Climate Impact—Attendance at in-person conferences comes with a substantial carbon footprint. Consider the impact of air travel, as well as the manufacture and distribution of single-use items, such as lanyards, booklets and advertisements.1 Life cycle assessment studies suggest a hybrid design can cut a conference’s carbon footprint by up to two-thirds. A recently published comment on the need to reconsider hybrid conferences in light of these environmental costs delves into the issue further.2
Challenges & Potential Solutions
Posters: The poster hall is the hub of the in-person conference. It provides an important networking opportunity and platform to share research, particularly for junior investigators and trainees.
Challenges—Virtual poster halls have proved less successful, with many poster presenters receiving minimal, if any, feedback on their work. With virtual-only poster halls, poster presenters become more reliant on social media advertisement of their work, but many still feel uncertain whether their work has been viewed at all. This limits the power of a virtual poster hall.
Solutions—A browsable central virtual repository for all posters, whether presented virtually or in-person, would allow all attendees the ability to browse posters at their convenience and to network, either by speaking directly with presenters or by leaving comments online. The benefit of maintaining the virtual repository, in addition to the in-person poster hall, is that it allows for increased engagement. Poster tours can be reimagined for the hybrid space, with posters presented as lightning talks for in-person attendees and livestreamed for the virtual audience. In-person attendees, particularly junior faculty and trainees, gain the benefits of in-person networking while virtual attendees are not excluded.
Maintaining virtual access: Virtual access is essential for those who cannot travel. Both livestreaming and on-demand access are important; livestreaming is crucial for engagement with presenters and on social media, while on-demand access facilitates learning when scheduling conflicts make real-time attendance impossible.
Challenges—Both livestreaming and on-demand content require sophisticated, expensive audio-visual capabilities and expertise. Each type of session—livestream vs. on demand vs. in person—requires different involvement from presenters, moderators and participants. Conference organizers may find it difficult to avoid scheduling conflicts between fully virtual sessions and sessions with an in-person component.
Solutions—While this may be expensive, livestreaming is important to create engagement between the presenters and the audience, as well as on social media. Additionally, when registration costs are high, livestreaming is often expected. Clear communication to both presenters and participants prior to conference registration of what material will be livestreamed vs. on demand vs. both is essential. Session moderators need to know whether their sessions will be livestreamed and what responsibilities that entails—most importantly, monitoring an online question-and-answer session to allow full participation for virtual attendees. On-demand access facilitates learning when scheduling conflicts make real-time attendance impossible. Finally, virtual-only sessions are incredibly difficult for in-person attendees, who may struggle to find a quiet place with a stable internet connection to attend virtual sessions that conflict with in-person obligations. Such sessions should be avoided at hybrid meetings or held at a time when they don’t conflict with in-person or hybrid activities.
