Al Gore, etc.
I was too tired last night to write about the Gore keynote. So how was it?
My boyfriend has this very particular was of saying “It was….[long pause]…oh…kay…” meaning not a total disappointment but not fantastic either. That was pretty much my response. It was certainly a huge thrill to see Gore live, but the content of the speech was not as good as I had hoped.
After an hour-long awards presentation session, we welcomed Gore to the stage. Standing 0 (two more would follow). He spent the first ten minutes or so delivering a bunch of crowd-pleasing anecdotes and jokes. He’s a very, very talented presenter. I was getting antsy for him to get to the point, though. Finally he started talking about how much he respects and values information professionals. This part was good. He clearly knows exactly what librarians do and what they are good at. He spoke about learning investigative research techniques while working as a reporter in the early part of his career, and how those skills shaped his philosophies in subsequent roles in congress and beyond. This was pretty interesting, and I felt glad that such a high-profile speaker actually cared enough to research the organization and customize his presentation to us. I felt as though he genuinely shares our values.
The focus of the speech then shifted, of course, to the climate crisis and what role he feels information, the internet, and information professionals must play in addressing the crisis. He touched on how the message became so much easier to understand when technology allowed for better visual representation of the data. I guess for me the downside was that it was SO American-focused. It comes with the territory, of course, that the former Vice President would talk a lot about America. But SLA isn’t an American organization; it’s an international one. And while the bulk of the audience last night would have been American, there were some of us there who weren’t. There were a lot of references that I didn’t “get” because I’m not American. For someone who claims he’s not planning on running in the 2008 elections, it seemed awfully rah-rah, “yea America” to me.
At the end of the presentation, prompted by a question from an audience member, he discussed his Climate Protection Project, in which he trains people from all over the world to learn and deliver his slide show, spreading the word much faster than he can do it by himself. At this point, he did talk a lot about other countries, which was nice.
Anyway, I’m glad that I got the chance to see him talk; it was a great experience and one that not many people get. I just wish it could have been less focused on the States and more on the international nature of our organization – and the climate crisis, for that matter.
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