[oclug] audience behaviour

[Brenda J. Butler]

On Wed, Sep 07, 2005 at 11:46:14AM -0600, Matthew Wilcox wrote:
> 
> audience.  My introductory talk on Unix files will be my last presentation
> to OCLUG precisely because of this.

> In your list of things OCLUG members do with their questions, you missed
> out the guy (perhaps he wasn't there last night) that interrupts to say
> "When I was using a SunOS 3 machine in 1986 ...".
> 
> I've done everything but officially notify the secretary that I've left
> OCLUG.  I've unsubscribed from the lists, left the IRC channel, don't
> intend to attend any more physical meetings and only found out about this
> particular thread because a friend told me about it.
> 
> Basically, OCLUG sucks.  I've found better things to do with my time.

It's a shame that you, a former talk-while-presenter-is-presenting
and trivia-dragger-upper, must make a big deal of OCLUG members'
"bad behaviour" by making a grand exit like this instead of
trying to improve things from the inside.

Please come back.  When you do, please don't talk during
presentations or bring up trivia during the talk (after the
talk at the pub is fair game for this sort of stuff).

Advice to those of you who want to take it:  don't sit with
your friends at the presentation.  It makes it easier to
avoid talking during the presentation.

When someone talks to you during the presentation, don't answer.
Look pointedly at the presenter, and lean forward to hear the
presenter more and the friend less.


By the way, OCLUG is not the only place with rude disrespectful
audience members.  There are lots of other occasions where
the other audience members take down the experience of the occasion
by a notch - or several.  For instance, I went to a course recital
for a friend in the music department at university.  A bunch of
parents were there, and they talked all while their kid was
not performing, only to stop when their own kid was on stage.

So, the OCLUG situation is not pleasant, but it's hardly the
cesspool of inconsiderate behaviour that some people make it out
to be.  Generally, the talks are worthwhile, even if they
do go on a tangent due to audience over-participation sometimes.
(How to do soemthing-or-other in Windows at a LUG?  Please!)

cheerio,
bjb