when things go wrong...or at least don't quite work as expected

sitting in the final keynote, it's fairly obvious that the people who like talking about mobile technologies really don't have the faintest idea about using mobiles *or* technologies. the presenter's powerpoint keeps cutting out (something to do with the non-uk plug, possibly - cue lots of predictable jokes about mobility causing problems, and lots of smug laughter) which is, you know, not his fault. but the really annoying thing is that probably 90% of the audience either can't or won't turn their phones, pdas, laptops, etc, to silent. which makes me want to shout "it's 2008! no-one is impressed that you've got a mobile!" - and various other things with more swear words involved.



so, here's a quick reflection on some of the mobile elements of the conference that haven't quite worked:

• we were invited to text in questions for keynote speakers, so that they could answer them in part of the Q&A session. great idea! except that for whatever reason, the texted question in diana laurillard's keynote was received on a laptop at the back of the room, which the session chair walked to the back of the room to pick up, brought it back to the front of the room, read out the question, and then returned the laptop to the back of the room. hello? a little too much personal mobility going on there. (oh, and by the by, she declined to answer the question anyway, because she didn't understand it.)


• the wireless access in the conference venue. where to start? while i have some sympathy with the organisers (they found out that the hotel wanted to charge £29k for wireless access for all delegates, so ordered broadband modems for everyone which didn't turn up in time despite being promised) why would you plan a conference about mobility and connectivity in a venue without guaranteed access? it just seems odd.


• the layout of the rooms is awful - the chairs are packed so close together that there's barely room to write notes, let alone type them.


• they gave us these little tracking devices, the idea being that they could monitor which sessions each person had been in and store the papers from these sessions in individual blogs so that you could access them after the event. again, great idea (if a little scary) - but on the first day, the system wasn't working properly because someone had unplugged the receiver while hunting for internet access (or something like that). i guess it's an experimental approach, and i'm probably expecting too much - and if the other bits of the conference had worked smoothly, it probably wouldn't matter too much. but add it all together and...

i think the strangest thing is that despite the fact that we've been given the proceedings on cd, they've also gone to the expense of producing printed conference proceedings for everyone. and it's a huge breeze block of a book, which i probably won't bring back with me because it won't fit in my case, and i don't fancy breaking my back for something that i'll glance through for maybe an hour or so. i know some people like their printed proceedings, and it gives them their isbn publication - but why not give people the choice about receiving them? save paper, save money...

hmmm, that all sounds very grumpy. so let me try to balance it by saying that on reflection i have got quite a lot out of the conference (contacts, links and ideas that i probably wouldn't have got around to finding during 'normal' work time; and it's made me sit back and really think about what mobile learning means for me, and more importantly what it isn't). there were some excellent sessions (eg, the V&A museum session was ace, really interesting; the MiLK project session was also really good; marc prensky's keynote was good, and mark kramer's session late yesterday was very thought provoking). but as someone else said, you really would like to know what was in the organisers' minds at some points during the planning and selection process.

i will make a slightly more upbeat post later, honest, but my wireless access is about to run out. so in the meantime, i'll leave you with 2 images that represent the new and the old elements of the conference. firstly, the scary tracking device - nice idea, but clearly needs some more work:

and finally, an image of something that always cheers me up in hotels - no matter how dingy and uninspiring the venue, you can't help but feel reassured at the presence of a corby trouser press, surely one of the most unused but nonetheless entertaining aspects of hotel life: