Most conferences are not optimised for audience engagement

TEDSF

2 years ago / 633 Views

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Have you ever been to a conference and felt it was a waste of time because the keynote speaker and/or panelists did not do justice to the subject at hand?

How many times have people in the audience at a conference been better off discussing the issues by themselves instead of listening to som “authority” on the subject?

We need to leverage the willingness of people to share knowledge and technology to make sure that we move away from the traditional confeence configurations that were fashioned after the 1st Industrial Revolution information production, consumption and distribution model.

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Back in the days, there existed gurus who were the sole custodians of knowledge and people gathered around them to absorb wisdom that they dissipated.  This was a result of scarcity of information and the difficulty associted with all aspects in the information lifecycle.

Today, we live in a networked society where that model has been destroyed because information onnaything and everything is freely available in our pockets. No one can claim to have exclusive access to information anymore. We now live in a world where it is easy to produce, consume and distribute information.

So why are conferences still not fully engaging all participants? Should we be listening to boring keynote speeches when we are not gainng anything in terms of learning?

4IR is not about technology, it is a way of life, a way seeing the world that was not possible before but as a direct consequence of the technological advancement has come to be.

When thinking of disruption, question things and you will see that a lot of things we do on auto-pilot are not necessary.

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Edzai Conilias Zvobwo is passionate about empowering Africans through mathematics, problem-solving techniques and media. As such, he founded MathsGee. Through this organisation, he has helped create an ecosystem for disseminating information, training, and supporting STEM education to all African people. A maths evangelist who teaches mathematical thinking as a life skill, Edzai’s quest has seen him being named the SABC Ambassador for STEM; he has been invited to address Fortune 500 C-suite executives at the Mobile 360 North America; was nominated to represent Southern Africa at the inaugural United Nations Youth Skills Day in New York; was invited to be a contributor to the World Bank Group Youth Summit in 2016; has won the 2014 SADC Protocol on Gender and Development award for his contribution to women’s empowerment in education; and has partnered with local and global firms in STEM interventions.