3 ms·

I'm similar. I give a lot of talks in the local clojure meetup (I'm one of the organisers, so I'm often the fallback speaker when nobody else is available). I f

I'm similar. I give a lot of talks in the local clojure meetup (I'm one of the organisers, so I'm often the fallback speaker when nobody else is available). I find it difficult to come up with good talks for that, but I guess I manage (passably). For conference talks though... I always draw a blank. I've wanted to give talks a bunch of times but could never come up with something that I would be interested in talking about, that I am knowledgeable enough to be confident talking about, and that is interesting for others too.

taway_1212 9y ago
I think this should be approached backwards - FIRST one should have a good idea that he wants shared with the world and only then he should consider giving a talk about it (vs other mediums of communicating the idea). A talk is just a tool, not and end in itself. A btw, wanting to give talks because successful people give talks is a cargo cult.
- dkersten 9y ago
  Of course, which is why I've never given a conference talk. I haven't got anything I feel like I should share. The desire to give a talk is because public speaking is something I want to be better at, because sometimes I've had opportunities where I could have talked about something but didn't feel confident enough due to lack of experience. Also, my employer would like me to give talks, but again, I don't feel confident enough to do so. At some point you just have to take the plunge and I'd rather do it at a generally friendly tech conference talking about something I'm interested in, before I do this in a more hostile environment. Maybe that's too selfish a way to look at conference talks...