[group-organizers] Lightning talks?

[Doug Hellmann]

> On Sep 2, 2015, at 8:50 AM, Ned Batchelder <ned at nedbatchelder.com> wrote:
> 
> On 9/2/15 12:17 AM, Dan Stromberg wrote:
>> Hi folks.
>> 
>> What are people's experiences with doing lightning talks at a meetup?
>> 
>> I guess the thing that concerns me the most is setting up a half dozen
>> laptops on a projector they've never been hooked up to before.
>> 
>> Do people do a "designated laptop" for the talks, and ask presenters to
>> bring their slides on a USB flash drive?
>> 
>> Also, what's a good duration?  Maybe targeting 5-10 minutes?
>> 
>> Thanks.;
>> 
> 
> For a local user group, I don't find much need to be strict about time.  About using a shared laptop, there's a trade-off: I'm surprised at how many people are completely baffled by using a machine with a different operating system than they are used to. Sometimes it's just better to spend the 30 seconds up front to let them use their own machine, and then they can present smoothly from a laptop they are used to.

Yes, the only time I encourage the use of a shared laptop is if the presenter can’t make their system work with the projector. That’s unusual, but it does come up from time to time.

> 
> Also, as someone else mentioned, the laptop-switch time can be used for Q+A by the previous speaker.

In Atlanta, we use the time to let the wait-staff offer a round of refills. :-)

Doug