1) Just participated in my first online conference #SSiC2020, or rather participated in a part of it as the process can take more than a day for a one-day conference. Here comes the flood about what it made me realize once more and how it felt like:

2) Maybe for the very first time, I was able to digest the content properly, simply because I watched a recorded presentation in my own pace, stopped it and got it back and watched it again, even multiple times when needed. Also enough time to check out the slides in peace.

3) Didn't feel like I have to multitask, like listening to what presenters say, paying attention to the slides and letting myself critically engage with it all at the same time. It didn't feel as if I had being constantly chased.

4) While multitasking can be okay for a couple of presentations, having to do that during the whole day or even during multiple days is indeed frustrating! It feels so especially for me as someone who comes from a non-English speaking country...

5) And you know what, asking questions to speakers in this format is not only an unintimidating experience but also a stimulating one! Again, it's because, after watching the recorded presentation, I was offered to fill in a form with my questions/comments to be sent to speakers.

6) Enough time to articulate my thoughts and ask clear questions. No more fear of getting lost in my thoughts/sentences while racing against the time I would be given to ask a question and making a sense at the same time. Plus it felt like I really learned something bc I wrote!

7) Even though I am an early career researcher with limited amount of conference experience, I always found myself questioning the actual meaning of it. I rarely see presenters - including me- actually benefiting from those questions/comments they receive during conferences.

8) Are we supposed to participate in conferences mostly to network? Is this the tacit knowledge we are expected to figure out here? Why not demanding more? I am not saying that networking is not beneficial or that all conferences should be organized online from now on...

9) But the online experience now reveals what we lack in the conventional conference format and what can be further improved. It is not that we were not aware of this. We indeed all knew abt it. But I feel like this time it became visible in a way that is difficult to be avoided

10) Tomorrow we will meet with the speakers online to have a discussion around the comments/questions they have received from us. So I am saying that based on these new online experiences, we need to reshape our offline conference format. We need to demand more from it!