What are the terms for participating in Metanomics

Metanomics is an open forum, and everyone is welcome to attend. We encourage audience members, whether at the main event location or our many event partner locations, to participate in the Metanomics group chat channels, local chat channels, or any other channels we are able to create. Our events are at their best when audience members use these means to respond to and ask questions of the speakers and each other.

However, Metanomics is an organized live event, and every moment is precious. To respect the time of our speakers and audience, we ask that all attendees follow agree to the following terms of participation:

Please show respect for our speakers, who are typically very busy people who have graciously agreed to talk in a public setting, often about controversial matters.

Please show respect for fellow audience members, by refraining from any personal insults or invective, belittling comments, or other forms of rude or bullying behavior.

Please do not distract others from the show by engaging in persistent and repeated debate on matters of tangential relevance to the topic at hand. Each episode of Metanomics is intended to be the start of a discussion, not the end, and we are glad to see that guests and audience members often continue to debate matters on blogs across the web for weeks after a show.

If you believe that an audience member is violating these terms of participation, please let us know. Try to avoid reacting in kind (fighting fire with fire), as this is invariably counterproductive.

We are delighted to be able to present Metanomics regularly to a large and growing audience of people interesting in the business and policy matters surrounding virtual worlds. We hope that clarifying and enforcing these terms of participation will make our events even more successful.

If you have any comments on this policy, please let us know!