Fig.1

In(ternet)ception

As the first group to get the ball rolling, I think we set the bar for others to follow. We had cupcakes (fig.2) for guests, we had the twitter live feed/stream in the background as the guests were talking, two photographers to go around the scene and two more camera people on the NX70s. It felt like a professional event without suits. But all the other formalities are there.

Fig.2

As all that was happening, I was at the front row listening as I was tweeting using the RMIT Adventure account to get some on the board for the whole seminar to see. There was even someone asking where they cupcakes were in the room, so i snapped a photo and tweeted her back. I wasn’t the only one in the group to get the fire started, some of us tweeted more but only one showed up or some came around once while others repeat. Technical issues that couldn’t have been resolved by us (nor did we see it coming) as the twitter live feed was a webpage and not an application.
Luckily there were participants who did Log in to their accounts to tweet and hashtag #Socialseminar. We had prizes for the best tweet, it was a shirt and a hoodie that one of the guest speakers brought in with us. All the proceeds go to helping homeless people. A good enough incentive.

At this point, Me and some other members were more focused on the performance of the seminar rather than the content. We were worried about the flow of things beside the conversation. Little did we know, Matt Group member) Had been constantly texting Ned (MC, Group member) to remind him of what should be asked next. How to keep him on track and fill in any gaps necessary. It was slightly unconventional to be having one’s phone whilst talking on stage with guests. Although, it could be argued that this is the 21st century. Instead of having cue cards or prompters we have a small handheld device to remind us of the structure of the show. They both took charge on the content along with Rebecca (Group member).

What the guests had to say about their line of work and how it relates to social media were occasionally dry and unrelateable. The purpose of this seminar is to show uni students that there are various ways to use social media to create an image of a company or yourself. There were just some instances where the connection to social media was very little and it felt irrelevant. But that was something no one could have foreseen, maybe the speakers were scrambling for answers so they just keep talking to keep the flow of conversation smooth and uninterrupted.