In-Person Conferences Make a Comeback.

• Author: Magnuson, Stew
• Position: Editor's Notes

* LONDON -- What a pleasure it was wandering up and down the half-mile long exhibit hall at the ExCel Center in London, while checking out the newest defense technology.

I never thought I would miss it so much.

For journalists and many members of industry--particularly those in business development, senior executives and media relations--time was marked by the major defense industry conferences: spring meant the Space Symposium in Colorado Springs and the Navy League's Sea-Air-Space just outside Washington, D.C; summer kicked off with the Special Operations Forces Industry Conference in Tampa, followed by the major air shows--Paris and Famborough--and in the fall, the Air Force Association's big show near D.C, with the Association of the United States Army confab a few weeks later. The year wrapped up with the National Training and Simulation Association's I/ITSEC show in Orlando.

In between are dozens of niche conferences catering to those in specialty fields: robotics, geospatial intelligence; cybersecurity, and so on.

And then it all came to an end with the COVID-19 lockdowns.

The National Defense Industrial Association was the pioneer in virtual shows, holding the 2020 SOFIC show completely online. Other associations and organizers followed suit.

Not that there weren't advantages to sitting in the mancave covering a trade show while wearing shorts and a ratty 10-year-old Washington Nationals t-shirt my wife has insisted numerous times should be tossed out.

Virtual conferences were necessary and a good stopgap. There are certainly homebodies out there who might prefer them. But I suspect they are in the minority.

The first indication that in-person confabs were sorely missed was NTSA's Training & Simulation Industry Symposium in June.

This was one of the first industry conferences to go "hybrid." Attendees could travel to Orlando in person or watch online. Needless to say, the association was anxious to see how this would turn out. Would anyone bother traveling in person when they could stay home and watch it from their computer?

The answer was clear by the end of the show: the previous in-person TSIS in 2019 had some 500 attendees. The one held this summer had 800 in-person attendees.

Humans generally crave the company of other humans.

However, those were the "golden" three months--back when everyone who wanted a vaccine had received it and no one had heard of the D-variant of COVID-19. Masks were off and the two vaccine jabs felt like...