If you have been reading this newsletter in the past few days, you already know that I am attending the Australasian Federation of Family History Societies Congress on Genealogy and Heraldry being held in Auckland, New Zealand. The Congress continued today with four to five simultaneous tracks of presentations most all day. One thing caught my eye today as a technological marvel and greatly impressed me. I would suggest that future conference organizers worldwide should consider doing the same on occasion. This could enable more content and better speakers at a reduced cost.
Elaine Collins is the Commercial Director of findmypast.com (formerly 1837 Online). She was scheduled to provide a plenary address at this Auckland, New Zealand, event this morning at 8.30am entitled, "For your eyes only: A preview of the 1911 census for England & Wales.” Because of the business demands of releasing the new online offering last week, Elaine could not get away as planned. In short, Elaine was a "no show" lecturer. She remained in England to take care of business. However, she and the conference organizers solved the problem with a bit of technology that impressed the conference attendees. She attended "virtually" and gave a great presentation to a large audience that filled the gynasium at Kings College in Auckland.
Elaine Collins remained in England but attended the New Zealand event by teleconference. Her live image appeared on a large projection screen in the hall, and her voice emanated from a connection to the public address system. In short, the audience had a better view of her on the large screen than they would have had if she had been there in person, standing behind a lectern. At appropriate times, the live image of her face was replaced by video from a computer accessing the 1911 census of England & Wales. Even though Elaine was on the opposite side of the world in England, she was able to deliver a first-class demonstration of the new service to an audience of several hundred people in New Zealand. The audience were able to ask her questions live just as though she was here.
It was a bit eerie to sit in the audience and watch a presentation being delivered by someone who was about 12,000 miles away, but also great fun. The teleconference solution was an excellent use of technology to simultaneously solve the problems of a presenter's busy schedule and to deliver the very latest possible information to an assembled audience on the other side of the world.
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