You may be getting a good handle on how to manage hybrid meetings, but what about special events? I would imagine it’s pretty tough to bring a sense of the experience of a flash mob or a chef challenge to those not actually at the event. But some are doing it—here’s how, courtesy of Special Events.

Dan Loomis at the Great Ideas blog takes on the controversial issue of whether an association’s online content should be for free or for a fee (remember the big debate when MPI decided to charge for the online versions of its conference sessions a few years back?).

Rather than take a side, though, he points to the benefits of both, and instead gives a pretty useful set of questions to ask before you decide, and some more resources to help guide your policymaking. Good stuff.

Can you even imagine how cool this must have been in person if it’s this amazing on video?

Thanks to @JeffHurt and Conference Basics for the pointers.

And this time, they’re not from me! Enjoy.

Adrian Segar on possible fixes for hybrid technology glitches/time delays (with some good responses in the comments as well)

CeCe Salomon-Lee on three technologies that may (or may not) be ready for prime time at more hybrid events.

Brandt Krueger from the sponsorship perspective. I hope he’s wrong, that others do understand just how cool the #ECTC11 sponsors are for being willing and able to go all out supporting something as audacious as this conference (and how well they performed their parts in the event). Stuff happens, folks.

Jenise Fryatt: If You’re Not Breaking Things, You’re Not Experimenting . I particularly love this part, which falls under the heading of Why Progress is So Difficult:

“We event industry professionals are perfectionists. Because we’ve seen proof that experimentation does lead to innovation, we’ll pay lip-service to its value all day long. But when it actually comes to failing publicly, do we have the guts to follow through and support such efforts?”

EventCamp Twin Cities did, and I for one applaud them for it. Our industry associations have been doing some interesting things, too, but they (especially those who serve my market niche, continuing medical education providers) tend to stay away from the bleeding edge because, well, they don’t want to get cut. I understand the urge to wait until all the kinks have been worked out.

But I’m glad there are people like ECTC11 organizers Samuel Smith and Ray Hansen out there breaking the eggs so we can all eat a really good hybrid meeting omelet. Thanks, and don’t let the critics get you down. It went about 95 percent right for this participant, which is pretty high in my experience.

Update: Here’s another one, from Corinne Kessel, a fellow EventCamp newbie who talks about her experience in the Vancouver pod. I love this quote: “I am thrilled to have been a part of such a radical attempt at event innovation. Things failed. But so much was learned.”

Update 2: Cameron Toth has rounded up a few more, plus photos and videos.

If people are talking about your property, it behooves you to listen, don’t you think? And yet all too many hoteliers still aren’t paying attention to what meeting goers and other guests are tweeting and Facebooking about their properties. Cara has a great post about those who are doing this well, as well as suggestions on how hoteliers can better serve their meetings specifically through social media monitoring.

Is it good or bad to tweet during a webinar? That’s what Ken Molay is pondering on The Webinar Blog, and it’s something I’ve wondered about, too. I’ve moderated a few webinars this spring, and we did keep a Twitter chat on a related hashtag going before, during, and after the webinar. I’d be tweeting snippets, and the presenters would join in when they weren’t presenting, as much as they could. And of course a some in the audience and others who just stopped by the hashtag also contributed to the chats. We even have a dashboard that allows participants to easily tweet (and post to Facebook and LinkedIn) right from the webinar interface. But is it a good idea?

Ken calls it a double-edged sword. On one side, it’s a great way to promote the event, the presenter, and the topic, and it allows those who can’t attend to follow along at least somewhat. On the other side, he worries that all that tweeting takes away from the learning when people are more involved in tapping out what he just said instead of taking in the next point. (As a presenter, he doesn’t want to have the distraction of following the hashtag in real time.) I’d add that the distractibility factor is already pretty high on a webinar, and adding in social commentary could make it harder for people to keep up than in live events.

But I also think it depends on the person. I know some people use Twitter as a notepad–that’s how they record what they’re learning, rather than using a pen and paper or a Word document or whatever (a practice some think should be outlawed). I know others who find it incredibly distracting and want to digest what they learn before they talk about it, whether on Twitter or a blog or face to face to a colleague in the office. I remember reading, but now of course can’t remember who or where, about one speaker who asks the audience not to tweet or live-blog his sessions—he wants them to take some time to think and make the info their own before sharing.

I don’t really see it as anything as sharp as a sword. There are benefits to both of the aspects Ken points out. If you’re into sharing, using Twitter for notetaking, or just like the instant gratification of getting the info out there, and your brain can handle the multitasking live-tweeting entails, go for it. If not, don’t; let what you learn mix and mingle and turn into something even better that you can later share. Or do both, or neither.

We all learn and use our learning in different ways. As the minister who married my husband and I said during pre-marital counseling, the most important thing is to learn to respect the differences. I have found that to be one of the truest and most useful pieces of advice I’ve ever received for not just staying happily married, but for life in general.

I know it’s been said many times, especially by folks in the meetings and conventions business, but Jonah Lehrer says it really well, if yet again, in this Wall Street Journal editorial. He says the limitations of the various different social networks “…suggest that the winner of the social network wars won’t be the network that feels the most realistic. Instead of being a substitute for old-fashioned socializing, this network will focus on becoming a better supplement, amplifying the advantages of talking in person.”

Has anyone who has been involved in any sort of technology-based social network, from listservs to Facebook to Google+, not used it as an adjunct to, not replacement for, being with people in real life? As one commenter noted, with exasperation that we even have these conversations about social media’s potential to eliminate face-to-face contact, “If anything, it just facilitates staying in touch until you see other people. Good grief. Why is social networking so difficult to understand? It’s very basic.” Exactly.

(Thanks to the MeCo listserv for the pointer.)

Thanks to the always interesting Keith Johnston for digging this one up!

Corbin Ball’s latest e-newsletter linked to this article on mobile apps for meetings, which is worth clicking through to just for the list of features an mobile meeting app can have—while perhaps not the most practical, I think my favorite is “treasure hunts and other games to stimulate exhibit hall flow.” I haven’t been to a meeting yet that uses that feature, but it has to just be a matter of time before it becomes as standard as the passport game. Just be sure that whatever you do, you don’t get so caught up in the coolness of it all that you forget to make sure it aligns with your exhibitors’ strategic goals.

We did what I humbly would like to say was an awesome free webinar on mobile apps for meetings not long ago. It’s still available on demand; Jessica Levin, Midori Connolly, and Elizabeth Summy provide all kinds of practical information on both the strategic and logistical levels. If you don’t have time for the whole webinar, our presenters very kindly answered the top 10 questions people had for them.

Think again.

(Thanks to @cmeadvocate for the link to this new version, though I think I like the background music better in the older one.)