iDMAa 2009 Conference System
The BSU Institute for Digital Intermedia Art has designed a system that integrates the technology that we have at our fingertips. The conference system is designed to assist attendees in accessing these affordances in very technology friendly ways. For instance, they can tweet on conference proceedings without ever opening a twitter account and digitally swap business cards with other contacts at the conference.
Mobile Attendee Website
The attendee website at http://conf2009.idmaa.org is designed to facilitate an attendee's navigation of the conference and augment the networking and discussion that goes on behind the scenes. It acts as a hub for the RFID enabled activities listed below as well as linking between our conference discussion and twitter. Attendees can use the site to add contacts, participate in discussions, and find people and presentations with similar interests.
Usage:

Navigation of the Agenda and Directory are self explanatory. Any time you see an attendee's name listed, a presentation title, or a session title, you can click to jump to that entry. If you see any interest/topic tags, you can click on it to find other presentations and attendees that also pertain to that topic.

Logging into the site provides more functionality. Your login should have been e-mailed to the e-mail address you provided at registration. If you did not receive a login name and password, visit the registration desk at the conference. Once logged in, you can touch your name at the top to go to your personal page. This page has your pertinent information as well as a list of contacts. You may update these at any time if you become aware of things you would like to change.

While navigating the site, if you find another attendee who you are interested in, you can add them as a contact.

Each Session/presentation has a discussion board that you can comment in as well. Lively chat is encouraged even during the presentation, when related ideas and thoughts can be shared before being forgotten.

Conference Networking Station
The networking stations (tweet stations) are RFID enhanced kiosks that assist attendees in using twitter and adding contacts. These stations recognize specific attendees and give them quick touch screen access to participate in the conference twitter activities. Any attendee in range is recognized and can be added to your contact list, giving you a way to digitally exchange information.
Usage:

Upon approaching the kiosk, your image will appear. The highlighted person is the current tweeter. Touch a person to activate them for tweeting. To tweet, simply type your message and press tweet.

To add other attendees as contacts simply select the other attendees names below their image and press the "Add to Contacts" button.

Confluence:
Surface Conference Navigator
Confluence is a proactive multi-touch display that promotes interdisciplinary communication. As the iDMAa Conference is notable for the breadth of interest of its attendees, metadata was collected regarding presentation topics and conference registrants' interests. As users approach the interface, this data is used to dynamically generate visualizations that highlight the relationships among attendees, their interests, and upcoming conference events. Hence, the system assists with session selection while promoting discussion among nearby attendees. This design builds upon related work by focusing on a task that is challenging at multidisciplinary conferences, specifically the selection of presentations to attend during concurrent sessions.
Usage:

Upon approaching the surface, attendees will be incorporated into the visualization. Events from the conference timeline can be dragged out for further perusal. Once items are out on the surface and attendees are around it, visualizations will occur that link attendees to sessions of related interest.

Each session and presentation may also have a QR Code image associated with it. If you have a smartphone, you can download a QR reader (ex. iPhone - NeoReader, Android - Barcode Scanner, etc.) and take a picture of the QR code. You will then be sent directly to the session or presentation's web page on our mobile attendee website where you can get more information and add the presenter as one of your contacts.