What's new in 2009 (less of)

If you come to Lift since 2006 you know that the conference evolves a lot every year. We read the feedback we get through the post-conference surveys, mix that with our pretty fertile imagination, and then take another step forward in our endless quest for a great event. That is how we went from 2 to 3 days, how the open program came to life, how we merged the separate fondues into one giant event, etc etc. So what is new in 2009? To follow up on the survey this post follows the "less of"/"more of" format OwlRe used in their report.

Part one was about what the community wanted to see more. Today it is time to talk about what you want to see less:

• Less powerpoint. Everybody wants less powerpoint, and we are working harder than ever with our speakers on the delivery of their ideas. Powerpoint is cool when you have a Jan Chipchase coming up with superb pictures (video), but can be an issue when each slide contains size 8 text. We have reduced the number of speakers (from 45 at Lift07 to 20 at Lift09) to have more time to prepare a good speech.

• Less pitches. "Some 25% of the comments focused on the issue of speakers promoting their own product and services and not providing any intellectual stimulation for attendees". Hum... We should have refined the survey question and asked "when did you see a pitch?" We sign a moral contract with our speakers that they will not pitch their products and have to share their ideas, and I think we have done a great job at Lift08. Sometimes a few talks get a bit borderline but I haven't seen anything brutally commercial at Lift in a long time (feel free to comment below if you have!), at least in the official program. This year I will repeat the speakers rules at the beginning of the conference, and I hope we will have even more members expressing their votes in the open program to filter out irrelevant content. Remember that if there is something you don't want to see in the open stage or in the workshops, vote for the rest! The rule is that the team does not control that part, so we need your help here!

• Less presentations that are too self-reflective, esoteric, lacking conclusions or key points, unclear, lacking analysis or too "geeky". I think Lift has evolved a lot since 2006 and we are heading precisely in that direction. In 2006 we were considered a bloggers' conference because we talked a lot about social media. That year the arrival or citizens/users/consumers in the social processes was the most important change happening. But we talked about these because we were interested in the bigger picture - how technology affects society - and since the identity of the conference is showing up more, with themes like change, foresight, solidarity, love, etc. We are now working to achieve a balance between being too technical and being too general. And again the fact that we have radically reduced the number of speakers will show you that we want to do a better job at avoiding empty presentations, and speakers reading their talks.