No cable, no presentation, just talking.
Last week I flew out to speak at a local design group. I had put together an extensive presentation, fine tuned my images, practiced running through it multiple times to get my timing down and polished several lame jokes. In other words I was loaded for bear.
Problem is I forgot to bring my mini-dv cable and the AV specialists were all PC acolytes so nothing they had would allow me to hook up my laptop to the video projector. I was dead in the water. No images, no clever dissolves or visual cues to captivate the audience while I droned on.
Panic slowly started to sink in as I thought to myself
"I am an artist with out art to show."
I decided to wing it. Slowly leaning forward towards the podiums mic I said
"Well I unfortunately don't have any visuals to show you, but if you'd like I'd be happy to do a Q&A with you."
Thankfully I had brought several freebies to give away and holding them up I continued.
"The best questions get prizes."
The facade of confidence was intact, but inside my stomach churned as I waited for the inevitable train wreck to occur.
Someone raised their hand and before I knew it the next thirty minutes flew by and it was done. Technology took a back seat and mere talking carried the day and to my surprise people actually enjoyed it.
I am a huge geek and love technology, but this situation reminded me once again that person to person conversation will always trump it. Being able to talk to another person and share stories, share struggles, share success, share failures together is what life is all about.
And the best thing about talking is you'll never have to upgrade your mouth. Something software companies could learn from.
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