The "Hallway Track" is my favourite thing about conferences. By far the best one of those I've had, so far, is at Functional Conf 2022 online edition (because of you know what), where I ended up hanging out for almost six hours with a bunch of APL nerds discussing APL, Life, The Universe and Everything in one of the "breakout rooms" of their conference software.
Everybody had their favourite beverages coming to them and were in their favourite jammies at their favourite spot in their home city/country talking about their favourite things and demo-ing their favourite stuff.
I do love in-person gatherings and online ones, when done right, both cases.
Online can be serendipitous in ways that in person can't (and vice-versa).
Next time I get a chance to organise an online conference, I'll steal from Jamie's playbook and invert the model. Viz. ask for pre-recorded talks, distributed to attendees just prior to the conference, with curated live chat + demo sessions with the speaker(s) about the talk. Make the Hallway Track as big and boisterous and charming as possible.
Everybody had their favourite beverages coming to them and were in their favourite jammies at their favourite spot in their home city/country talking about their favourite things and demo-ing their favourite stuff.
I do love in-person gatherings and online ones, when done right, both cases.
Online can be serendipitous in ways that in person can't (and vice-versa).
Next time I get a chance to organise an online conference, I'll steal from Jamie's playbook and invert the model. Viz. ask for pre-recorded talks, distributed to attendees just prior to the conference, with curated live chat + demo sessions with the speaker(s) about the talk. Make the Hallway Track as big and boisterous and charming as possible.