Notes

Webinars, Virtual Conferences - Love Them Or Hate Them?
I joined the UK Electronics Group at LinkedIn a little while back. Unlike almost all of the LinkedIn groups I've come across this is nice and small with what seems a fantastic membership of professional types. A discussion emerged where the idea was floated about whether perhaps a conference needs to be organised somewhere and just what it should contain. I made what I thought could be an unpopular comment, proclaiming that I think it will be great idea to look at organising some form of online conference using webinars. For me this concept solves every one of the problems of conferences - the need to travel in the united states to some town that is hugely inconvenient for 99% in the attendees, your day or higher out in the office which I'd have the ability to pick and choose what I took part in. It would also mean that a properly organised online event could attract lots of visitors to make everything very worthwhile to perform to begin with. To my surprise the sole other comments for the discussion did actually trust me - I thought I might get lambasted for suggesting that doing a conference online could by any means much better that in the flesh human contact!
This got me contemplating the therapy lamp contributing to the exhibitions conferences will often be organised around. It seems obvious in my opinion that online conferences are very much in their infancy at this time, but get this amazing potential. Speaking being a company that that's just exhibited at Southern Manufacturing & Electronics 2010 I have recent firsthand experience from the woes of being an exhibitor at an exhibition event. I was very surprised to find out a large number of exhibitors are in fact pleased about a simply a few decent enquires we have spent a lot of income plus a a great deal of staff time for it to be there. For the big companies I guess brand promotion justifies anything, nevertheless for many more I spoke to (and us) this indicates quite irratic as to if they get anywhere near to properly justifying time and funds invested being there.
So take all of the problems of modern day specialist conferences and exhibitions:- the venue, the price to exhibit, time and inconvenience to attend, the quantity of exhibitors, the quantity of visitors and the volume of seminars, speakers or sessions that have been appealing to visitors (whatever line-up you put onto only certain sessions are of great interest to several people). These problems are common now solvable should you we're to place the event online. Now to anyone it's not taken part in a webinar this might sound like techie geek nonsense. But if you have attended a webinar that has been hosted properly coupled with content that you simply we're interested in then you'll are aware that actually attending a webinar could be an extremely rewarding experience. This is still a really techie dominated field, but as is also always the way the proven fact that the techies are beginning to have really with it means that its probably just a couple of years before it hits the mainstream. Firstly the undeniable fact that a webinar is definitely an event in a particular serious amounts of in the event you want it then you need to be there then can be a surprisingly compelling thing. Even though you're going to become watching something online, and perhaps even if it's just participating (asking them questions, interacting etc) there will be something about the event itself as well as the knowledge which you and a great many others will probably be there during this virtual place altogether.
So then case itself. Well you can totally cock it as an organiser of course, but it's also not really very difficult to generate an event which everyone comes far from impressed, educated, informed, or regardless of the aims are. Its no different that will get website visitors to remain true inside a room full of people and speak - if they are interesting, present reasonably well and possess good content for their audience that works just as well online.
However the matter that really got me considering this all is a webinar I attended today along with a virtual conference I've received invites to wait next week. Both are performing it inappropriate for me and I believe it is interesting how obvious this indicates to perform it right and why these companies get it so wrong. Its really quite easy - if you apply real life rules as to what you do this perform equally efficiently (and could easily be better in lots of ways), but should you use technology to cheat that doesn't. What niggles me is the fact that I can see a perfect way of approaching all this and need I had some time and resources to produce an ideal system, but there's not enough hours in the afternoon to do my current job so instead I'll just comment through the sidelines.
Firstly the less than great webinar. I've attended several webinars and have generally been really impressed about how precisely well they technically just work these days. This one was laid on by way of a big worldwide company inside electronics design sector, by having an impressive product I already use. They have a really progressive program of normal emailed short videos regarding their creation that are really effective in a very way that fits into my silly busy working life (a 2 minute video sent regularly showing often really useful tips is surely an amazingly effective marketing strategy). So I was looking towards the webinar to master yet more concerning the system, as well as even though it's a meeting that I knew plenty of other engineers like me will be attending. It was hosted utilizing a system from a company called UP Media Group, whoever the hell these are. Their system was basically rubbish. The experience enrolling and becoming to the webinar was unfriendly, taught me to be jump through hoops to make use of the particular software and settings they wanted me to use, and after that when I got there looked like it absolutely was designed fifteen years ago. So we wait for the webinar to start out, having been tipped that individuals could attend early before it starts if we wanted 'to begin the experience early'.
This experience involved just one scrolling chat window, also designed 15 years ago. It was nice inside the sense which it was form of fun to find out each of the people posting silly comments and to get an actual feel to be there effortlessly these other people, but when you've got more than 5 people on this type of system its basically pointless as all of the messages randomly show up in quick succession. I've not seen anyone make this happen bit right yet, but there are some really obvious innovations to make this experience great and turn a webinar in a rewarding semi networking type event also. The idea of appearing early and being 'part' of computer is appealing when case is very niche and can attract those who specialise in a particular field - lots of us did. So provide us with an experience to utilise each one of these well matched people working together. Show us maps with the attendees there who're geographically next to us (I don't care about people in Spain, but I'm interested to determine who's there through the UK or later on from me). Let us easily enter some info, upload an image, provide our LinkedIn page, Facebook page, etc, etc. We're all there to interact and find out desire can there be so make that experience work in a very really fulfilling way for everyone. Finally make chat experience work properly.
It's not hard. When someone responds to another individual show it prefer that, why don't we join specific discussions, show us every one of the things individuals are talking about and then we can find compatible folk to participate with, not simply a stupid list of random comments. With the speed of connections these days giving us audio and webcam functionality and then we can speak and discover others in smaller groups, or perhaps listen in is not implausible. You do it when you hang around outside a real life conference, so why don't you online? Actually online could be better for meeting new contacts as its a lot easier to try a fast hello online behind the safety of your PC rather in person if your not the confident sort. I could continue, but this stuff is all so solvable nowadays, really wouldn't be challenging to implement and may transform the knowledge into something cool indeed.
So then this webinar starts. Well personally at least it falls over, disconnects repeatedly, shows me error messages before finally it starts. Its fine, but its only a PowerPoint & audio type experience which can be frustrating when you are aware that it's all technically very possible show a little bit of low res video in the speaker alongside, other information on stuff, other visitors, promotion material etc I can scan in the boring bits I'm not into. About a half-hour inside my connection fails i really enjoy seeing so I reconnect. The webinar starts again from the beginning. Not only will there be no way for me to skip to the point I left or to the live feed (I'm not going to re-watch the 30 minutes I've already seen), in addition, it becomes completely obvious that the webinar just isn't live in any way. It's pre-recorded. You can just see the big corporate company bosses deciding to complete this. Pre-record it, make certain it's perfect and ensure there aren't any hiccups. What they do not get is that by doing this they've violated usually the one rule of providing a live webinar - it should be live. When you realise it isn't all in the reasons to go to vanish instantly and you'll never use that companies webinars again. It's just a bloody video with someone there to resolve a few questions live at the end.
So to the virtual conference. The event is called Virtual PCB and I like this idea. Its not happened yet however it appears like it might be an interesting knowledge about seminars along with a virtual hall of exhibitors to go around and interact with. Again it does not take live thing that I think is actually compelling. If you want to visit you've to go there while it's on and if you do then the exhibitors will probably be accessible in order to meet you, albeit virtually via your PC. However it's already broken for me personally before its even started for two main reasons. Firstly I had a quick look at the costs the exhibitors be forced to pay and it is really expensive. I'm all for there being a decent cost barrier to entry for exhibitors - it means get an excellent quality of relevant exhibitors for that visitors. But this can be a virtual exhibition with merely a fraction in the costs to use than the real life event. The prices these are charging seem ridiculous in my experience and may undoubtedly defer most companies exhibiting that I'd actually want to find. However the primary reason it's broken may be the visitor registration.
To subscribe you have to provide your email address contact information naturally, and answer every one of the questions by what you're into. Nothing strange there - all conferences want this within the hope you'll forget to tick the box saying you can't use my details for marketing. However this form doesn't have any such box and you cannot sign-up without answering every category. I complain to the organisers this can be a violation of people's to certainly privacy plus its illegal in lots of countries worldwide including the UK. read more 've not had a reply. On the form it states that you provide them with permission to provide these details with their sponsors.
Sorry but I don't walk around a down to earth exhibition with all of of my info and preferences emblazoned on my small T-shirt, why on earth would I accept this for that online equivalent? I choose who I give my details to. No doubt they'll even be tracking all of one's movements over the exhibition and definately will they be sharing this with the exhibitors for a small fee - this guy looked through these bits of your respective stuff for 5 minutes and here's all his details so you can bombard him with spam. There's something horribly eerie about knowing people will likely be told you are looking by simply daring to look at a page (oahu is the thing about LinkedIn I really wish they'd change). In this point in time I think it's a terrible attitude for a meeting organiser to get and demonstrates a whole not enough regard because of their visitors and also their exhibitors in that lots of people much like me will just not attend because of computer.
So that's my wee rant over. It felt good, yet , it's actually a rant wishing someone would fix these things and present me the truly amazing online conference and exhibition experiences I want. I really want to have the ability to attend these products, learn interesting things, meet new people and firms. The realities of the real-world conferences and exhibitions imply that I can rarely actually justify it though. Once someone available gets it right in the online space the forex market is going to be massive.
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