Zoom Events Will Try To Re-create the In-person Conference Experience

Zoom is announcing an expanded live events product today that's launching this summer. From a report: Zoom Events builds on Zoom's previous paid event marketplace, OnZoom, by layering in features that can support larger multiday events and non-video activities like chat. Zoom says it's still building out Zoom Events in the lead up to its launch, but as it stands, it's both a rebranding of the more small-business focused OnZoom, with new features that serve Zoom's original pre-pandemic customers -- enterprise companies. Like OnZoom, with a paid Zoom Meetings or Zoom Webinar license you'll be able to host live events, organize them in a hub, sell tickets, and track stats like ticket sales or attendance.

Good thinking

[gosso920]

It will prevent future Jeffrey Toobin-esque "waxing the surfboard" incidents.

Donuts

[ylleKnaD]

If they really want the in person experience, they need to add a link to have donuts delivered to everyone in the meeting.

Re:

[GoTeam]

They also need to simulate the "getting drunk and making very poor hookup decisions" experience. They're also missing the "crap, that idiot is walking my way so I need to pretend I didn't see them and duck out into a random hallway" experience. Honestly, now that I think about it, my experiences might be abnormal.

Done with Zoom

[alaskana98]

Zoom knows it's Pandemic-days gravy train is about to go off the rails and is trying to cement itself as relevant in a post-pandemic world. Nice try, but no 'Zoom session' will ever replace the in-person experience. And good riddance, I'll be happy to toss Zoom on the burn pile along with my stash of masks (almost done with my 2 part vaccination).

Re:

[Applehu Akbar]

Virtualization in business is a ratchet, nt a racket. Because Zooming saves money over physical presence, companies everywhere are thinking of ways to virtualize interactions that were once physical. This will result in a lot less corporate travel. Airlines will be forced to be nice to plebeians for a change, rather than catering to a fixed market of business travelers.

Re:

[shaitand]

Not I. The office was pointless before the pandemic and was proven pointless by the pandemic. Personal interaction is different of course.

But Zoom was a known national security risk with data proven to be sent overseas. Especially during the pandemic with everyone sharing trade secrets through remote communication I'd hope nobody used that garbage!

Stop peddling Zoom.

[BAReFO0t]

Nobody cares.

It is malware for the mentally less fortunate. The recent equivalent of AOL, but with all the amenities of a modern Silicon Valley startup insecure spaghetti code project.

Re: Stop peddling Zoom.

[Baloo Uriza]

Thank you. I really have been enjoying a lack of physical meetings for business. The last thing the world needs is going onsite someplace when technology enables us to not have to do that.

No

[l33t j03]

Not possible.

The only reason anyone goes to a conference at all is for the party. Yeah there is some guy from somewhere taking about something, and sure we all pretend to be interested, but that is just because we know there are eyes on us and we have to go through the formality of the conference for the IRS to allow this as T&E.
But all we are all doing is waiting for it onto end so we can spend $400 on sushi and sake and then 10 times that on drinks, because we need to unwind from the pressure of

Re-create the In-person Conference Experience

[Oligonicella]

So Zoom's working on a holodeck?

Re:

[Ostracus]

I want the Moriarty version.

unnecessary

[systemd-anonymousd]

In-person conference experiences can already be had in VRChat, as long as you're okay with 66% of your coworkers being eboys or egirls, 33% being furries, and 33% being walking memes

If I never go to another trade show...

[Only a-z A-Z or Spac]

it will be too soon. Everything about it is misery. You're presenting: Enjoy your extortionate floor space cost, your insane booth manufacturing costs, the (probably much worse now) huge expense of shipping the display, pay for Drayage, pay for carting, pay for carpet, the crazy cost of union labor to install the booth, the $150 an outlet to get 110V plugged in, the $4000 to have 25Mbps of bandwidth that will ABSOLUTELY fail when you have the one customer you were really waiting for in the booth, the fact

Re-create the in-person conference experience ?

[takionya]

Do they mean, like in real life meetings, where your input is ignored and the CEO goes for whatever fad he last read in some technical mag. We need more devops and agile in the cloud .. bla bla bla. Move all our IT infrastructure to the cloud by Monday, Tuesday at the latest.

Is there an open bar?

[sabbede]

Because that's the first, and perhaps only, question to be asked when invited to a conference.

Will there be cocktail waitresses to sloppily hit on? How does one engage in an ill-advised hotel dalliance with a co-worker over zoom?