tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9818962.post7627448847227800154..comments2024-03-20T13:10:11.477+05:30Comments on nanopolitan: Bubbly, bubbly bubbles in scienceAbihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06790560045313883673noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9818962.post-12890494309569640142007-04-07T11:27:00.000+05:302007-04-07T11:27:00.000+05:30TGIF: Character-building experience, it certainly ...TGIF: Character-building experience, it certainly was!<BR/><BR/>Niket: <I>You are talking about something different than the "herd mentality" that Ponderer refers.</I><BR/><BR/>Mmmm, I don't think so. Here's the point (which was implicit in the post):<BR/><BR/>The 'herd' attended the talk just before mine, and (in a mercenary fashion) went on to the next one in a different session and hall. Reason? Those talks were all in a 'hot' subfield of that era ('intermetallics'). <BR/><BR/>I agree with your other points about large conferences with multiple parallel sessions. I too prefer smaller, focused conferences. <BR/><BR/>BTW, do Gordon Conferences have parallel sessions? I don't think so, but I haven't been to one myself.Abihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06790560045313883673noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9818962.post-7455436761287707802007-04-06T22:56:00.000+05:302007-04-06T22:56:00.000+05:30You are talking about something different than the...You are talking about something different than the "herd mentality" that Ponderer refers.<BR/><BR/>The big umbrella meetings are not organized well, have several sessions of ones interest going on simultaneously and have typically higher acceptance rates that allows a dreadfully incomplete work to follow some really insightful or interesting talk. As a result, people often go to talks based on who the speaker is. A talk of mine at AIChE (aiche.org/annual) was extremely well attended. Later on I discovered that my advisor was denoted as the speaker in the sessions info.<BR/><BR/>I had the pleasure of attending Combustion Institute symposium recently. It is also a large-ish symposium, but significantly well organized and with a low acceptance rate. You had a 25-minute slot, with 5 minutes for questions, 1 minute for change-over; the session chairs were very particular of sticking to the schedule. All sessions that I went to were well attended. Due to the well-planned scheduling, people entered or left during that one minute change-over. While some sessions were more popular than others (session-to-session variations could be significant), I saw less than 15% of people leaving or entering at the end of a presentation... most talks in a session had more-or-less equal attendence.<BR/><BR/>I've heard that Gordon conferences tend to be similar... even more so. Never attended one.Nikethttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14882163077938014472noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9818962.post-86652588540936659512007-04-06T21:01:00.000+05:302007-04-06T21:01:00.000+05:30awww!!that is something about these big "mela" lik...awww!!<BR/>that is something about these big "mela" like meetings, i think.<BR/>well- i guess you can chalk it down to another character building experience. :pAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com