While the title of this post stems from Led Zeppelin (but could also be a catchy bluegrass title), it is clear that communication is one of the most important components of science. There are inestimable differences in what can be accomplished in a simple, face-to-face conversation compared to email or even a phone call. So, even though I complain about the travel (see my July 7 post), I know there is good to be had (and not just the beer drinking) in going to meetings.

Some meetings are fun, and a lot of ideas are exchanged – but it never quite translates to getting things done. I’ve gone to a lot of “working group” type meetings, 20-30 people, and it is hard to convey the speed with which ideas loft on hot air (and can be quickly shot down) at such sessions. Sometimes these groups end in synthesis papers, white papers, and such, but it is too easy for us to lose focus once we return to our desks and our full inboxes.

Last week, upon learning that my Chilean colleague Sergio Navarrete was visiting the University of South Carolina, I buckled up and drove 6-7 hours round trip so I could have lunch with him and visit with some of my favorite U.S.-based marine colleagues for a bit as well. Nearly a full day of driving is usually anathema to me, a waste of fuel and hard on my back. But it was extremely productive, even though we spent 2/3 of our time talking about the earthquake that struck Chile in February we sketched out some great ideas for how the field component of our work can begin soon.

I was lucky there - having a necessary and enjoyable colleague within driving distance, and a day when I wasn’t teaching, doesn’t come together often. So now I’m struggling with how to manage my collaborations across the globe most effectively. Our EID work is underway, and we’ve had two meetings using Adobe Connect Pro (to connect the Athens folks with Katie Patterson Sutherland at Rollins College; eventually we’ll pull in more partners to these meetings too). The first meeting went well, and I was impressed with the software. Yesterday - not so well, some echo effects and hiccups in attempting to connect more than 2 laptops, made me a little more concerned.

I think this is going to be fairly important for my OCE funded work in Chile. Two of us are here at UGA, one colleague in New Hampshire, others in Chile. Teleconferencing (either the institutional route, or up to 5 lines on my cell phone) has strange “who has the conch?” problems (and costs associated with long-distance calling; iChat only works on Macs; Skype only allows 2 video feeds. I briefly tinkered with Cisco’s WebEx, which works similarly to Connect Pro, but it seems we are likely to stick with the latter for the EID work so I’d rather know more about one imperfect system than just enough to be dangerous about two such systems.

Hopefully these Voice/Video Over IP solutions are going to be improving. It’s certainly going to be key for us getting things done in the coming years.

update: Ron Eytan, new postdoc in the Wares and Lipp labs, pointed me toward what appears to be an excellent solution. EVO is “worldwide collaboration network” from Cal Tech. I’m not sure how they do it, but the interface is easier, the video is much higher quality than the above solutions, and the audio is no worse....and it is FREE!

Tags: meeting