Here's an interesting topic for future ponderings: "Internet artifacts". Maybe I'll talk about it in a podcast. If you dig around for "emlarson weblog" on a Google search, you're not going to find this blog... but, instead, you'll find GoStats references to it. I haven't used GoStats in ages because their stats aren't that great (StatCounter is much better!), yet there they are. And there's even a test PostNuke site that comes up at MobyNuke; it was down for ages, but it came back, but now my login doesn't work. (Support over there doesn't exist, which is fine because it's free, but it's another case of getting what you pay for; read through their forums if you don't believe me.) So not only is there tons of information out on the internet about folks... but lots of it is just plain wrong!
Passing on Panel Discussions?
In his latest podcast ( Blogarithms IT Conversations News: August 14, 2005 ), Doug Kaye mentioned an interesting anecdotal tidbit: People seem less interested in panel discussions at conferences than they do in single speakers. The panel discussions get lower ratings at ITConversations.com, and... there was some other reason he mentioned it, too. (Okay, so I don't remember. Sorry!)
As I was listening to one of their panel discussions this morning, I had a thought: It was really hard to follow. It takes a lot of mental energy to keep up with who's-saying-what. And I don't even particular care about the who's-who; it would be even worse if I really need to know which person was making a particular point.
Could that be what people are reacting to when they rate panel discussions lower than single-speaker talks?
Comments