eNetworking 101: The Blog: Lovin' the tools

Last week I was at a conference of 2200+ people where the social networking tools where not just talked about, they were used. The conference generated 300+ blog posts and many photos (3,000+). With more 40 bloggers at the conference, a tremendous amount of content was created that summarized and discussed the sessions as well as provided other information. Since most of the presentations (e.g., PowerPoint) will be online eventually, I wonder if a formal proceedings is needed anymore for this conference. The documents in the proceedings were submitted weeks ago and may not mirror what some people presented. In fact, not everyone submits materials for the proceedings, so what you have access to via the blog posts, etc., is more complete.

The photos allow you to see what the conference really looked like and what the attendees did. If you had never been to this conference and wanted to know what to expect, the photos would tell you!

I haven't used the word "wiki", but there was also a wiki for the conference that was begun months before the conference took place. Many people contributed to the wiki and even more used the information that was placed there.

In addition to those tools, people were using Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Meebo and other tools both day and night. People used the tools to talk about the sessions (as they were going on), make plans, ask for help, and do networking.

Did everyone at the conference use these tools? No. And given the problems we had with wifi at the hotel, I'm glad that all 2200+ people weren't trying to blog, twitter, and updated their Facebook status. However, enough people were using the tools so that it had a discernible impact on the conference. More was organized on an ad hoc basis, more was being accomplished and more people were "in the know" even if they weren't using on of the tools.

The result was a very active conference with information flowing freely and quickly. And isn't that what we want?!

What tools will you be using at your next conference? Can you incorporate some of the tools I've mentioned in order to make the information flow more freely?