Many conferences now days have poster presentations which are great for the people attending but tiresome for the presenter. Follow these handy tips to avoid the pain.
- Have a passport from some obscure country (e.g. Russia, Italy, China, or Iraq).
- Even if rule 1 does not apply, still do not attend the conference at which your paper is accepted.
- Arrange to have dinner with a big-shot when your poster is being presented.
- If your talk is refused an oral presentation, show your contempt by simply not producing a poster.
- Just stick a photocopy of your paper up (preferably double sided). People will forgive your non-attendance because all the information you would have told them is readily available for them to read.
- Make an embarrassing poster. For example: use 5 pt font; print the poster on separate A5 sheets (at least 40), do not number them, and be sure to arrange them so it is unclear whether left-right precedence is used or up-down precedence is used. Randomise the truth from conference to conference. Give your poster a personal touch – draw it by hand; photocopy your handwritten slides, or even better, put the slides themselves up; use the word “fuzzy” in the title.
- Be a big shot.
- Collaborate with multiple co-authors and say that you thought they were going to do the poster.