This document goes over what a "spatial video chat" platform is, how networking works on Gatherly, how do have speakers and panels on the platform, and why Gatherly is great for hosting conferences with multiple simultaneous sessions.
Gatherly re-envisions the structure of social interactions online. With Gatherly’s minimap, attendees can mingle like they would in real life - going from one conversation to another, choosing who they want to talk to for however long they want to talk to. Take a quick peek at the platform and see it in action:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWFKZ1NuXQs
Gatherly tries not only to mimic, but also to improve the in-person networking experience. In real life, you see the whole room and easily navigate from one conversation to another. You choose who you talk to and how long you want to talk to them. Gatherly events replicate this using a minimap that enables this freedom of movement, giving you a better overview of the whole event than even in real life.
Just as in real life, the person can “walk” away from or to a person to end or start conversations:
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/N3DS3mKVUeEH5tuTMlhX-ByeQnmhVeX8dDREsRkYbz2YKbJP7dArC0n7yzmfSYvF0ieDfsu4aa15gIWBNXkbuN4DHTYPTjzMyEyj1L5zbTTyO0excdryldxnczha1YM0NTjtnp6m
Let’s take a closer look at the minimap. Each circle is an ongoing conversation. The number in each circle represents the number of people in that conversation. The blue squares are people currently not in conversations.
When people click on a circle, they move towards it and join that video call!
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/9BUJs_DtncaBHgp5SjluUv24YPG3i7BkuD1ldLHv9jpPmCUGQCWDltviT0n-yQBG0ycCNjgDjHBU8JOmBXX2xL20xDtKKI86FPYAAqusKWiMB__QVwpM0YFs1JgPVK9hihTA-_5F
"The minimap is only a certain size and my event is 1000+ people?" Don’t worry, we’ve heard this concern before. Gatherly enables conferences of all sizes to have events. In real life, you have attendees on different floors that people can navigate through. The way to reach these different floors is through the elevators.
Again, Gatherly takes inspiration from real life:
On the first image above, you’ll notice elevators on the minimap as well as the floor name “Welcome Lobby.”
When users navigate to the elevators, a modal like the second image one above appears that allows them to choose a new floor to visit within the event. With the elevators and this multi-floor concept, one can have many hundreds of people all in one hotel.
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/cMZnzmSUBRqd8X5Cq4m7QkBTDob4fEoFLdsDIE4AywnLsoU-JpCHlQOf0XYItJq-EQCN_To50VU-cje6eoqqbUr-yE7tVA7bXqUMCgtbd0OejtQcZcS22c0OtQCWDxRHy8oeflvV
So how does the user journey look? As you’ll see in the above floor previews — lots of conversations happening simultaneously. People can move from one conversation to another by joining new groups. They can use the elevators to access the other floors of the hotel, enabling an unlimited number of groups with an unlimited number of engaging conversations to coexist within a larger event.