Sabrina Dent: Freelance web designer, developer and internet marketer living in Cork, Ireland with one dog and a husband in no particular order.
Win, Lose or Draw at FOWD London
One of the many reasons I have been quiet on this blog for the past few weeks is that despite having any number of things to say, whenever I sat down to blog, the only thing that wanted to come out of my mouth was variations on OH MY GOD I HAVE TO PRESENT AT FOWD PLZ KILL ME NOW.
For those of you not familar with FOWD, it is a big deal. Despite never having heard of FOWD until a few months ago, that fact that FOWD is a big deal was made crystal clear to me by 300 people all saying “Oh my God, you’re presenting at FOWD? That’s a really big deal!”
Though nervous about this gig, I was excited about my topic and happy with my presentation. I didn’t know if the audience was going to be happy with it, but I knew it was what I wanted to say.
Granted, a talk called Stalinist Web Design is never going to be the easiest sell, but I was totally prepared to win, lose or draw on my own merits. What I wasn’t prepared for was getting completely and utterly thrown by failing technology when my presentation refused to advance the split screen (Slide view for the audience, Notes view for the speaker) after the first slide.
This is, apparently, how the universe punishes web designers who refuse to use Macs.
One the plus side, the endless interval between slide one and slide two did mean I got to hear several hundred people sing Happy Birthday to me, which was deeply embarassing but also delightful.
On the minus side, it also meant that when technology was finally beaten back into submission, there were no longer any notes on my visual view. No doubt someone more polished at this than I am would have made a more graceful recovery, but at that moment in time I was so grateful that I had an old fashioned, dead tree printed copy of my notes that I might very well have cried had I not been busy trying very hard not to vomit.
And so for Episode #308 of Do As I Say, Not As I Do, I actually read my presentation directly off the 13 pieces of paper in my hand.
For those of you not familar with the cardinal rules of presenting, they are:
- Never read off your slides;
- Never read directly from your notes – use them as prompts;
- Never blow your nose whilst you are mic’d.
Luckily, I blew my nose beforehand.
Anyway, this turned out to be one of those presentations people mostly either loved or loathed. (The fact more people hated Microsoft totally doesn’t count – that’s like shooting fish in a barrel.) I like people with strong opinions, so I’m as accepting of “was arrogant” as I am happy with “was fabulous.”
Mostly, I’m glad it’s over. I’m glad Carsonified invited me, glad I turned 37 in London, glad I got to meet a ton of genuinely nice and interesting people, and glad I got to speak at FOWD.
And really glad I didn’t vomit.
01 May 2009
| In: Design + Domesticities + Events | Tags:FOWD, london, speaking
[...] Sabrina Dent is alive, nuff said, her dog lives in my kitchen now. [...]
01.05.2009, 9:12 amGlad it went well for you … well, that you didn’t vomit anyway. Are your slides / notes going to be available online at all for those of us unable to have attended? Sounds like it was an interesting presentation. Thanks!
01.05.2009, 9:36 amI had to take a call about half way through your talk but what I saw was excellent, certainly caused a bit of debate for the rest of the day. Nice work Sabrina, congratulations!
01.05.2009, 9:59 amAnd a belated Happy Birthday to you with a big hug from little Mia.
01.05.2009, 10:19 amHey Sabrina!
You talk was fantastic – its nice to hear your not the only one working in a certain way some times. Its also nice to put a name to the way i work! ;)
Really enjoyed it and hope you had a wick birthday!
01.05.2009, 10:49 amseems to me that you played a blinder.
01.05.2009, 11:58 am[...] Future of Web Design is currently on in London & the very talented Sabrina Dent was up yesterday giving her talk ‘Throwing Client Collaboration Out the Window: The Stalinist Web Design Model’. She’s back blogging again which is awesome & has a post up about her FOWD experience. [...]
01.05.2009, 12:20 pmCongratulations on the presentation and the birthday. :)
01.05.2009, 12:47 pmHi Sabrina,
Are the slides online?
Walter
01.05.2009, 1:52 pmWell done. Get up, shit you pants, and do it anyway.
I did my first public presentation when I was 23 at a conference in York. I stood up, opened my mouth to speak and nothing came out except a high pitched squeak of pure unadulterated manfear.
I had to stop, open the button of my shirt and get a glass of water. Once I started I finished the whole 20 minutes presentation in exactly 8 minutes.
Thank be to jaysus, they asked questions!
So well done you!
01.05.2009, 2:31 pmHey guys, thanks a lot. I cam off stage feeling not so great about it but the nice comments both on the day and online really help.
Walter, I could put the slides up but they’d be kind of useless since vis Rule #1 I never read off the slides – the real content is in the notes. I will PDF up the whole thing and post it when I’m back in the People’s Republic. But you already know all about Stalinist Web Design, because that’s what you got with Twitter Mosaic. You’re also the only client who has EVER tipped me (whch was so cool I called my mom to tell her), so I like to think we were both really happy with the outcome of this approach.
heheh. I was just asking John on saturday when you would grace us with your presence on twitter again. soon I hope.
01.05.2009, 3:11 pmHate that. Slide Failure I mean. Absolutely, absolutely always have a printed out version. Always, always have 1 card with 5 points on it (for five minutes) etc. etc. so you can talk around bullet points. FOWA? FO-YA !:)
01.05.2009, 9:27 pmHi Sabrina
Will you be sharing the presentation (or speech notes) online for us antipodeans?
The concept is intriging.
02.05.2009, 12:01 pmPhew! Glad you back, was about to draft up a blog post “I think I broke Sabrina Dent”.
03.05.2009, 5:47 pm[...] An obvious no, no when presenting. I did think it was odd at the time, but it turned out to be due to a tech fail. I guess we shouldn’t be so quick to [...]
04.05.2009, 11:05 amHi Sabrina,
05.05.2009, 11:25 amI was one of the FOWD attendees and I loved your presentation. The only thing that bothered me was the fact that you read from your paper notes, but I understand that now. I liked that it was very outspoken and you had a clear message. Even if one doesn’t agree with you, at least you made a point (not every speaker did, I felt).
So, I hope you’ll be speaking more often at conferences! I’m sure next time it’ll be easier :-)
Sounds like you had a good time, lousy presentations not withstanding.
12.05.2009, 7:52 amLooking forward to seeing the video on the FOWD site :) Put it all down to experience… and get a mac! :D
14.05.2009, 8:10 pmI enjoyed your talk Sabrina – well done for daring to step up on stage.
Thought you might get some comfort from reading about Danah’s nightmare experience at Web2.0 recently – at least you didn’t have a live twitter wall to contend with….
25.11.2009, 12:23 amHi Gradualist –
Funny you should mention that. I was just reading Danah’s post and discussing it with a friend on Twitter. It rang a lot of bells for me, and while the Twitter backlash at FOWD was nothing like that, the small amount there was wasn’t pleasant.
One thing I never mentioned because it seemed so stupid at the time was that I literally could not see over the podium. (People think I’m taller than I am, but I’m 5’2″ – short.) There’s a photo somewhere of me on stage, and you can barely see the top of my head!
That meant that, like Danah, I could not stand there and glance down over my propped-up notes at the audience; I had to stand NEXT TO THE FUCKING THING with paper in my hand. The whole thing just felt really awkward and painful and mostly, I was glad when it was over.
And kudos to Danah – it took me more than a week to get over it! But like I said in a recent interview – it’s good to fall on your ass sometimes. I keep my FOWD pass next to my awards for a very good reason.