It's no surprise that we're seeing cases studies coming out of the recent SXSW interactive conference of what to do--and what not to do--when trying to mesh old-school speaking standards with the new Twitter backchannel. Earlier this week, I offered you some lessons from the Twitter CEO's unsuccessful SXSW keynote : Let the audience express itself early, don't sit to be sure you project energy, be interactive with the audience when you represent an interactive technology and plan, plan, plan your content. Today, New York University professor Jay Rosen--who refers to "the people formerly known as the audience" as a signal of audience power--weighs in with a positive case study, How the Backchannel Has Changed the Game for Conference Panelists. If you are organizing, speaking at or just attending a conference, meeting or workshop, I think it's a must-read because it is: A positive and achievable primer on how to put together a panel discussion that A vision of how to merge the audience's needs and those of the speakers , mixing advance information and promotion with in-person followup

Time and again, when I ask my readers what they fear most, several mention the fear that, despite their best effort, their speech will fall flat, get no reaction or a bad reaction--that there will be a mismatch between what they see and what the audience sees. It's poignant here, because so many thousands of people looked forward to this keynote as a highlight of the interactive conference--even Gray's piece is titled, "The SXSW Keynote With Ev Williams You Had Hoped to See." His long wishlist for the talk indicates that would-be attendees came there--as most audiences do--with many

I once attended a political forum that gave "pointed" a whole new meaning, when an audience member asked how much time the candidates would spend on their elected role. Speakers need to be wary of pointing (especially when you want the audience to vote for you). In many cultures, it's highly offensive--even a foot pointing at an audience can be insulting to some. One candidate looked at the front row where the other candidate's family--including newborn twins--was seated. Pointing at them, she snapped, "I don't see how my opponent can say he'll work full time when he has