Online events are usually much shorter, even if they feature the same content length. This is because we assume when people need breaks they'll take them and they can continue to listen in the background, and also because an online event just has to be shorter. Fortunately, we can pre-produce much of the event in this case, and so our breaks for conversation and context will be brief and pre-cut into the program.
Online events behave a little differently than big in-person events. Because they're much easier to attend, and also much easier to cancel, we optimize for creating a HUGE rush of attention the week before the event.
So while during our live events all the tickets would be sold already a week out, and we'd mainly be in private parties, we use the week before an ONLINE event as the big promotion push. This creates buzz and a sense of something happening together. We've designed for it so it will work really well!
The week leading up to online events looks like this:
Each evening there's a live promo event that we'll spend all day previewing and telling people about. That'll basically be a zoom call with a host and a couple speakers where we'll either feature a past talk or promote an upcoming talk, often both. These will last about an hour, and you should get a spreadsheet of them about a week out from the event.
The run of show for our online events looks simply like:
Because it's an online event, we want to have something happening as people arrive so they know the show is underway. This is music or discussion etc.
Speakers and performances all pre-recorded and lined up next to each other to illustrate the theme.
Some sort of physical embodied activity here.
The next collection of speakers & performances.