[pavement]

I think it would've been pretty awesome if you proposed a slide deck composed purely of vaguely captioned images, and then got up there, and derailed the talk for 90% of your alotted time by just delivering an off-topic talk regarding subject of your choice (maybe something highly technical and intimidating). All the while clicking through slides as if they related to your spoken word, and then at the end, summed up with the sentiment you expressed in this post on your site. And then, when you open up the floor for a Q&A session, respond to any questions with markov-chain generated non-sequiturs.

In my book, that would be a great talk. The more extemporaneous, the better.

Maybe that's a little anti-social, but remember that in comedy, a joke that bombs can be entertaining all by itself. And if your worried about losing your nerve, when the moment arrives, and it's time to be beligerent, just do a couple of shots before you get on stage.

...on the other hand, if the talk gets a positive response, you'd probably have another problem on your hands: being asked to come back and give the same talk again. One way to curb that would be to pre-record your protest and just play the recording into the microphone.

[snipeyhead]

I had thought about it, trust me (in very much the way you're describing, funnily enough) :) But ultimately, it's their conference, and they do have the right and the responsibility to schedule the sessions they feel will be most valuable.

Not to mention that if I pulled that stunt off, I probably wouldn't be invited to speak at many conferences anymore, because organizers aren't fans of loose cannons. But really, I didn't feel the need to be a dick about it. Their loss. I give a pretty good presentation. shrug