ALA Anaheim: Rather Short

Among the minor distinctions of Dan Rather's talk was its brevity when compared with other speakers. Allotted an hour, after 45 minutes he was done with his prepared remarks as well as those shied at him during the q and a, when he left the stage for the ordeal of facing fans lined-up for his book-signing. As an audience member I felt as though I had paid for a pound of butter but got three-quarters instead. Since he didn't talk any faster than other speakers, his words had a higher unit price without being better.

ALA Anaheim: Where's Anaheim?

“The city of Anaheim is easily accessible, within 5-10 minutes of the convention center”--American Libraries (May/June 2012, p. 76)

An innocent statement? Hah!

The convention center is in Anaheim, so accessibility is not an issue.

Just to walk a few blocks from the center absorbs more than 10 minutes.

There are parts of the city of Anaheim that are not easily accessible, whatever the transportation.

If "the city of Anaheim" is its downtown, to reach it by car in 10 minutes would require breaking speed limits and running traffic lights.

ALA Anaheim: Say It with Flowers

    It is almost de rigueur for any conference speaker to devote a few words acknowledging their audience of librarians. The words are neither unflattering nor insincere.  To speak of librarians is equivalent to judging the merits of mom and apple pie. As much media makes plain, the public has a consensus of good will toward them. 
     However librarians might enjoy the plaudits they receive from celebrity speakers, when it comes to considering their own, the view is far from appreciative. Think of the Far Side cartoon where one part of a panel shows flowers and has the caption "How we see flowers"; and the other shows these flowers with grotesque physiognomies, the caption being "how flowers see themselves".

ALA Anaheim: Don't Go Away

After librarians have made the effort to travel hundreds or thousands of miles to reach the conference, one of their ambitions seems then to be to put in an equal effort to depart the same in order to see the nearby sights. This temptation is recognized and formalized by tours offered through the convention center. Nevertheless, odds are that once the librarian decides she has to get away, and spends hours deliberating which tour is most appealing, she will find that it has been canceled. Tour offerings are as substantial as mirages.
  
If it's going to be canceled anyway, a tour should be offered to really off-beat locales--say Barsoom or Oz or Arkham. Nothing compares with being able to boast of the places you would have gone to, if only there'd been a tour.

ALA Anaheim: Now Hear This

An audience is split into two types of people--those who microphone and those who don’t. Those who don't have as much to say as those who do; while those who do have as little to say as those who don't. Phenomenally, the better a speaker is known, the longer the microphone queue and (sometimes) the longer the questions or comments.

The microphone stand comes in all heights--except that of the questioner. Some questioners provide autobiographies (some are so long that you wonder who the featured speaker is) while others have decided that they are in a debate and are taking the opposing side.

ALA Anaheim: The Late Show

Some speakers deliberately (it seems) begin a program late out of fear it will otherwise run short and as a result they'll be implicitly accused by an audience that it's not getting its money’s worth. Talking to the end also suggests that the speaker had so much more to say but ran out of time. Such a talk has one of two effects on the audience. People observe either, "The subject was getting warmed up, and the speaker just couldn't cram everything in"; or, "At long last that's over."

ALA Anaheim: Exit Strategy

At every session an observer will find that the most coveted place to sit is at the end of a row. It's a position of least effort, though it is hardly a formidable inconvenience to slide to the middle. Body bulk in itself doesn't explain it, for many practitioners were not waist-challenged. Presumably the sitter wants an unimpeded exit strategy should she wish to depart early. Among the reasons for this: the subject or speaker isn't what she hoped, a prior engagement, fatigue, unfathomable eccentricity.

Being at the end corks up the row. People who come in later will have to brush past the end-sitter to get to a seat. It's a dissuader and mild hindrance to those who might otherwise choose that row. On the other hand, some of these later comers might be the ones who'd have wanted to preempt that end seat.