New Meeting Features On the Horizon - Mobile Device Users, These Are For You!

As a meeting attendee in the 21st century, I'm sure you manage much of your life on the mobile device of your choice (PDA, Blackberry, iPhone, Android, iPad, Kindle, Nook ... the list goes on and on). Wouldn't it be convenient if the next meeting you attendee could accommodate some of these mobile features that you use daily and love?

Just think, at your next meeting you may be able to:

• Search a general meeting program on your mobile device vs. on a bulky paper program
• Manage your personal meeting itinerary when you want to and where you want to
• Search and access full abstract text
• Watch captured presentation audio, video and poster presentations
• Locate what presentations are near you in the next X hours
• Find other presentations by the same author
• Interact socially with fellow attendees

Do all this, AND MORE, on your mobile device. And with so many abstract management providers and meeting planners focusing on accommodating these capabilities, you just may be able to coast through the next meeting you attend, mobile device in hand!

Pages Without Pages

It's a funny thing when you stop and realize how much something has changed that you took for granted. Recently I was at the ACC 59th Annual Scientific Sessions event in Atlanta. As I walked through the amazingly large conference halls, I kept noticing bins upon bins of printed program books, abstract books, and all kinds of handouts. Keep in mind that it was the last day of the conference, towards the end of the session events, and most of the bins I saw were very full. I picked up one of each book to see the quality of the production--ACC did a wonderful job of putting together a format that reads well and is very professionally done. Yet surplus in the bulky-print-book department must certainly be costing the organization some undue expense.

ACC is an association clever enough to consider alternatives to physical, printed media. In fact, they partnered with us this year for the 59th annual event to offer their program and abstract book in Kindle, iPhone, Nook, Reader, and other digital formats (http://cttoasis.wufoo.com/forms/acc10-i210/). The uptake of these formats, especially the iPhone version of their content, signifies a real shift in preference for how attendees want to access content. It's impossible to know (without quantitative testing) whether it is the cost/environmental concern or the simple convenience and portability of this type of content that is the primary motivator for "trying it", but it's clear that digital content consumption is on the rise for good reason. Fortunately, we're going to survey all willing participants in the digital content download group to see how to better cater to this progressive segment in the future! Data rules, and we want to hear the voice of our customer and their attendees loud and clear!

At OASIS, we've experienced a surge in demand for digital content offerings. PCMA's Convene approached us to do an article about our partnership with AHA and SfN with regard to e-Book creation. You can read it here http://bit.ly/bUAJI1 in the great article "Pages Without Pages". (Contrary to the one contextual error in the article, we're sure you know by now that OASIS is one of the original abstract management solutions with a history of over 15-years. Our Content Discovery Suite e-Book offering is what is new--the article references e-Books and OASIS interchangeably). We are optimistic that many associations realize the benefits of this important trend. It is a part of our core offering and we'll keep pushing ahead to create more opportunities in the digital content space.

Got Mobile?!

The demand for digital content accessibility has never been greater. When you think about catering to the many high tech professionals that your association serves in the STM space, it's imperative that you allow your attendees to access their entire meeting itinerary on any mobile device they’re already comfortable with—online or offline. iCalendar support enables direct-to-personal calendar imports for itinerary access from anywhere. iCalendar is a fascinating concept because it is not new. It was actually a specification developed several years ago that sets the standard for how to make many items of calendar-based content accessible as a single, portable file. Why don't more systems leverage this concept?! It seems like a no-brainer, so we ensured it got onto our roadmap here at OASIS.

It makes sense to let each user keep track of their own personal itinerary on the device or software that works best for them. Attendees with iPhones? No problem. Some find Google Calendar easier? Simple. OASIS iCalendar capability enables entire itineraries—not single sessions—to be imported directly into a user’s calendar device or application at once.

If this sounds as exciting to you as it does to us, please check out our newly released information sheet at http://home.abstractsonline.com/_transfer/OASIS_MobileItinerary.pdf