OxfordJam and the Birth of Event Ecosystems

While the Skoll World Forum is the big show in the world of social entrepreneurship this week, storied Oxford is playing host to another event as well. The OxfordJam is a three-day mirror unconference that's meant to add a new, dynamic, participant-driven feel to the week, and which may be a leading indicator of a whole new world of event ecosystems.

If there's one view that I use this blog as a bully pulpit to promote, it is my contempt for the format of most conferences -- particularly their continued embrace of the panel discussion. To recap, I think that panel discussions suck the life out of a room with their awkward pacing and unfollowed-through threads of conversation. By the time you get through introductions of panelists, there tends to be time for no more than Tweet-sized nuggets of wisdom. And I'm not the only one who thinks this.

What's more, the decision to rely on panels tends to have more to do with a conference's need to have open speaking slots to entice great people to come than it does to do with a strategic decision about the most interesting content. Unfortunately, the reliance on panels can also indicate a general adherence to the time-honored but totally boring tradition of dividing a conference into those deemed worthy to speak and those deemed worthy to listen.

If I sound angry about this, it is because I think that in the digital world, offline gatherings are not diminishing but growing in importance. The way many field-leading events do it these days, however, people go because "they have to, because everyone is there," but grumble all the way through about all of the missed opportunities for something really creative and connecting. Simply put, we can and should be doing a lot better.

The team at OxfordJam -- while perhaps not being quite so tyrannical in their beliefs as I -- clearly saw a need and an opportunity, as well. Co-founder Ben Metz had been to each of the previous Skoll Forums, and each year hosted a dinner that became a more and more important part of the experience. This year, he decided to experiment with a side-long event to turn that conversation into a more active element of the Skoll experience.

Oxford Jam is running parallel to Skoll and is open not only to Skoll attendees but to the community as a whole. Indeed, one of its goals is to bring the content, ideas, and energy from the premier event to citizens of the UK who might not otherwise attend.

The content is structured around a set of broad themes ranging from my personal favorite, Asset Based Development, to Social Finance and Gift Economies. These themes are explored in speaker sessions and workshops, but also in less formal meal-time and late-night sessions. What's more, the sessions seem to mostly becoming from members of the community who got in touch with the Jammers and asked to host.

Having not seen any panels this year, I don't want to pre-judge the Skoll Forum's content just yet, but I actually think the symbiotic, cohabitational model of the World Forum and the OxfordJam might be the forbearer of a broader trend in which one keystone event seeds an ecosystem of related programs.

Like platforms and application on the web, no one can do everything well. To succeed, however, every one needs to be great at whatever piece they take on. I'm looking forward to seeing how the new OxfordJam does.

Photo credit: tanvach