The 15th anniversary Talkaoke party was a great milestone. It was the first time two Talkaoke sessions were performed in the same space and, actually it worked rather well. There were faces there from the last 15 years; recent members, but also people who were there at the very first Talkaoke event. And there were many from all that time in between. Looking back, I have learnt from every single event we have done, that’s a lot of learning. If you want to look through material, 274 events are on archive.org and we are adding more from the archive as well as new events every week.

Because every Talkaoke event is different, depending on the collected personalities, mood and theme, there is scope for much more. This year sees a massive growth internationally for us. There are nascent Talkaoke projects in Holland, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Brazil, and across the Arab world. My job has become much about distilling the learning of how to get the most out of the Talkaoke set up, rather than hosting Talkaoke myself.

That leaves me able to sit around the table and really enjoy the event, hearing what other people have got to say and ranting on myself a bit too much. It is good training for the next generation of Talkaoke hosts to pull the mic away from a loudmouth like myself, and let someone who is quieter and more considered have their say!

Mikey

Swivelly chairman.

Here’s a short post about one of our tools for participation and conversation: the Heckle System from Saul, The People Speak’s researcher in residence.

Heckle is the tool we use to create instant, shareable visualisations of conversations as they happen – you might have seen it in use if you’ve ever been to a Talkaoke, or watched how people at our events post up images, videos and tweets to the video stream of what’s happening.

 

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Romance isn’t dead. It remains under continuous threat, as necessary as it is to the human essence, but ‘the table of chat’ gives you one more reason to believe.