In the odd delay built into a journal like E&P, I'm writing this in the immediate aftermath of attending the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health Spring Conference. It's interesting that in this age of more real print and virtual print than we can even begin to think of completing, and more resources for learning than our predecessors could have imagined, we still make the time to travel and to sit in the same room as a speaker, to hear them talk. I wonder why we do this?

I suspect there are a few reasons. One of them is to do with trusting that an eminent speaker will have prepared an interesting and stimulating talk, which introduces us to a new set of ideas. Another is to listen to how …