Here are some of the things I experienced during my last webinar on “Integrating Zimbra into Your Campus". There are advantages, and disadvantages in using webinars to keep up to date. And if you’re using a laptop to view it – then you’ve just hit the jackpot!
- You can have a meal and eat it without having to rush things
- You can even do the dishes and even clean up afterwards
- You can take a dump, and still follow the webinar (lifesaver!)
- You don’t have to stay focused all the time – you can do what you like in the meantime
- You can always shut it off (or silence it), if it’s not interesting
- No need to drive 50+km to get to a location, to listen to someone who might not even be worth listening to
- You can do drink/eat/burp all you like
There are some (small) disadvantages too, such as:
- Internet connectivity is required (fingers crossed your ISP doesn’t blow it that evening (mine recovered 5 minutes prior to starting))
- There’s the odd latency/jitter issue, causing the audio/video to shock
- You can’t see who you’re talking to (though, not necessarily a disadvantage ;-) )
- No free sandwiches/gadgets
- You don’t meet any new people in real life (so much for networking)
Despite those things, I’m still glad I can just go home after a hard days’ work, put myself in the sofa with my headphones and just listen to some guy speak thousands of miles away. Something I probably wouldn’t have done if I had to visit the guy personally.