* It was fun.
* It was a live interaction between the presenter and the silent thinking of the crowd (aka. “Oh this talk sucks” or “That’s just great, he said that‚Ķ”)
* It’s not anymore a passive listening, but active, a kind of game.
* If the presenter is good enough, he will interact that the live comments. For example, a negative comment pops up on a weblog about something which has been said then the presenter can address the issue.

You also can do that with an IRC channel displayed where people are commenting.

I think the best approach is to not let anyone take any notes, use a laptop, PDA ot whatever but only listen. The human mind can only concentrate 100% at one thing at a time.

Print outs of the presentation should be hanlded out later, it could be notes or the complete presentation.

This will also make the seminar, conference, presentation etc more relaxing for everyone, even thouh some in the beginning will feel restless not using laptops and stuff…

Stefan

I would think that most attendees are at a presentation because they want to be. They are truly interested in the topic but something just goes wrong and they drift off into laptopland. Sometimes it can be the speaker, but I don’t believe that is the case with Doug. He is a very engaging presenter — not boring at all.

The distraction of the laptop is that some people think they can multi task. What they are really doing is dividing their attention;
“Mmm? Oh.. yes, yes I am listening. Do go on…”
People tend to pay more attention to what they are reading — listening is secondary.
The speaker can eventually become like background music.

Possibly the only way to completely engage these people is to compete for their desktop. If they are going to pull out a laptop make sure they are using it to enhance the presentation — whether it be AIM, expanded online examples, or whatever. Grab them at the beginning when their attention is still strong, though don’t make it so that those who don’t have laptops feel they are missing out!

To return to the starting point of this topic, you might be able to get your audience more attended when you warn them for the risks of using the WiFi, something like: All you, who are using the WiFi here, are you aware that anyone can see what you are doing? Are you aware of the fact that you have absolutely no privacy despite how good your firewalls are? You never know who is watching you, it could be me :). I would appreciate it most if you listed to me speech.

Most of it is email / IM’ing, and web-surfing, with the occasional glances at fantasy football/baseball sites. It is interesting to me that we as students shell out all this money for our education, and then sit there absent-mindedly letting it all passively slip by.

During the lecture we used some questions before we plunged into a new subject and asked the audience vote on a question using the buttons. The system calculated results and we used those in the presentation. Audience attention (and anticipation) rose during the lecture and we had a very relaxed, fun, highly interactive session. Unfortinaly, to get such a system for a session is rather expensive in relation to overall costs.

I guess using a simple webserver hooked into the network and some server side language scripting could make up for a simple voting system to be used in a lecture and be cost efficient. That would be leveraging the WiFi environment present.

Preparation though is much harder. You must have different scenario’s in your lecture based on possible outcomes, but it can be very worthwhile in my experience.

Voting is a split-second task, while typing takes up more time and concentration. I do have problems myself taking notes and listen attentivly at the same time. I think WiKi pages or communal blogs take away a lot of the attention in the first place and makes the life of the presentor much harder.

When I have a class that is interested, the speaking on my part is much better. When the class is disinterested, I feel like the semester was wasted. As a teacher, I can ignore those who are simply sitting in the chair for class credit and spend extra time with those that want to learn.

As a speaker, I start using more jokes and asking the audience for questions, what do you not understand?

How does this relate to wifi? If you have something more important on your mind, do it. It won’t bother me. But if the whole room is doing something, even if they are just using AIM to discuss the fact that I buttoned my shirt wrong, I would be missing the connection that makes a conference more effective.

The lack of wifi at the @media was a bummer for about 5 minutes and then I got over it. I was at a recent Museums on the Web conference and their super-powered wifi actually reached my hotel room several floors up. THAT was nice! I didn’t have to pay the hotel’s $20/day charge.

I have to add a small quotation from a professor:

The presenter knows, what he’s about to say. Connecting to the people is the challenge of the upcoming decade.

A presentation is a stage show and the audience is very much apart of the whole experience. If the audience is unresponsive the experience is lessened.

“I can do what I damn well please” is the standard cry of the selfish egocentric. Other people paid for the event as well so try not to stuff it up for them. If you are not interested in the presentation go outside. Or, as Doug mentioned, at least sit at the back.

Ed wrote:
“…People have the right to set $100 bills on fire in the street, too…”
Not in Australia, it is illegal!

If wifi is available, and people do have laptops out and open, what are other ways speakers can take advantage of this — rather than allowing the scenario to be a distraction?

In addition to the AIM/IRC channels already mentioned, I could also imagine a wiki set up in advance — either a global wiki for the entire event, with pages for each session, or at least one set up just for that session. Or even just a blog post, with open comments. Either one of these could potentially allow even people not attending the conference to semi-participate without being there if they knew exactly what time the speaker/panel was presenting.

We kind of did this at SXSW this past year for the panel John Allsopp moderated on Web Design 2010: the future of the Web. Dave Shea set up a blog for the purposes of continuing the discussion. Though there could have been more active uses of it during the panel. I don’t know. We tried to set up a SubEthaEdit doc for collabortive editing for the same session, but the network kept going in and out, dropping everyone each time, so it didn’t work for us.

What other means are there?

fyi, I don’t care to judge anyone who opens a laptop and checks email, or whatever. I know I’ve done it once or twice, especially if I’m bored or the speaker loses my attention (and/or respect). It’s their perogative if wifi is made available. However, if you know you’re going into a presentation where you might be using the laptop more than paying active attention, it’s probably common courtesy to at least sit in the very back where others behind you can’t see your screen and don’t know that you aren’t taking notes.

I’ve spoken at a lot of different places and I’ve actually once thrown a gentleman out because he was telephoning rather loudly in the middle of the audience. Needless I used him as an example, since the subject was “dealing with resistance in a new IT project” ;-)

I think I would give a big jerk at the ethernetcable that leads to the router somewhere during the speech or beforehand. Or simply request to keep laptops closed or walk out if you cannot be offline for one second.

I think there are two extremes on the pendulum.
1. I paid for this freekshow so I can do what I want.
2. WiFi banned.

In the middle??? Just as cellphones have become bad juju to use at a restraunt, I think laptops may undergoe the same peer scruitny and make the majority of attendees WiFi wisely. If I was reading my email and the guy next to me whispered, “nice email buddy” in a sortof disgusted way, I would close the laptop and remember that I was here to listen.

Solution? How do other things vyiing for our attention keep it in this day where ADD is considered normal. I shudder to say this, but we probably need to take hints from television. They keep peoples undivided attention for hours! How do THEY do it? Probably by making as interactive an experience possible. Fancy moving flash pieces will probably do that job! Instead of just showing off a sample of code… have the screen go to warp and stop at the code etc etc… Lame ways of keeping ones attention but we know they work. I would probably look to Discovery channel because they teach AND entertain. (emphasis on the entertain) I want to know how they build choppers for some reason.. so I watch. I watch Crock Hunter because I want to see him get bitten! (is that a bad thing to say?)

All in all, I think we as a community may want to address these issues just as we are. Those going to the conferences most likely read these blogs too… they will get the idea.. and then peer critique may help too. There will always be those that use their Nextel speakerphone yelling thingie in the restraunt, but most people turn off their cellphones at the door or go outside when getting a call.

If people want to waste their time and their company’s money goofing off during a conference presentation, so be it… but why are they there in the first place? Just skip the session if you’re not going to pay attention. Show the presenter (and the learning process in general) a little respect and hang out in your room or the hotel bar instead if all you’re going to do is check email and goof off.

And if the goof-offs are paying for the conference on their own dime… good luck in life. Nice job spending your hard-earned cash for the ability to check email, which you could’ve done for the cost of a latte at an internet cafe. I sincerely hope you’re a competitor of mine… I’m learning while you’re wasting money. ;)

I agree it sucks for the speaker to look out and hear the crickets. I think Veen’s idea of using IM is a great way to help the audience engage. It’s sad that in today’s culture the attention span is so short that people have a hard time not getting distracted in less than 5 minutes (I’m guilty as well). Getting the audience more involved is the key, but exactly what the magic formulae for that is, I don’t know.

My point is shouldn’t someone who makes his way into such a conference room know why he / she does so?!

Banning wifi completely isn’t the right way, though. What if someone has some great ideas during such a presentation and needs to type them immediately let’s just say to make a nice
Zoom Layout – just a for instance :)

To sum up I like to have the opportunity to “wifi”, what everyone makes out of it is…