MemeFactory—an Internet-culture lecture/performance group—illustrates the challenges and benefits of tech-heavy, multi-person presentations.
ThemenofMemeFactorydon’ttrafficinminimal- ism. No, this presentation team—“three gentle- menwith five computers and three projectors,” as they describe themselves—has something much more macro in mind when they take the stage to informandentertain audiences concerning the wide world of Internet culture and “memes.” Amemeis an idea that spreads from person to
person throughout a population, especially via the Internet, where a typical meme is a sort of inside joke marked by rapid proliferation, evolution, and exhaustion. ButMemeFactory itself seemsany-
TheMemeFactory team are both skilled tech-
nologists and 21st-century vaudevillians, using goodold-fashioned show-bizsmarts toengage their audience. Their use of the three projectors, for instance, originatedfrom a desire to bring to life the unique kingdomofmemes.“Our subject matter is web culture and the tons of media that gets pro- duced by people …on the web,” Davison said. “And part of that world is getting overwhelmed, so we want to recreate that experience by getting [our audience] overwhelmed in the presentation.” The three create their presentations using
Apple’s “super-robust” Keynote, a PowerPoint- style program that Davison praised for the “inte- gration of its rehearsal/presenter display, which allows for really tight marriages of notes and slides.”Ofcourse, no programdoes everything for you. MemeFactory begins by brainstorming top- ics and creating an outline, which they then divide among themselves for fleshing out.“Alot of peo- ple Iknowlike to throw up a slide andthen …just sort of talk about it for a minute,” Davison said. “We don’t do that.We literally script every word.” While labor-intensive, this method pays off in
THREE HEADS > ONE: MemeFactory’s triple-threat “performative” lecture at NYU in April.
thing but exhausted. Since forming in mid-2009, the group—Stephen Bruckert, Patrick Davison, andMikeRugnetta—has presented atROFLCon II, atNewYorkUniversity, and during São Paolo, Brazil’s Social MediaWeek. In an interview with Convene,Davisonsaid he andhis partners goback and forth on what to call what they do. “Depend- ing on the audience, we’ll say it’s a ‘performative’ lecture, or a lecture-like show,” he said.“We def- initely come from ... performance and theater work rather than conference presentation.”
terms of stage presence and audience participation. “If you design the text of the presentation as a dia- logue,” Davison said, “with each of us interrupt- ing ... each other, it becomes easy to turn that rela- tionship out to the audience: ‘Whatdoyou think?’” Technology also helps MemeFactory to encour-
age audience participation. Rugnetta, using a graphics-development tool called Quartz Compos- er (also by Apple), figured out how to include— inside the presentation itself—a live video feed fromthe iSight cameras on their laptopcomputers. Editable textboxeswithina slide also are possible, as when, in São Paolo, the group presented Brazil- ian memes and solicited explanations of what was going on from the audience. Said Rugnetta: “We find it makes for a better presentation to give the audience more credit when it comes to under- standing complex subjects, not less.”
36 pcma convene June 2011 ILLUSTRATION BY GREG MABLY
‘Presentation Hacking’ MemeFactory’s Mike Rugnetta said in an email that he and his colleagues are really interested in “presentation hacking.” Meaning what, exactly? “We’ve devel-
oped a piece of soft- ware which live- tweets to our MemeFactory Twitter account from Keynote,” Rugnetta said. “We’re thinking about using this for image attribution or for tweeting links to further informa- tion on topics covered in the show.” In addition,
the crew are trying to work out how to have one comput- er’s Keynote program control the other Keynote programs, allowing for synched slide advancement — possibly while the other two mem- bers are in the audience.
Hunter R. Slaton is a senior editor of Convene.
Working Smarter is sponsored by PSAV Presentation Services, www.psav.com.