This is the blog post where I remind all of you that you could be doing this, too. Not literally sitting in a coffee shop at 21st and Walnut Sts. in Philadelphia typing a blog post while you wait for your 10-year-old daughter to finish orchestra practice (she plays the violin. I am easily the least talented person in this family…), but you could be using the same tools that Scott and I use to run CMEpalooza. This is what we use:
- WordPress for our website/blog
- YouTube Live (née Google Hangouts) to stream presentations
- WordPress, Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn for promotion
That’s basically it. Yes, there’s a little bit of a learning curve for using these things, but less than you might think. Every year the technology gets better, the video quality improves, and it gets easier for people to use. We have far fewer tech issues now than when we first started doing CMEpalooza (OK, yes, the first session of CMEpalooza Fall 2016 went completely offline for a few minutes, but that was because my stupid laptop crapped out, which was my own dumb fault) and the majority of our faculty are able to come right onto their session Hangouts with little difficulty. The technology works. It’s not perfect, but it works pretty dang well.
Now here’s the kicker. Do you know how much it costs for us to produce CMEpalooza? Any guesses?
$25.
I pay 25 bucks for the CMEpalooza.com URL (which I pay all on my own. Do I ask Scott to chip in? I do not, because that’s the kind of guy I am. I’m a giver.) That’s it. Everything else is free. I’m not including the hours Scott and I put into it, but the website cost is the only monetary expense involved. This is definitely something you can afford to try.
In closing, let me remind you of a couple of upcoming CMEpalooza-related activities.
- Ask a question on the CMEpalooza QBoard for our “What is Data Visualization and How Can I Apply It?” session
- CMEpalooza Company Spotlight with Global Academy for Medical Education on Wednesday, April 12 at noon ET
- Don’t forget to complete a CMEpalooza Pursuit form by the end of the day on April 6 (that’s tomorrow) to win free $$$
CMEPALOOZA 