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Civility in critiquing the ideas of others is no vice. Rudeness in defending your own ideas is no virtue.


Mon 20 Dec 2010, 01:53 PM
One of the frequent issues that I have heard expressed by both speakers and IBMers (who are sometimes both) at Lotusphere over the past few years is that evaluations are not filled out.  I think IBM can fix this.  Create a completely predictable URL for the evaluations. If you are worried about either spam or astroturfing, make people log in to use it.  For example, if you wanted to evaluate BP212, you could use www.securelotusphere.com/sessionevals.nsf/RecordEval?OpenForm&Sessid=BP212 (or whatever).

Have the form pre-filled with session name, time, speakers, whatever you can deduce from your data.  Have it simple enough and small enough to allow mobile use.  Think Google front page, but without the logo.

This may seem like a simple step, although I have been unable to convince anyone at IBM to do it in past years.  But think of the potential benefits:

1) In the Sessions database, I could have a button called Fill Out Evaluation that was hidden until the session start time.  Speakers could encourage attendees to click and evaluate, minimizing their chance of escape.

2) Even more potential for the iPhone and Blackberry and other mobile versions.  People should be able to click on a button, record their impressions, all before the crowd thinned in the room and they could move on.

3) After the session, if somebody emails or tweets a speaker, or chats to them on Sametime, and says, "Hey, loved your session, but the room was too damn small", the speaker could respond with a URL saying, "Glad you liked it. Have you filled out an eval at http://bit.ly/hXWnyT to let them know?"

Make it easy to get to, during and shortly after the session.  Make the attendee fill out the absolute minimum by using what you already know.  Make them know that IBM can work smarter.

Anybody have any thoughts or reactions?  Anybody know who might be able to make it happen?

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Mon 20 Dec 2010, 11:23 AM
I want to populate the Sessions database with as much social networking as is practical.  For example, it would be cool if you could hit a Tweet This button and send a tweet that starts with 

In #LS11 session SHOW202, presented by @StuartMcIntyre @rwunder 

and then lets you finish it out to make a tweet such as 

In #LS11 session SHOW202, presented by @StuartMcIntyre @rwunder. These guys make Connections look easy.

In order to do that, I need Twitter ids.  I'll go ahead and add a few people who I follow or know, but anybody else who would like their Twitter id, blog URL, Facebook name or whatever, send me an email or reply here (if you are going public, you might as well start now).  

Also, if anybody has ideas for how to link up the people, not just speakers, but attendees and so forth, in useful ways (Want to do a facebook invite or have people sign a guest list for a BOF or ...), be sure to let me know.  I am working with a couple of people already, but happy to add more.

Remember, the more we connect, the more connected we are.

Copyright © 2010 Genii Software Ltd.

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