Singapore Polytechnic Media and Communication Conference: Click to Connect

When I first heard from Ms Trudy that all the year one students of DMC had to attend the “SP Media and Communication Conference”, I had absolutely no idea what to expect. Like most of my other classmates, I only knew that it was compulsory, and we had to be in smart casual attire. So grudgingly, in the midst of preparing for my exams, I dragged myself out of bed so that I would reach school by 2pm.

When I reached the event venue, which was the Auditorium, I was surprised to see that it was quite a large-scale event, with even a registration area. We were also given goodie bags, before we were ushered to our seats. When I saw the stage set-up, I was taken aback at how professional it looked. Our seniors must have put in a lot of effort, because it looked exactly like a press conference, right down to details like the backdrop.

While waiting for the event to start, we were all occupied by the live tweets that showed up on the projector. Apparently, tweets with #SPMediaComm would be shown on the screen “live”, so everyone was busily tweeting to get their few seconds of fame. It was really entertaining to see the screen constantly being updated with more tweets, especially with some that were humorous.

With such an innovative start, I found myself looking forward to the programme itself, which certainly did not disappoint. As the emcees introduced the guest speakers of the day – Mr Damien Cummings, Online and Social Media Director of Dell, Asia Pacific and Japan, and Mr Julien Courant, Managing Director of DGM Asia Pacific, I heard exclamations of awe from my fellow course mates. I was so surprised to hear that our seniors had actually gotten such high-level executives from the industry to give us a presentation!

The first presentation was by Mr Damien Cummings from Dell, who shared with us some pointers on creating user generated content. That might sound like a lecture, but his witty, tongue-in-cheek remarks were enough to keep our attention for the entire presentation.

After that, Mr Julien Courant from DGM gave his presentation on social media. Initially, I had some trouble understanding him because of his French accent, and this would probably have made me tune out, if not for the way he organised his presentation. Mr Courant used amusing examples, some of which were slightly self derogatory, to illustrate some of his points. He also played funny videos to keep our attention.

After a short break with refreshments, our year two seniors presented their findings on the impact of citizen journalism among youth. The four presenters spoke confidently, and the presentation slides were attractive and well organised. They also included fun videos, like one that featured Mr Yam Ah Mee, to make the presentation more entertaining.

At the end of the presentation, all the members of the research team went up on stage to address questions in the Question and Answer segment. We were encouraged to ask more questions, either through Twitter, or by asking through the microphones placed in the middle of both aisles. I found the whole “interaction through Twitter” concept really clever, because they could get feedback from those who found speaking through the microphone too daunting.

The team was constantly bombarded with questions, ranging from regarding personal opinions to the survey questions. However, all of them answered confidently. What struck me was how each member of the team answered at least one question. That showed that they really knew their stuff, and it was impressive to see that they could readily answer the questions thrown at them.

In all, I think the event was pretty enjoyable, and it certainly gave us year one students some new insights into the power of social media.

Written by:
Lim Li Yi
Year One Diploma in Media and Communication (DMC) Student