Blog Post 3: Conferences

While I have never personally attended a conference, I have an idea of what I think they would be like. I imagine myself standing in a line that wraps around a building. Wearing a badge that’s attached to a lanyard, eagerly awaiting going into a large building for several hours, possible for several days. I imagine there being some sort of main event, in the main room of the conference that everyone attends. From there, you split up into different rooms depending on your interests. For example, if I attended a conference for work (I work at Starbucks) and it was a coffee conference, I would be really interested in a panel about the ethics of different types of coffee and brewing methods. Also, a panel centered around how to grow small businesses is something I would attend. Along with these panels, there are also workshops at conferences. They could either be entirely separate from the panels, or part of them, usually taking place after, putting to action what was learned in the panel. After that panel / workshop is over, typically there are breaks, that then lead into other panels, other workshops, and this cycle repeats all day, sometimes for a few days. The only thing close to actual experience I’ve had at a conference is watching videos about Vidcon, a video conference that takes place in Southern California. I watch a couple youtuber’s who over the years have gone to these conferences. At conferences like these where they could be celebrities, sometimes there are meet and greets. Also, at conferences like these, the panels might be centered around guest speakers, instead of a topic. For example, a youtuber at Vidcon might have a meet and greet, followed by a panel, where they speak about themselves, their career, a possible topic they’re passionate about or whatever their channel is about, and the people attending the conference pick and choose who they want to meet.