When things go wrong

Joseph Reagle

Our question(s)

  • What to do when things go wrong?

What to do??

  • You’re being heckled
  • Everyone is staring at their laptops
  • Your time slot gets cut from 45 minutes to 10
  • Everyone in the room hates you
  • One guy won’t stop asking questions
  • There is a rambling and nonsensical question
  • You are asked an impossible question
  • The microphone breaks
  • No laptop/slides
  • There is a typo on your slide (nooooo!)
  • You’re late for your own talk
  • You’re running out of time
  • There are only five people in the audience (Berkun 2010, pp. 169-172)

Stories

57 ACE Acts 20:9–12

As Paul spoke on and on, a young man named Eutychus, sitting on the windowsill, became very drowsy. Finally, he fell sound asleep and dropped three stories to his death below. Paul went down, bent over him, and took him into his arms. “Don’t worry,” he said, “he’s alive!” Then they all went back upstairs, shared in the Lord’s Supper, and ate together. Paul continued talking to them until dawn, and then he left. Meanwhile, the young man was taken home alive and well, and everyone was greatly relieved.

Some of my own

1995

I traveled to Europe with my (older) boss for a meeting that I would facilitate. When a high-level European Commission official first met us, he asked me, “What do you do, carry the luggage?”

I ignored the comment and ran the meeting later in the day.

1996

I traveled to Brussels to open and facilitate another meeting, but got food poisoning and spent my time in the bathroom of the hotel.

Fortunately, my colleagues stepped up.

1997

At a large meeting at the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, I was advancing the slides of TimBL, inventor of the web, and managed to screw it up and throw him off.

I apologized to him afterwards.

2010

During a panel before a large audience at Harvard, my voice got so shaky I literally choked.

I took a moment, apologized about being nervous (I could’ve skipped that), and continued on and continued to participate instead of wilting.

2007–2025

New class slides often have typos.

I appreciate and thank students who send email me.

(I consider it part of the participation grade.)

2025 Faculty Talk

  • I rehearsed my 20-minute talk four times over two weeks and could’ve presented the thesis and support unaided (missing a lot of media).
  • I planned to use my colleague’s laptop since my slides were online, but screen-sharing permissions had reset on her laptop—and mine.
  • We managed but lost time, leaving me feeling rushed and speaking too fast and tripping over a few phrases.
  • I apologized to the organizer for not coming earlier and testing my equipment.
  • I reminded myself even after 30 years: slow and dynamic!

Wrap-up