With all the buzz around the use of the social media now at conferences of various topics, sizes, and locations, what is it about the use of these tools that are appealing to conference organizers and how do they determine if this is the right fit for the conference audience, vendors, speakers, participants, etc.? I ask this because of our recent discussions in class about how our professor Sherida Ryan will be "twittering" at an upcoming conference. I too attended a conference recently in Toronto
The tweets were displayed in a live broadcast using a projector and a laptop on large screens in the main dining hall. While I see the value in knowledge-sharing, what can one really get from a one to two sentence blip about a conference specific? Well apparently quite a bit! Little did I know that staff who organized the conference were following the tweets, local news media and even people who were unable to attend were virtually kept abreast of the insightful, well-organized sessions happening.
Despite this knowledge transfer happening, what I found at as minority gen-X participant at this particular conference in a sea of baby-boomers and pre-baby boomers, was that I understood the concept, was familiar with using Twitter and at times found it a bit distracting to have the live tweet feed happening in the same room at a key note speaker, the other part of the audience were seemingly just uninterested all together. The majority of the audience aged 50-70 there had never used Twitter or knew of its purpose. As I spoke with various people at different tables I sat at, I found myself explaining what the scrolling blubs were and where they were coming from on the project screens to many.
Looks like Twittering is not too popular with certain age groups yet
So I wondered after the whole experience--who really benefits from this online info-sharing? Was it just the in thing to do at the conference...were the conference organizers trying to pull in a new age group into the Web 2.0 scene? Was it because of media benefits? Perhaps all of the above, however, I still am scratching my head at what the actual in-house participants got from this social media introduction. I'm looking forward to some insights after Sherida's Twittering experience at her conference...perhaps that will she some more light on this phenomenon...
In the meantime, feel free to follow me @ http://twitter.com/onaomi
While some are fans of conference twittering, others are suggesting Google Wave may be the better option for knowledge-sharing to prevent less disconnect: Google Wave vs Twitter.
I think it's great to have options...but this still doesn't help with the digital divide in attendance.
Now having said my opinion...I Googled what others had to say about this:
http://rodeworks.com/learn/twittering-at-conferences-and-workshops/ (similar to my take)
http://chronicle.com/blogPost/Paper-Highlights-ProsCons/7178 (twittering @ academic conferences)
http://commetrics.com/articles/forrester-conference-and-twitter-does-live-tweeting-help-engage-conference-delegates/ (perhaps it can be engaging)
Incorporating social media tools in events, such as conference, is becoming a strategic endeavor. Many organizations fall into the trap of early exposure to compete against other organizations to be leading adopters of new technology. I believe organizations should begin thinking about emerging social media tools as part of organizational change and cultural behavior. It is often overlooked because of its wide use in personal interaction and therefore assumed that people already know and use it, but as organizations begin to introduce these tools into elements of their organizational practice, it becomes a strategic method on how the organization improves performance through the use of these new technologies.
ReplyDeleteIn my organization, I admire the way we introduce new ways for people to interact and learn. On our intranet portal, we receive new articles on emerging technology and how the company will be introducing it into our culture. We have a series of web conference meetings for people to join to learn more about the tools and ask questions. We receive emails requesting a group of people to beta test a tool before it is launched to the general public. We also receive surveys to gather and assess the opinion and feedback of people who will use or be exposed to the tool. So these are just a few things I see my company do effectively to incorporate social media tools as a true part of the organization and culture. If more companies dig deeper into the impact of these tools to realize the huge implications of it is not properly familiarized, I believe it would reduce the level of resistance, similarly to any change within an organization.
I think I would have been one of those participants at the conference asking what the he*# is this!! It’s a terrible thing when new things are forced upon people and the expectation is to understand and accept it!