Simon Willison’s Weblog

Who is the best conference panel moderator?

28th February 2012

My answer to Who is the best conference panel moderator? on Quora

Two of the best moderators I’ve seen are Jeffrey Veen and Jeremy Keith, both of whom are regular contributors at SXSW.

Moderating well is an incredibly tricky skill, and it’s always fun to watch a good moderator keep a discussion interesting and manage the Q&A from the audience. Jeremy is particularly good at the latter, in particular cutting people off who use the microphone as an excuse to launch in to a rambling non-question (I’ve seen him cut them off instantly by saying "That’s not a question... Next person please)