The future: "Virtual RISC OS Shows?"

To answer “why a hotel”, the main reason is convenience for those travelling. I typically stay 3-4 nights because the slog of driving and doing show (not to mention preparing) takes a big toll on my physically. We make a weekend of it, and try and relax and enjoy ourselves. We could do this with a community hall, but it means driving over on the day of, which can be a bit of a pain. The community halls may not be super-close to affordable hotels.

Second is day-before access, and storage of gear. Hotels are set up for this, community halls aren’t. Having to build a stand “on the day” just makes a long, tiring day even longer and more, erm, tiring. Hotels will usually lock and secure rooms at night.

Finally, there’s a prestige element. Community halls are nice for some purposes, but hotels send a better impression to people who haven’t been before, or who are new to the community. Don’t get me wrong – I’m no snob (Steph and I got married in a community hall type location), but I do recall people turned their noses up at the Summer MUG show because of the community hall location, sadly.

Also, for public transport, I agree it is important. However, outside of London region, public transport is, erm how to put this politely… I bit rubbish? There is pretty much zero integration of public tranport outside of london metro area, so cars are de-rigour for most of the country. For example, I grew up in a (commuter-type) village about 3 miles from several towns. We had one bus a day (still do, I think). That’s not one bus in two directions. One bus. Not entirely helpful. Thanks to Beeching, there’s basically no train service outside of mainlines either, so again… Obviously its not that bad everywhere, but equally, Cheshire is hardly off the beaten track, and its a reasonably affluent commuter-y area. It’s just not a metro-area so the public services are hopeless.

Why does a show have to be in a hotel anyway? I am more likely to go to a show in a community or church hall near a station than a hotel out in the sticks. What about others?

My first thought was to use village halls, they generally have good tea/coffee facilities. We would probably have to lose the talks in such a small environment.

Yes, I should have thought first, before putting keyboard to web page, that exhibitors, and maybe some attendees, travelling from a distance need a hotel for staying the night. Put my error down to too much Harvey’s Sussex Best Bitter last night. However, perhaps a community or church hall in a city or town with train station and hotels. Wakefield used to hold their show in a sports venue, can’t remember whether it incorporated a hotel, and was close to the city centre and station. If that was too expensive, then why not try a community or church hall in the city? It might be cheaper to be in a hall and book it for an extra time for storage than a hotel. Another possibility is a college or university which SAS AUG did for many years for the South East show in Guildford.

I am afraid I have no time for the “prestige” part of your post, Andrew, RISC OS is in no position to fuss about prestige, much more thinking about survival. Many community or church halls have more floor space than the pokey rooms used at the present Wakefield Show. Wakefield website is one of those putting road directions for ‘petrol heads’ before public transport and, surely, the environment is more important than prestige?

Can we have more of trains and less of motorways please?

Show organizers should ensure that the venue is within walking distance of a station with a frequent train service. ROUGOL do this, […]

ROUGOL have the slight advantage of being in London.

In fact, it’s not that simple. On the only occasion that I’ve been to London as a visitor and not an exhibitor, I came down from Leeds by train. It’s a long journey into Kings Cross, followed by tube, followed by 20 mins on a suburban stopper to Feltham… Not entirely dissimilar to a train into Wakefield Westgate, a short walk to the Bus Station, followed by a 20 minute ride on the Arriva 444.

Wakefield used to do this, but then moved to a hotel a twenty-minute bus ride away from Wakefield Westgate station,

Actually, Wakefield started at Cedar Court, moved to Thornes Park, then to a pub that was really in the middle of nowhere by a canal, then back to the Cedar Court.

Thornes Park was great, but as I’m fairly sure I’ve explained to you in the past, it also had the slight problem of being very large, expensive and having no infrastructure. WROCC had to hire in all the stands and tables, and bring in all of the electrical distribution equipment to get safely from the 3-phase service points high up on the walls down to the stands (which all had to be maintained and fully tested before each event). Once the heyday of the 90s was gone, the costs were unsustainable. It also had a full day’s set up before the event, involving many people taking time off work to help.

As far as the bus ride goes, see the comment above about London! Oh, and the point that both Chris H and I have made about how few people used the free, direct minibus from Westgate to Cedar Court in the final couple of years that we provided it.

Why does a show have to be in a hotel anyway? I am more likely to go to a show in a community or church hall near a station than a hotel out in the sticks. What about others?

Andrew has largely covered this, but the main issue is cost and convenience. None of us are getting younger, and a hotel will – for a reasonable outlay – set everything up ready for the exhibitors to arrive. Community halls won’t.

It doesn’t have to be out in the sticks, but generally the more out of town hotels are cheaper than the city centre ones. Remember that the shows are all just breaking even at present, so the additional cost probably wouldn’t be viable.

Can show webmasters put travel directions by public transport first, that is, before directions by road. We are not all ‘petrol heads’. Judging by car park usage at the London show, most punters come by public transport.

Our experience in Wakefield is the opposite, although our travel info gives jumps to all modes (car, train, bus) in the first paragraph of the page. :-)

[…] the Black Jug, Horsham.

I know it well. :-)

However, perhaps a community or church hall in a city or town with train station and hotels. Wakefield used to hold their show in a sports venue, can’t remember whether it incorporated a hotel, and was close to the city centre and station. If that was too expensive, then why not try a community or church hall in the city?

WROCC have done a lot of work on finding community hall type places, when we moved from Thornes Park to the Frobisher Suite, when we moved back to Cedar Court, and when we then downsized in Cedar Court to the rooms upstairs at the back. Each time we did a comprehensive survey of community halls, church halls, schools, pubs with function rooms, and hotels, and failed to find anything which would work better than what we currently have.

The bottom line is that it really isn’t as simple as you might think. A lot of halls simply aren’t big enough, or are not really secure enough to leave things in overnight, or have too many restrictions on use, access, or whatever. Spaces which are any use often have regular Saturday bookings.

Also, David, I think you’re really overplaying things talking about “a matter of survival”. It really isn’t. Most of the shows have been rising in attendance and break even in their venues. No-one’s looking to make a profit on the event itself. The sad fate of the MUG show proved that community hall isn’t really a solution – better to enhance the transport and venue/experience of the existing shows I think, which is why we moved the SW Show this year. As a venue, I actually preferred the Webby, because it was a really “comfy” venue, but it is notoriously off the beaten track, so ROOL were right to push us for a move.

There’s good stuff been said on this thread though, even if it did stem from Chris’ ill-timed (but reasonable) justification for not attending. If someone has a modern phone and wouldn’t mind doing a bit of recording as Rick suggested, that’d be a great improvement/start.

The sad fate of the MUG show proved that community hall isn’t really a solution – better to enhance the transport and venue/experience

Two points that really caused the problems at Kenilworth:

1. No public transport (although since the show stopped at that venue the town now has a rail station – which is within walking distance of the venue)¹
2. Extremely limited on-site car parking so once exhibitors were in there wasn’t much remaining.

Combine that with the limited space/facilities and it was always likely to struggle.

Venues of any size are more difficult than people think. Too large and the price is ridiculous², too small and the whole thing becomes unworkable.

¹ I know that on one occasion the only reason ROOL were actually able to attend was me driving up to Nuneaton(direct connection from sunny Cambridge) to pickup Rob Sprowson and deliver him to the venue (hopefully not taking too many years off his life with the driving)
² Thirty eight years of CAMRA activity have shown me all the variants of how venues can make their premises unattractive to people with a modicum of financial snese.
I contratulate the current active show organisers in having found something workable.

Just to add the mini bus we provided free betwwen Westgate station in Wakefield and the show cost nearly 300 pounds for the day and was the cheapest we could get within the law! but in its final year 6 people used it all day, not value for money, this had to paid for by exhibitors and visitors. Sad but true.

Although Cedar Court has free wi-fi, they do I believe have a usage limit in any 24 hours. recording of the theatre talks has been done by 2 people each year and they try and get them out as soon as they have time to get them out, remember people running the shows are doing it for free and in their own timne. As for interviewing exhibitors during the show this could end up distracting form them doing sales and marketing their wares etc. so not s simple as it sounds.

I am sorry some feel the wakefield show is in “shabby rooms”, the hotel has now been brought by a bg hotel chain who are refurbing the hotel, but this probably means increased costs for next year (if we decide to run one).

(if we decide to run one)

That would be a shame. Wakefield is the best venue for us Northerners. I never thought it was shabby, althought perhaps exhibitors look at it more closely.

Do WROCC need to hold their show in Wakefield? What about Leeds, which is a much bigger transport hub than Wakefield? Remember, that SAS AUG held their SE show in Guildford which is further from Horsham, where we meet, than Leeds is from Wakefield.

Of course, any venue will be difficult for some folk to get to, but the point is whether the venue is convenient for enough folk for them to attend and make the show worthwhile. So Steve Fryatt’s example of coming to the London show from Leeds is irrelevant. Surely, we are not expecting folk to attend every RISC OS show, just to encourage them to go to their nearet show.

To be blunt, if you hold your show in a place which is hard for all but a few people to get to, don’t expect a reasonable attendance.

Any venue in central Leeds will be much more costly than Wakefield. Move out of the centre of Leeds and you will face the same problems you claim for Wakefield, plus Leeds traffic will be a lot worse.

It really isn’t. Most of the shows have been rising in attendance and break even in their venues.

Is that certain? It isn’t how I remember the figures, which are more on a gentle downward trajectory. Not huge, but it’s still the wrong way.

No-one’s looking to make a profit on the event itself.

They aren’t, but equally no-one can afford to make a large loss (or groups like WROCC can’t; I don’t know about Richard and yourself). Things are currently finely balanced, and it won’t take much of an upset to make things difficult. The key starting point at Wakefield each year is “can we get the same price for the hotel?”

Personally I think that videoing the shows should be crowd funded.

Those people who cannot or will not attend could donate towards the cost of videoing a show and
when the set target is reached then live streaming could take place.

The target figure should cover the hiring of equipment plus operator(s), and no Rick I don’t mean someone walking about holding out a mobile phone for the shows time duration and should also cover
the shows venue expenses.

Regards Ron.

From something that started with an assumption with a sight negative tilt:

Those people who cannot or will not attend

Moves to a reasonable sounding premise:

could donate towards the cost of videoing a show and when the set target is reached then live streaming could take place.

But then slides into something taking a pop at people, who in various cases, fall into the “can’t” as though it is actually can’t be bothered.

The target figure should cover the hiring of equipment plus operator(s), and no Rick I don’t mean someone walking about holding out a mobile phone for the shows time duration

and here we finish with the dumping of all show expenses on those who aren’t there to partake of an at-the-show-discount.

and should also cover the shows venue expenses.

Perhaps you’d like to rephrase the posting? You’re likely to upset someone at this rate.

For what it’s worth I thought Rick’s suggestion of a budget solution was a damned good idea. Probably needs fleshing out, but at a point that is mere days before the event any cheap/zero cost proof of concept is a better idea than nothing.

@ Steve,
!/ People who cannot attend; infirm or live to far away. Though a couple from Glasgow often attended the SW show and another persons travel time to Weston-Super-Mare took aaabout four and a half hours from deepest Cornwall.

2/ People who wont attend; got something better to do.

3/ Are you volunteering to carry the mobile phone around the show Steve. After all the show only runs from 10:30AM till around 5:00PM and with lots going on all day.Should be a doddle.

4/ Cost; Visitors to the shows have to pay out more than just the admission charges, so a show discount will slightly offset those added costs.

5/ Shall we say that a fiver each from the hundreds of people wanting a live video feed should more than cover the venue costs and the actual video costs.

Regards Ron. (Getting ready for the show, looks like it will be a good day out.)

Watching six and a half hours of someone wandering around to exhibits sounds like punishment.

There’s no real way to deal with attendance vs. non attendance. It’s not possible to have show goers discounts for non attendees. It doesn’t make sense and removes some motivation for people who can’t attend.
I don’t even live in the same hemisphere so I obviously won’t be attending. I know there are others in the same situation. Now I think of it that also means that any live stream would be at some horrible time of night.
Really I’d be happy to see either a nice writeup by someone or writeups by vendors and maybe some attendees about what was shown and preferably links to more information.

There are a few things in this thread that I want to comment on, so this might seem a little disjointed, but here we go…

On the subject of finding a venue (and this is largely going to echo what Andrew Rawnsley and Steve Fryatt have said):

I spent some time looking at possible alternatives to the Webbington before Richard (and possibly Andrew at some point as well – I’m no sure offhand) ever discussed the subject with me. This was because I was being increasingly made aware by show visitors about the problems getting to it, as well as seeing discussions on forums.

What I think should be very obvious, and which I found when looking, is that the closer to the centre of a city or other large town (I didn’t look just in Bristol, but the whole region) and the closer to good transport links (both road and public transport) the more expensive the venues were.

As Andrew notes above, there are good reasons to host the events in hotels – and top of that list is convenience for exhibitors, because a show doesn’t just happen for the hours it is open; there’s a lot of hard work before and after it takes place – both on the day itself and the days preceding, and possibly after. How much will vary from one exhibitor to the next, but some have to do an awful lot.

So if not in a hotel, it needs to be somewhere very close to one – ideally right next door, or as near as damn it, so as to keep things as efficient as possible.

And then there are all the other boxes that need to be ticked, including it being easy to get to for visitors who may not be coming by car (the reason I began looking in the first place).

I did find, for example, a golf club with suitable facilities (and the price was very good IIRC) – but while the nearest hotels are close by, they are far enough that exhibitors might have found it inconvenient. Added to that, the nearest railway stations were Bristol Parkway (no direct bus link) and Severn Beach (infrequent buses). Temple Meads has a quite frequent bus route to [a bit of a walk from] the venue, but it would be quite long bus ride.

There was also a hotel within walking distance of home for me, but the show would’ve had to be spread over two floors, and while in this case the exhibition rooms were also quite cheap, the actual hotel rooms were ridiculously expensive, with alternative hotels for people to stay only a short trip away, they were far enough away that it was less than ideal. (And it would also have meant that long bus trip from Temple Meads).

Finding the right venue is difficult. ISTR that my original list had a lot of possible venues, but almost none of them ticked all the boxes.

The Arnos Manor Hotel was, in fact, a very lucky find in that it does just about tick all the boxes – it’s not too far out of central Bristol, only a short bus ride (or a couple of miles(?) walk if you’re that way inclined) from Temple Meads railway station, it’s good for drivers (for both access and parking), its room rates for those staying seem reasonable. The only slight let down is that while it’s not far from central Bristol, it’s far enough out that it’s not as well served for local pubs and restaurants as somewhere closer to the centre would be – but there are some.

Sadly, I/we (the Bristol group) haven’t had the opportunity to test all of them, or even the time to properly find out and list all of the local hostelries. If this year’s show is a success, maybe I can persuade the group to help with such an investigation as we progress towards next year’s. Hic! ;)

(AAMOI, I originally dismissed the Arnos Manor based on the info on the hotel’s website, but when Richard asked me to look around, I checked it again, and it had changed hands and the info then available still didn’t make me entirely sure, but it warranted a proper look – so I took a proper look!)

On a side note: Andrew, I’m not entirely convinced it was the fact that it was in a church/community hall that was the problem for the MUG Show – although it undoubtedly contributed. The lack of a local railway station would also have been a big factor (as Steve P mentioned above). And I’ve always felt timing was another.

Consider that when that show was going, we had four mainland UK shows:

• The Southwest Show (late February, sometimes early March)

… very close to (the shortest gap was, IIRC, 6 or 7 weeks) …

• The Wakefield Show (Mid-late April – used to be May).

… just over two months until …

• The MUG Show (very early July)

… then almost four moths until …

• London Show (late October)

… and from that another four months until the Southwest Show again.

That uneven spread, I feel (and have probably said before), is sure to have a bearing – and shows that happen too soon after the previous one are going to suffer. To that end, I strongly suspect the Wakefield Show has suffered the consequences of sometimes being far too soon after the Southwest Show – but that’s just gut feeling.

Conversely, I reckon the London Show has probably benefited from the longer gap – and even more so now that the MUG Show is no more. (Note that when I say benefited, that could equally mean its attendance numbers might be worse if it wasn’t for that gap – not to imply it’s doing well financially, which I obviously don’t know).

Ideally, for three shows per year, I feel it would be better if they were four months apart, and for four shows, three months – but like finding a suitable venue, finding suitable dates that don’t cause problems in other ways might be problematic – too close to or soon after xyz (Christmas?, bank holidays, school holidays or other popular holiday periods, when families might go away – and so on). And some venues might charge more at certain times – not just for the conference and exhibition rooms, but also hotel rooms.

And thinking about it London and Southwest are four months apart when the latter is in late February – so Wakefield being in June would balance it out currently, but for the above reasons (and more I haven’t considered) it may not be practical; the organisers would be in a better position to consider it – and for all I know may have done so before and dismissed it. (From what Steve said above, they’ve certainly spent time looking at venues.)

That was quite long for a side note. Ho hum.

Going back to the original thread topic of ‘virtual shows’, TBH I don’t think the format of RISC OS shows is suited. Not all developers have the equipment to pre-record talks and demonstrations for use in such a show. (Or to edit them – editing videos can be very time consuming if a lot is needed). Doing a group/live thing instead removes the editing hurdle, but if you don’t want something awful, you still need something better than a smartphone pointing at either yourself or your screen to play your part as an exhibitor.

Live streaming at a proper show is a little more plausible, but not for the main show floor – the format just isn’t suited to the idea. It would be haphazard, with some exhibitors unable to talk when whoever is live streaming it as at their stand, etc. (As I see Tristan has now alluded to.)

In that sense, it’s better if someone could wander around and record little chats with exhibitors where they can, and edit it into something reasonable to upload later – which has been done from time to time; where I’ve spotted such videos I’ve included them in show reports.

Live streaming the various talks OTOH, would be possible – and much more practical; people would know in advance when the talks are due to start, so could access the feed at the right time rather than sit around hoping whoever is streaming is going to [be able to] talk to someone interesting in a minute… etc.

The downside – sorry – is how terrible the people giving most of our talks tend to be. When I first started recording the talks, I simply uploaded them more or less as they were, just topping and tailing the recordings with a simple title card – but as presentations go, they were terrible.

That’s why I started going further with the editing – cutting out te ums ans ahs, and the uncomfortable delays in the talk while something is picked up for the audience to see, or even handed out to them in some cases. All of which can take an awful lot of time. (Which is why my Wakefield videos have never appeared – I haven’t found enough time to edit them, though I suppose I could have done the least problematic ones first.)

I’m going to single you out on this Chris, because one of yours in particular stands out in my memory: One of the videos I’ve uploaded of one of your talks from a year or two back is about nine or ten minutes – and that was edited down from about forty minutes IIRC, and none of the real content of your talk was lost in the editing. (I may even have changed the order of bits you said so that they followed a more logical sequence.)

I should stress you that you aren’t the only one that takes extra effort to edit – but some need a lot less effort.

So going back to what Tristan said, even live streaming the talks, if they’re like that, would be punishment for the audience.

Ideally, you’d also want to be able to cut the live stream to the relevant slides, because for the small screens we tend to use, the images aren’t always too clear on the camera – which ups the technical requirements quite a step. And again, this is another thing I started doing a couple of years back when editing the videos – asking those who gave talks to send me slides – or pictures of anything shown – so that I could overlay them at appropriate points in the video. (Alternatively, whoever is live streaming it can aim the camera at the projector screen and zoom where necessary – but unless it’s a professional doing it, the result is still not going to be great.)

I think the real bottom line of this (surprisingly long post for me¹) is that if you really want to know what’s happening at a show, you need to attend the show. If you genuinely can’t, be patient. News will emerge, sooner or later.

Actually, that’s not quite the bottom line because I’ve thought of something else! Exhibitors could do an awful lot more to publicise shows – not just show banners on websites, but start using social media more. I’m a heavy Twitter user, and I know there are some RISC OS people who also use it – but I don’t see anywhere near enough promotion of the platform or events there. Talk about your software (and RISC OS – and upcoming shows) on social media.

I know some social media sites/services are truly awful – cough Facebook cough – but they are a key part of promoting things these days. You don’t have to use them all, just find one that suits you, or which you find the least awful, and use it. You don’t have to say or post a lot – but post something relevant, when it is appropriate to do so.

(But don’t make it write only – read as well, especially replies!)

This business of sending out show-announcements at the last minute, as well, really really doesn’t help. I realise there’s a worry of announcing things that might not be ready in time, so might be referred to as vapourware, but it’s not an issue if you take the right approach. Talk about what you’re thinking of doing (again, social media) and as you make progress, comment on it – with screenshots if possible. And if you have trouble getting something working, which might mean it won’t be ready for a given show, don’t be afraid to say that as well.

You don’t HAVE to have a finished product at the show – it’s perfectly acceptable to have talked about something you’re working on, and just show a work-in-progress on the day. It helps keep people interested.

This also goes for websites which, as someone else said, are terrible. Or was that in a different thread? Actually, yes, I think it was. :)

A blog, preferably integrated into the site (not the stupid way I’be done with posts.softrock.co.uk and which I intend to fix at some point, so probably some time in the 2020s), is a good starting point to all of the above. You can talk about plans and ideas, progress reports, etc on the blog. If it’s integrated with the site, it makes it look like the site looks is being regularly updated (technically, it is). Your social media posts can quite literally be links to your blog posts.

(And I know I’m as bad when it comes to the SRS site – and indeed the SRS Twitter feed – but in my defence, I do put quite a lot of effort into another website of mine!)

Anyway, that will definitely do for now!

¹ Which has taken me a couple of evenings to write, reading the thread on my phone and drafting the post on a computer, ready for me to connect something to the internet (which after a few problems, is now live – now I just need to set up my desk and computers!)

Sadly, I/we (the Bristol group) haven’t had the opportunity to test all of them, or even the time to properly find out and list all of the local hostelries. If this year’s show is a success, maybe I can persuade the group to help with such an investigation as we progress towards next year’s. Hic! ;)

One should always check the local resources – especially when talking about info on local hostelries:
http://www.camrabristol.org.uk/committee.html
Note the “APPLE” co-ordinator. Definitely your favourite topic (that’s assuming you do the Pear that is the first P)

it’s not too far out of central Bristol, only a short bus ride (or a couple of miles(?) walk if you’re that way inclined) from Temple Meads railway station

It’s pretty much exactly 2km (1.25 miles) according to RiscOSM, via the main road, or 2.6km (a bit over 1.5 miles) if you take a route down by the River Avon, which looks nice on paper. I haven’t decided which I will do on Saturday. I might just get one of the frequent buses – the 1 or the X39.

Yes, I also looked at RiscOSM for a walking route and have printed it out. I made it 2.1km or 1.3 miles along the main road; but then, unlike Matthew, I didn’t go via a load of pubs. :-) I expect he was influenced by Steve Pampling’s post. Hello Steve! I am also a member of CAMRA, but will leave any drinking for the return walk to Bristol Temple Meads. Yes, depending on how much you drink, the distance could be a lot longer.

Vince, well done! You have obvioiusly tried hard to get a good venue and I hope your efforts are rewarded with a good turnout.
SO, EVERYONE , who is not a million miles from Bristol, TURN UP.

I disagree that most of the talks are terrible. In fact, with the exception of one or two talks at shows, they are very good and I include, I think, all the regulars in this. I know that talks given by ‘techies’ can be terrible and have witnessed this at club talks and so I am the first person to be critical of talks on technical subjects; but I haven’t seen this much at shows. I remember only one badly presented show talk.

I had to look up AAMOI in a search engine. The first entry was Association d’Aide aux Maitres d’Ouvrages Individuel. It does have something to do with buildings, but I don’t know whether they are into hotels.

It took me 20 minutes to walk from Temple Meads station to the hotel. I’m quite a fast walker, but wasn’t rushing (I’d already travelled from London and spent the afternoon wandering round Bristol museum, so wasn’t exactly brimming with energy by then!). There’s a slight incline at the start but then levels out. Stay on the left hand pavement as the right hand side disappears at one point.

To get the bus, walk down the station approach road and turn left at the bottom, the bus stop is right there. Get the number 1, 349 or X39 to Arnos Court, which is directly opposite the hotel. It’s only three stops and takes less than five minutes. The buses take cash or contactless card and it costs £2.50.

David Lane:

Virtual RISC OS Shows was an agenda item at our SAS AUG meeting last night at the Black Jug, Horsham

That’s good to hear. If only you had publicised it beforehand others might have been able to join in! How is anyone supposed to know that the group even exists if you don’t advertise?

Can show webmasters put travel directions by public transport first, that is, before directions by road

The SASAUG website has the public transport info right at the end. More of a problem is that it is directions to your old venue that you haven’t met at for over a year. No mention of the new venue, although it does mention the SE Show in Guildford :-(

As we were saying, RISC OS websites are mostly terrible.

Just for comparison and to show the sort of effort that is needed, the next ROUGOL meeting (next Monday, 18th Feb, featuring Chris Cox of Acorn RISC Technologies :-) ) has been on the group’s website since last September. Full details and venue info here http://rougol.jellybaby.net/meetings/index.html

Other places it has been advertised:
- here in the ROOL announcements forum
- in the StarDot forum forthcoming exhibitions section
- there’s a Facebook event, which has been linked into the Acorn Enthusiasts group
- on RISCOSitory of course
- comp.sys.acorn.announce
- Twitter
- it was in the London Show guide

Plus anywhere else I can drop it into the discussion, like this ;-)

Dave:

Vince, well done! You have obvioiusly tried hard to get a good venue and I hope your efforts are rewarded with a good turnout.

I think everyone hopes that. :)

SO, EVERYONE , who is not a million miles from Bristol, TURN UP.

This ^ :)

I disagree that most of the talks are terrible.

To be fair, most was the wrong word in the way I used it – but as I said, I edited that post over a couple of evenings in a text editor on a computer not connected to the internet, while reading the discussion itself on the small screen of my phone.

Rephrasing what I said in a more logical way, hopefully, what I meant to say was that most of the talks needed editing, and some a great deal – because some really are, quite frankly terrible.

It’s possible I subconsciously phrased it as most being terrible, because most of my video editing time when dealing with the show talks is editing the terrible ones. (Think about it…)

It’s generally that those who use slides in their presentations tend towards the better examples, and those who don’t tend towards the worst. The reason is simply that if you use slides, they become an aide-memoire – so you spend less time uming and ahing about what you need to cover; as soon as you click through to the next slide with a bullet list of features for ABC, or an image of XYZ, you know that’s the next few minutes of your talk – and you know all the details (it’s your product or area) so there’s less time wasted, less of those ums and ahs, and the result is a presentation that comes over better.

(And even better still when I edit, because – as mentioned before – I ask for copies of the slides to overlay them as necessary).

Another thing which helps is something that (if memory serves) only Rob does: When an audience member asks a question, which may be a bit rambling (and often quiet on the recording) as the person formulates what they’re asking on the fly, he condenses/summaries it and then repeats it back. [Punch] That’s the way to do it. [/Punch]

In fact, with the exception of one or two talks at shows, they are very good and I include, I think, all the regulars in this.

In which case, we are probably on the same page. :)

Disregarding the general quality of the talks, I was thinking about this on my drive home from the hotel last night. Since the editing does take an awful lot of time (for the worst offenders) what I might do from now on is initially upload the ‘raw’ versions¹, then upload better, edited versions at a later date depending on when I can put in the necessary time.

¹ I’ll still have to load them into my editing software to join the files if necessary, and to add a title card to the beginning and end – but the result will be the raw footage, so people who didn’t attend can see the talks that much sooner.

Exporting the talks from the software ready for upload will actually be the long job in that (depending on the length of the talks).

However, for this weekend’s show, that’s still going to be a touch longer than ideal, because I won’t be able to even look at them on Sunday; I’m heading off to London to attend Monday evening’s ROUGOL meeting – so at best it’ll be next weekend, hopefully.

Another thing which helps is something that (if memory serves) only Rob does: When an audience member asks a question, which may be a bit rambling (and often quiet on the recording) as the person formulates what they’re asking on the fly, he condenses/summaries it and then repeats it back.

That comes partly from 4 years doing student TV where you learn the only thing a camera’s microphone picks up is the thing it’s pointing at, and partly from watching back show talks where you can play Jeopardy! to guess what the question might have been from the answer.

You can get microphones suitable for recording an audience as they use in studios to capture the laughter track, but in general most camcorders have very directional “zoom” microphones.