"C'est là que vous verrez le blé séparé de l'ivraie"

Les formats virtuels offrent une grande liberté. Il est possible d'organiser de grandes conférences avec des ateliers séparés sans aucune restriction spatiale, et d'augmenter considérablement le nombre de participants. Lors des événements Bitkom, nous avons parfois eu cinq fois plus de participants qu'avant la pandémie.

It’s important to be very clear on this: the social interaction component must not be underestimated. Good in-person events always manage to engage their audiences, especially during breaks and with targeted networking formats. Chance meetings and face-to-face conversations often deliver the best results. And that’s hard to replicate in a virtual environment. We’ve had this experience ourselves, despite trying out a lot of different things and always exploring new approaches. Each event has its own goal and some goals can be achieved perfectly well in a digital format, while others cannot.

High-quality, effective in-person formats and events that thrive on being noisy and crowded will continue to exist. And that’s where everyone will want to be as soon as the pandemic situation allows it. I think the bulk of digital formats will cease to exist once the coronavirus pandemic comes to an end. There will probably be a solid lineup of virtual events that people are happy to tune in to; ones that are really well done and ones that bring the benefits of digital formats to bear on their target audience. Virtual bars with music or avatars moving through a virtual event will no longer be a novelty at some point. There are many benefits to virtual events, but if we don’t enhance them with interaction and networking, they will soon cease to exist. On the other hand, mediocre in-person events with mediocre lectures will have to evolve massively; no one will fly around for hours to attend those anymore. Many events will either evolve or disappear over the next two to four years. That’s where you’ll see the wheat separated from the chaff.