Last year’s American Diabetes Association annual meeting gobbled up a lot of social media attention, most of it criticizing the organization’s ban on photography in sessions. This year, it’s the presenters who’ll be in the position of deciding whether to allow photography.
During ADA 2017, attendees tweeting photos of presentation slides were surprised to get tweets from the association saying, “Thanks for joining us! Photography isn’t allowed at #2017ADA presentations; we’d appreciate if you could delete this tweet.”
Social media responded with fury, news outlets wrote about it, and the uproar came to dominate public perception of the meeting. While the ADA claimed the policy was to protect intellectual property of unpublished data, critics countered that instant information is the norm and that medical innovation depends on it.
This year, it will be up to the presenters to decide whether their slides can be photographed and shared. The organizers state: “Each presenter/study author will announce, verbally and visually on a slide at the beginning of their presentation, whether or not he/she approves of photos being taken of their slides.”
So watch for the slides, and share your #2018ADA experiences and reactions with us at @ClinEndoNews.