Hi Amy, using Twitter - and a Twitterwall which shows all tweets with the conference #hashtag - can be very usefull during a conference. But, as mentioned by Kritika, it is not good to have such a wall in the conference hall itself. But outside in a foyer it is nice. People share their thoughts or initiate certain discussions this way. Also, as many like me have their picture together with their tweets, you learn to know people faster and may then discuss with them in real life;-) I am very experienced in this as I coordinate the Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting's social media activities since 6 years. Both, Twitter and Facebook, are also helpful for viral effects e.g. to share blog post links etc.

Hi, Amy-

Hope all is well. I think that "improve" needs to be better defined in your question and might help others come up with more specific application for social media.

Just to throw this out there (and maybe off-topic)...is there an online mechanism for members of societies to contribute to "white papers", proceedings, or other publications that are developed in the meeting? I can imagine a lot of informative information could be developed using the wikipedia model and allowing society members to access materials for editing.

Hi Ken -

I think you have found the heart of the problem. I hear requests to "improve with social media" that often lack a clear idea of the exact task to be done. Some ideas suggested have been to allow more participation from those unable to attend or to include twitter # with each session to promote discussion on the topic. The wiki idea is interesting. Have you seen this used in other meetings?

Amy- I have not seen the wiki idea used at other meetings. However, I think it might be a good way to take advantage of the peer-review machinery and allow experts in the field a chance to contribute to lengthier meeting or society documentation.

I think using social media may be a good way to generate interest in different meeting topics or sessions. As for promoting discussion, primarily for those not able to attend the meeting, I see some limitations to some of the commonly used social media outlets. For example using twitter, I'd be concerned about the depth of discussion that could actually take place.

I will add that my concerns might arise due to ignorance since I don't regularly use social media. However, I am open to having my mind changed and would be happy to hear thoughts from others.

Hi Amy, I think social networks could improve the discussion about the topics of meetings, congresses and seminars.

As other people told to you, I don't think twitter could be the right social media, too much limitations (no file storage, only 140 characters are for sure not enough for a complex conversation), but facebook has some good features that let people to join a meeting remaining at home.

Some suggestions:

- in a facebook group, you can upload documents, so it could be useful to upload powerpoint presentations (better in pdf format, I know some "researchers" that built their own careers copying other people works) and proceedings (if you don't publish them on a journal, often they become hard to find);

- with cheap tools (a camera, a mixer and an editing software for live mixing two or more video signals, as well as an internet connection) you can broadcast the meeting works live on youtube, using google plus hangout. At the end of the stream, you obtain automatically a youtube video that people can watch even when the meeting is over.

Posting all that stuff on a facebook group, users can discuss about the topics of the meeting and new ideas can come out.

Good luck!!

Lots of academics now 'live tweet' from conferences, giving overviews of what the speaker is saying. You can also pre-schedule tweets for your own talk and have them roll out while you are speaking with your main points, as well as adding links to the presentation on SlideShare or a PDF based on your talk to your tweets (I have done this successfully). I have followed conferences from afar using Twitter and interacted with the people in the room as well as the speakers later. It's a great tool for enhancing conference engagement and promoting attention to the conference. Don't forget the value of advertising the conference via Twitter and calling for papers etc using Twitter as well, including links to the conference website or PDFs.

I totally agree with Deborah. I attended SMACC 2013 http://smacc.net.au/ this year which was predicated on the whole idea of Social Media. As part of my doctoral work I have reviewed both the research & grey literature on 'conference tweeting' and the value add is amazing. I particularly like to vicariously attend conferences via Twitter. If you look at the stats via Symplur http://www.symplur.com/ there can be no question regarding the value of pre- & live conference tweeting. There does need to be some rules however which should be established upfront; these will help to prevent 'gazumping study' results. Facebook can be used to reach more individuals however hopefully key people will already be engaged

Hi Amy, Actually I was looking for a such type of social media research because we get seldom chance to visit abroad. I prefer to use facebook rather twitter. It's a very good idea. Go ahead. I am with you.

Hi Amy, a conference is not complete these days without the use of social media in my opinion. Social media adds value and context to both attendees & those unable to attend in person. I recently attended the Medical Library Association Annual Conference in Boston. They had a whole session devoted to technology during which they had a live projected twitter feed, with people in the audience using an agreed hashtag to tweet about what the presenters were talking about. In parallel they had a projected screen beside the speaker which displayed all of the live tweets. This meant that everyone could follow whether they were present or not (listening or not!). It enriched the content of the meeting and engagement of all participants. It was also very cool. Plus it acts an an archive - you can search through twitter to locate all tweets from the conference. If you go for one type of social media, I would recommend twitter. Best of luck.

Hi Amy,

Yes. When there are breakout sessions, I appreciAte when 'pearls is wisdom' are being tweeted from another room. Because of the online activity, I've met ofinve at the conference to further discuss a topic and project. One conference displayed tweets during the keynote at the bottom of the screen, so all could feel included. As a presenter, I take questions from Twitter that I am able to share with my entire room. It allows a shy or unsure person to speak up. Definitely have a conference hashtag, and make it as short as possible.

Sorry for typos - I'm on mobile

Although I'm all for Twitter during a conference, I'm not sure about displaying tweets on a screen for all to see while a speaker is speaking. Very distracting for the audience, a bit off-putting for the speaker, I would think, and what if some are nasty/overly negative?

There is typically somebody who screens the tweets, but in general at professional conferences, I've not really noticed that problem. I also teach profs/speakers how to interact with an audience using Twitter from the stage (in addition to other SoMe apps), and most like it. You defiantly want to warn your speaker if you have tweets displayed, so they know what to expect off to the side. I know it will be up at my next keynote - but I'm also teaching a medical audience how to effectively & efficiently use SoMe in Higher Ed. The tweets will allow non-users to be involved & see how it works.

Medicine 2.0 is awesome at this. Also, AANP (American Academy of Nurse Practitioners) used this at their past two conferences. Look at your meeting attendees, if they are already connected it should be successful. If not, you may want to offer a training workshop on social media 101.

I went to OHBM in June and they add two different technological tools:

1/ During the meeting, people could text questions to a certain number, specific to the given presentation, and the presenter answered them. Keep in mind that people were also able to stand up and ask their question via a microphone. I believe that this could be easily implemented using Twitter by using a different hashtag for each session.

2/ An app was created for the meeting that contained information such as the conference schedule, a map of the facility, the abstracts and a direct link to their Facebook. I believe the app can still be downloaded for free (OHBM 2013).

The recent human microbiome meeting in Bethesda incorporated some of these tools as well as real-time webcasting. Also, there was the Sanger meeting on microbial genomes and public health where Nick Loman was encouraging a crowd-based analysis of the German E. coli genome.

Using social media can be quite rewarding with regards to inputs and updates, but I agree with Deborah, social media displays can be distracting to the speakers and audiences and can dilute the content. Albeit they may be used as side screen auxiliaries with someone constantly monitoring the content.

Hi Amy, using Twitter - and a Twitterwall which shows all tweets with the conference #hashtag - can be very usefull during a conference. But, as mentioned by Kritika, it is not good to have such a wall in the conference hall itself. But outside in a foyer it is nice. People share their thoughts or initiate certain discussions this way. Also, as many like me have their picture together with their tweets, you learn to know people faster and may then discuss with them in real life;-) I am very experienced in this as I coordinate the Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting's social media activities since 6 years. Both, Twitter and Facebook, are also helpful for viral effects e.g. to share blog post links etc.

Hi Amy,

I would recommend two tools that can be helpful for your case.

- Google Hangouts: Some live TV programs use their hangouts page to receive questions and comments from the audience (ex. The Streem on Aljazeera:

https://plus.google.com/u/0/+TheStream/)

- Creating Online Event on Facebook: in which people who click attend can receive updates and notifications related this event, but you need a moderator who will post the conference updates.

prepared in-Search: Can communicate through Facebook Scientific Research

Hello Amy, It is a great idea. Sophien Kamoun has set some very good examples using twitter and Linkin.

Yes new techniques have been used to measure the content of social websites during the meeting but its not credible because people are using fake ids

Possibly a little late to answer, but we've used an add-in for Powerpoint - http://www.sendsteps.com/en/ - very effectively. The presenter is in charge of whether the sendsteps wall is open to input, and can decide what format that input comes (eg as votes on a number of options, or free text comments). You would usually moderate the comments coming in (ie mark the ones that are constructive as "published" and leave the rest unpublished) which avoids distraction, and the audience can contribute via Twitter, SMS, or a whole variety of ways. Well worth trying out using the free version for fewer than 25 in the audience to see how you get on.

TwitterWall in the conference foyer has also proven very successful - the conference foyer is very public and people are a little nervous about being too negative in front of their peers and professors (and potential employers) so we've never seen any problems arise

Thanks for this link! I am going to see if we can incorporate this into at least one session as an experiment this summer. We have found that a lot of interesting conversations happen in the hallways during or after sessions and we are trying to bring more of this discussion into the sessions.

And no, it is not too late. This is for an annual meeting and I am participating in organizing it for at leas the next three years, so if anyone has other ideas on social media or increasing participation and learning at meetings, I would appreciate reading about them.

Wonderful thread. Great ideas.

Hi Amy,

>>And no, it is not too late. This is for an annual meeting and I am participating in organizing it for at leas the next three years, so if anyone has other ideas on social media or increasing participation and learning at meetings, I would appreciate reading about them.

My experience is that Twitter and Facebook have their own audience: so you can even publish the same news in both media to promote the content and receive a feedback. While I was working for EPPO, we started using a curated content providing in Scoop.it (http://www.scoop.it/).

Scoop.it media is useful for announcing or promoting meeting/conferences or published articles, proceedings etc. An easy use and sharing in your blog, Facebook page, Linkedin or Twitter. This social media uses key words for automatic search of Internet content in different social media (YouTube, Slideshare…) and other sources (defined web pages), it offers suggestions which are selected for publishing under the topic by content curator. But you can publish and share only news from 1 conference or other source. See some examples:

http://www.scoop.it/t/plant-health

http://www.scoop.it/t/pest-alerts

http://www.scoop.it/u/petter-francoise

http://www.scoop.it/t/plant-pests-global-travelers

http://www.scoop.it/t/food-policy-news

Hi Amy,

I recently attended the American Phytopathological Society (APS) annual meeting and besides the usual twitter and Facebook tools the Society developed and app for smartphones especially for the meeting. Ateendants could see the meeting schedule, set alarms and notifications, find other people attending and also send them messages, schedule meetings and networking opportunities. I found the app extremely useful and easy to use and I know that APS provides services for other societies also, if requested. If you are interested, contact them and I'm sure they'll be willing to provide their services and give advice. Their website is http://www.apsnet.org

Vasileios

Hi Bitas,

This question is actually for the APS meeting. We are looking at additional options for future meetings.

Oh dear - I should have written "Hi Vasileios!"

I am glad to hear that you have found the app useful. The company that put it together trials it at a few meetings each year and it seems to be better each meeting.

It's a small world after all!!

I thought the name looked familiar! :)

There will be lot of social media usage at the forthcoming IHC, Brisbane.

The Future of Genomic Medicine 2014 conference was heavily covered on Twitter-->4k tweets in two days. The tweets were posted on screens outside the conference area, as well as in the auditorium during breaks. At one point, we had so many tweets that the hashtag trended nationally and spam bots threatened to ruin the tweet stream. Our solution was to change the hashtag, which bought us a few hours.

Another conference to explore is HIMSS, which added social media "ambassadors" to the conference. More here: http://www.himssconference.org/GenInfo/NewsDetail.aspx?ItemNumber=27931

One final thought is the evolving use of Twitter during art events. Tweeting during opera has received mixed reviews over the past few years, but it may provide clues toward effective usage. Best of luck.

Thanks! These are all helpful tips. I don't think we will be able to incorporate a lot of this in 2014, but will try for 2015.