Free, open and on-line
The autumn conference season is upon us. What will be this years trends? Two years ago we were all adding friends to our Facebook accounts. Last year was the wonders of Twitter. This year I guess we will all be checking our mobile devices and swapping favourite apps (mine is Audioboo if you are interested!).
But of more importance to me is the slow progress in making face to face events accessible online. As recently as last year some conference organisers were still reluctant to allow live streaming, usually arguing lack of bandwidth although in my view more worried about what this might mean for conference attendance (and conference fees).
Many of the sessions at next weeks Alt C confernce can be accessed for free online. And many session organisers seem to be planning to use Twitter to facilitate online interaction. It is still a little tricky to find out what is available and where. The best way is to follow the has tags. Alt C is using #altC2009 and the fringe conference F-Alt can be followed on #Falt09. T help readers I have updated the Pontydysgu events page adding as many details of online links as are available at present.
Look forward to meeting up with you all in Manchester or online next week.