Simon Willison’s Weblog

What are good topics for panel discussions?

29th October 2013

My answer to What are good topics for panel discussions? on Quora

Anything that’s controversial in your industry, especially if it’s a recent debate. Just make sure that your panelists disagree—there’s nothing more boring than a panel where everyone has exactly the same opinion.

As an example: the topic of building HTML5 mobile web apps as opposed to creating native iOS and Android apps is a perennial point of contention in the web development world. A panel with people who passionately represent both sides of that debate would be a good bet for a web conference.