Naming Events in a Digital World

As we start to bring more virtual and hybrid elements into our events – should we reconsider how we name these events?

In the past, we might have given an event a local or regional name. This name helped the event connect and identify with the city, state, or region where the event took place. If the event was a big one we might add the descriptor “National” or “International” to the name.

What about in the digital world? Do these naming standards apply?

Let’s look at Event Camp Twin Cities as an example. We called the event – Event Camp Twin Cities – because it took place in the twin cities of Minneapolis-St.Paul. The Twin Cities is the name for Minneapolis-St.Paul around here. We expected to draw most people from the area. So, the name seemed logical at the time.

What happened in reality is that we created something much bigger. We had 75 people participating in Minneapolis. Most people were from Minnesota, Canada (a northern suburb) and Wisconsin with a few East and West Coasters sprinkled in there for good measure.  Then, we had two remote sites that had about 20 people in them – one in Dallas, Texas and another in Basel, Switzerland. Finally, we had over 550 people participating live online from all over the world. These people came from all over the place.

Using digital technology, we took a regional event and created a global one. I think that we are going to see more events doing things like this. Calling these events “National” or “Regional”events – just doesn’t seem appropriate.

So what should we be calling these events? The Big One?