The COVID-19 pandemic radically disrupted the conference event industry - it may never be the same again. In response to social distancing and health guidance, many conferences have tried (some successfully) to move online.
As someone who has run several conference events in the past (including PIPELINE Conf, SenseConf, events at Leeds Digital Festival, and many internal tech conferences), I have found it fascinating to see the rapid evolution of new approaches, discarding of approaches that do not translate from physical to online, and rapid evolution of technologies to make online conferences a great thing to be part of. Here is my take on what seems to work well for online conferences.
Summary:
the key to good online conferences is interaction with speaker and attendees
pre-recorded talks help to avoid the need for expensive broadcast technology
speakers need training and mentoring in giving online talks - and some new equipment
live-streaming talks excludes people in less wealthy regions
Photo by Gabriel Benois on Unsplash
1 - the key to good online conferences is interaction with speaker and attendees
One of the best conference series I have attended has been DevOps Enterprise Summit (DOES), run by Gene Kim and the team at IT Revolution. For 2020 (and probably the foreseeable future) these events are online. Gene does a great job of bringing people together for great discussions and conversations - through books (like my Team Topologies book), conferences, podcasts, and online book clubs - and the IT Revolution team wanted to make sure that attendees had a great online experience, not just a lame online version of the physical event.
My experience at DOES 2020 was excellent, and I think it was due to the amazing level of interaction between speakers and attendees. Talks were pre-recorded (with significant guidance - see below) but only played at specific times in the schedule. This meant that as attendees were watching the video, they could speak to the speakers simultaneously in the chat app.
I spoke at DOES 2020 with my co-author Manuel Pais. Our talk - Team Topologies in action - covered five case studies of organisations using the patterns from our Team Topologies book. The conference format meant that not only could attendees interact with us as speakers but attendees could interact with the people we mentioned in the case studies, too. The interactions during the talk were really rich and valuable for everyone. The discussions were also in parallel with the talk, as the talk was being streamed - something that is impossible at a physical event.
2 - pre-recorded talks help to avoid the need for expensive broadcast technology
Live talks at an online conference are possible but need quite advanced equipment to be sure to avoid technical problems. The OBS tool for live streaming is powerful but needs some skill to use. Each speaker needs to have multiple stream-capable broadband internet connections (wired + fast 4G) to ensure minimal disruption, and the various streams need live mixing using advanced consoles or online tools. All this adds up to quite an advanced and expensive set of technology in order to guarantee a problem-free event. Expecting each speaker to have reliable connectivity probably excludes people from less wealthy regions, too - see point 4 below.
An alternative to live talks is pre-recorded talks: each speaker pre-records their talk a few weeks before the conference, which gives time for editing and captioning. The video is then streamed on the day of the conference.
Pre-recording talks seems to feel very unnatural to many speakers familiar with live talks, but some people prefer pre-recording because the finished video can be more “polished” than a live talk.
A useful technique to make pre-recording talks feel more natural is to run a video meeting with real attendees listening to the talk; record the video meeting and use the recorded video as the basis of the talk video.
3 - speakers need training and mentoring in giving online talks - and some new equipment
Giving a talk at an online conference - whether pre-recorded or live-streamed - needs some different techniques for speakers compared to speaking at an in-person event. Probably the biggest challenge for speakers is to become familiar with looking directly at the camera, not the screen. Looking directly into the webcam is a bit weird at first, but quickly becomes a habit when you see how bad it looks when speakers look at the screen.
Another problem is the angle of the laptop or device the speaker uses to record/stream the talk: a laptop on a desk with the screen angled upwards to the speaker’s face will tend to show the ceiling of the living room or home office and generally looks quite “lo-fi”. A better approach is to use a laptop stand or other device stand so that the camera is level with the speaker’s eyes and they are facing directly ahead (or slightly upwards).
A good talk also needs good lighting on the speaker: good lighting usually means one or more LED lamps shining directly at the speaker’s face to remove shadows.
4 - live-streaming talks excludes people in less wealthy regions
I’ve been doing many online talks in the past 6 months during the COVID-19 pandemic (as well as a significant amount of online training) and I always keep my video camera on during sessions. At first, I found it rude when people did not switch on their video - I wanted to see their faces to connect with them - but after a while I realised that video costs money. Real money.
My company, Conflux, now has clients in many regions of the world, some of which do not have reliable or cheap internet access. Some people may be attending training sessions and conferences from home where they pay by the GB for internet access:
One approach I’m trying at the moment to retain a sense of connection with attendees in less wealthy regions is to ask people to switch on their video for 30 seconds while I take a screenshot of all the people on the call, then they can disable video and conserve bandwidth. I then keep the screenshot on my second screen for when I am in discussions - it helps me remember the faces of people speaking.
Emerging practices for online conferences
The good practices and technology around online conferences are evolving at a rapid pace and no doubt we will see huge changes in how online conferences are run. What’s clear is that you cannot simply “move an in-person conference online”. In fact, online conferences offer some advantages over in-person conferences and there are opportunities for much greater speaker-audience participation with online conferences.