December 9, 2014
Time for the fall meeting… and is it time for a new conference format?
Posted by Laura Guertin
The future of scientific meetings: what will EGU 2024 look like? http://t.co/dBBOK78NXj #GeoQ
— EGU (@EuroGeosciences) June 24, 2014
Since I started going to professional conferences, the format for presenters to share their information has not changed from oral and poster sessions. Sure, the technology has evolved, from 15-to-20-minute talks utilizing overhead projectors to two slide projects to one MS PowerPoint. But have we stagnated in terms of thinking of innovative, creative, and effective ways we can use new and emerging technologies to disseminate our work? The good news is that organizations such as EGU and AGU are exploring different formats, and scientists are noticing.
You know it is 2014 when you are at a banquet and one of the speakers gave a short talk by skyping in and an iphone was held up to a mic — Christopher Palma (@dfrctionspikes) January 12, 2014
For the AGU 2014 conference, several virtual options are available for those that are unable to make the journey to San Francisco. Presenters have the option to upload posters to the ePoster portal, which has a discussion board for asynchronous interactions between the authors and viewers. There are numerous (more than 600!) live streaming and on-demand sessions listed here for people to view from the comfort of their own office. And then there are remote viewing sites, where AGU encourages us to, “gather your coworkers or fellow students to watch and discuss live and on-demand sessions from the Fall Meeting. Hold discussions among your attendees, participate via social media as you watch the sessions, and even have refreshment breaks!” This sounds like a great option for departments to organize, to bring faculty and students together to view and review the content of the talks.
Other organizations are exploring different presentation formats at their conferences. The flipped conference format is gaining popularity, where speakers upload their talks ahead of time (or at least foundation material for the talks) for audience members to review. Talbert (2014) speaks to this, from his own experience.
Giving this kind of talk through recorded video raises some interesting possibilities for “flipped conferences”. For example, what if each speaker at a conference posted their talk online (in video form) prior to the conference, and then at the conference they were required to present just the abstract and then allow 10–15 minutes just for Q&A? I think a lot more “conferring” might happen at conferences, rather than just sitting there and listening. — Talbert (2014)
The 2014 Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR) Conference included a series of flipped sessions in their program. And although I think there is room for the “flipped” format at the discussion table, I’m not seeing discussions about making videos accessible to all audiences – a critical piece before we move too far along in this direction.
Certainly, individuals are giving virtual seminars outside of conferences, still adjusting to using online tools for presenting but open to the possibilities and realizing the benefits.
And given that cyber-seminars facilitate great talks from geographically dispersed audiences, I’ll take the slight oddness of doing it. 3/3
— Anne Jefferson (@highlyanne) December 5, 2014
Conference attendees have some ideas for what they would like to see in the future…
I wish there was such a thing as a programme that sent a pre-written Tweet summarising a slide each time a presenter clicked “next”. — Kimi Collins (@kimi_collins) November 26, 2014
Interestingly, this option is already available! (See How to: Auto-tweet during your keynote)
I’m not sure if we are ready for this final suggestion just yet, but maybe, someday…
Henceforth I should like to participate in all my remote meetings via hologram. — Cian Dawson (@cbdawson) September 29, 2014
Additional sources for exploration
Dunn, J. (2012, July 5). It’s time to flip the conference. Edudemic. (Article online)
Talbert, R. (2014, June 5). Four things I wish I’d known about the flipped classroom. Casting Out Nines, The Chronicle Blog Network. (Article online)
And although I think there is room for the “flipped” format at the discussion table, I’m not seeing discussions about making videos accessible to all audiences – a critical piece before we move too far along in this direction.
The flipped talks are a nice idea. Do wonder how many people would actually watch the talks in advance and how many would then only watch the talks of well-known scientists.
Making the video available to the public changes the character of a conference from a place to get feedback on preliminary work to broadcasting of results. I would argue we should leave that up to the presenter. We had a similar discussion shortly about tweeting conferences, which has a similar problem.
A post dated 12/10/2014 on The Chronicle Blog Network, titled “The Rise of Digital Poster Sessions: creating new learning interactions in the library,” is worth a read: http://shar.es/1HpcbI