I wonder if the search for an alternative to the “hallway track” could actually be fruitful.
Speaking for myself I never benefited much from the hallway track, because it relies on the type of in-person socializing skills that I’ve always struggled with. Conferences feel like a grown-up intellectual version of a junior high dance to me! A virtual forum could be a boon to people with good technical ideas but high introversion.
Of course, maybe one’s passion for research is supposed to override one’s shyness. I’m unsure which bar I personally failed to clear :-)
> A virtual forum could be a boon to people with good technical ideas but high introversion.
This sounds like IRC, or whatever the preference is these days.
As a conference organiser myself, I think it's perfectly fine for people to not enjoy the hallway track.
These people might be the ones who benefit the most from sitting in the talk room, and being exposed to the variety of ideas that a conference would hopefully offer.
I also think that it's perfectly fine to just crowd around a speaker (at least, in pre-COVID times), and just listen in on the technical conversations that other attendees are having with them.
I am part of half a dozen hallway tracks which are basically email threads (two are is a digests) each of which stretches back decades. Like the hallways you can dip in or drop out for a little while (just delete threads that don't call out to you) and fortunately all seem to have attracted new entrants over time. There's a small but significant inter-thread overlap as well.
In any conference the hallway track is the most important to me and it has happened more than once that I have failed to attend a single formal presentation yet found the conference a great success. But I have noticed that these threads are just as vital.
Of late all of them have switched to 80% covid-19 of course. Fortunately not exclusively.
At work we've taken to creating a dozen 'rooms' or 'hallways' or 'tables' to mingle with on certain days. It's expected one bounces from one conversation to the next and mingle. It's surprisingly effective!
Speaking for myself I never benefited much from the hallway track, because it relies on the type of in-person socializing skills that I’ve always struggled with. Conferences feel like a grown-up intellectual version of a junior high dance to me! A virtual forum could be a boon to people with good technical ideas but high introversion.
Of course, maybe one’s passion for research is supposed to override one’s shyness. I’m unsure which bar I personally failed to clear :-)