It’s a nerdy, populist idea: folks in the audience of a lecture often know just as much as the speaker, so why not have everyone contribute? It’s called an unconference [wiki], and the idea is to democratize the convention experience.

AAN will experiment with an UNconference by hosting a special, free-wheeling session on “Blogging for Journalists,” during the 2007 Convention in Portland, OR.

I’ll guide the session along with an outline of topics, soliciting best practices contributions from UNconference attendees, and – of course, blogging the results on the community convention blog at Portland2007.AAN.org. Later, I’ll work the results of the UNconference into a session on Blogging for Journalists I’ll be leading for the 2007 batch of Poynter College Fellows. [I was a Reading & Writing Fellow in '04].

Interested in attending? Pop over to the convention blog at portland2007.AAN.org, where this is cross-posted and let me know what timeframe works for you.