we aspire to - by what we wear.
"There's nothing new there - but what I have noticed is if you go to a big event like the Web Summit or CES in Las Vegas... if you see someone walking across the floor in a suit, you're pretty sure it's somebody junior.
"If you see somebody walking across in a smart t-shirt, jeans and runners combination it's a fair bet they're someone important".
