Before Your Session

One to four days before your session you will receive an automated email from our scheduling system containing information about the session. This email will include the schedule, general information about how the sessions will work, and the Zoom, Youtube and Discord links. You will receive one such email for each session where you are a presenter, chair, or organizer. In each Zoom meeting there will be a technician managing the stream and assisting with technicial issues during the session.

Joining Your Session’s Zoom Meeting

The Zoom meeting will begin 15 minutes before the session starts to allow the contributors, chair, and technician to set up and test everyone’s audio and video set up. Make sure you are in a well-lit and quiet room, and have your laptop plugged in. The Zoom meeting information will be included in the automated session information email. Please make sure your Zoom is updated to the latest version. After the audio/video check the technician will communicate with you over Zoom’s text chat, so have this open in the pop-out view mode.

After the A/V setup check you should disable your video unless you are preparing to speak or speaking on the stream.

During Your Session

If your session contains playback of pre-recorded videos (e.g., paper presentations), the technician will play these back directly to Youtube. The videos will also be screen-shared back to Zoom so you can follow the session without watching YouTube. Note that the quality of screen sharing on Zoom is lower than the quality that will be seen on Youtube.

Do Not Watch Yourself on Youtube

Even with the ultra low latency stream setting there are about 5 seconds of delay between the stream and Youtube. If you are watching Youtube for feedback on when you are live or what is playing on the stream, the delay will be disorienting and you will be late. When the technician’s countdown to going live for Q&A or introductions ends, you are live! Having the Youtube stream playing in the background can also result in audio feedback on the stream when you are talking.

Live Q&A

About one minute before the presentation ends the technician will stop screen-sharing to set up for the Q&A portion. At this time you should turn your video on. When your presentation video has ended the technician will switch the stream to display the Zoom meeting to allow live responses to questions from attendees. Questions will be asked via Youtube and Discord chat, the technician and chair will monitor these for questions and relay them to the presenters over Zoom’s text chat. The Youtube and Discord chats will be synchronized, so only one needs to be monitored. We recommend monitoring the Discord chat, which will provide a richer experience and is where you can continue the conversion after the session ends.

As the Session Chair

As the chair you will provide live introductions to each recorded talk and help relay questions from the chat to the presenter, similar to the typical chair role in an in-person conference. Questions will be asked over YouTube chat and Discord, which you can select from and read back to the presenter over Zoom. It is important you repeat each question back over Zoom so that the presenter and other attendees can hear them. The Youtube and Discord chat channels are synchronized with each other, so you only need to monitor one. We recommend watching the Discord chat. The technician can also help you in monitoring the chat for questions. Please also see our example video below on chairing the session.

The End of Your Session

There is a hard cut-off 10 minutes after the session is scheduled to end to allow time to set up the next session, so please keep to the session schedule. Additional discussion after the session can be continued on Discord.

Example Session Tutorials

Please watch the example session tutorials below to see what to expect as a presenter in the virtual conference.

Recorded Talk with Live Q&A

Also available on BiliBili

Live Presentation over Zoom

Also available on BiliBili

Live Panel over Zoom

Also available on BiliBili

Chairing a Virtual Session

Also available on BiliBili