Re: Orlando Conference and Exhibits (rambl

[Janice Gelb <janiceg -at- marvin -dot- eng -dot- sun -dot- com>]

In article ORG -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com, KMcLauchlan -at- chrysalis-its -dot- com writes:
>
>The "Coral Cafe" made it obvious THEY knew they were 
>serving a captive market. Serving staff were ok, but the 
>cook wouldn't even get hired as an apprentice in Montreal 
>or Ottawa.
>

I disagree on this one: as someone who eats vegetarian, 
I was very pleased to find a restaurant that offered 
decent portobello mushroom sandwiches for lunch.

>
>So, I was surprised that the STC in 
>its 47th year of doing conferences, wasn't bigger and 
>wasn't swamped with eager vendors.  The hours, and the 
>early break-up of the exhibit area were not endearing, 
>either. 
>

I manned an exhibit one year and I believe that your 
latter point explains your former: it's very frustrating 
for a vendor to go to all the trouble to host an 
exhibit and then have it close early.

>
>Back to the quality of presentations: I suggest 
>that STC provide some coaching for the unsure... 
>things like... either learn to talk at a decent 
>volume, or learn to keep your mouth near the mike.
>

STC actually does provide a pamphlet for speakers, 
and a session for them on Sunday afternoon. My 
theory (and I'm a presenter myself) is that if 
you're good at this, you're going to be good, and 
if you're a person who is not comfortable speaking 
in public, there's not much STC can do to help. 
In terms of volume, though, the audience can 
certainly provide feedback that the speaker cannot 
be heard.


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