V.M.L. … is a two-year-old U.S. citizen child currently being held incommunicado … at an unknown location … in the Alexandria[, Louisiana,] area. … On or around April 22, 2025, around 8:30am, V.M.L.’s mother[, Jenny Carolina Lopez Villela,] attended a scheduled check-in at the New Orleans [Intensive Supervision Appearance Program (ISAP)] office with V.M.L. and her eleven-year-old sister. [ISAP required V.M.L.’s mother to bring both of her daughters to her check-ins, which V.M.L.’s mother had been regularly attending for almost four years. At] that appointment, ICE officers apprehended V.M.L.’s mother and the two girls.

Roughly an hour after V.M.L.’s mother and the girls went into the ISAP office, V.M.L.’s father, who had taken them to the appointment, received a call from a person inside the ISAP office. That person said the family had all been taken to the immigration office and gave him an address. When he arrived at the address, he saw that it was the ICE Field Office in New Orleans …. ICE officers took him outside and gave V.M.L.’s father a paper saying that V.M.L.’s mother was under their custody. The ICE officers said they could not give him any more information but that V.M.L.’s mom would call him soon.

That afternoon, an attorney representing V.M.L.’s father called and spoke with ICE Officer John Harnett. The attorney communicated that V.M.L. is a U.S. citizen. ICE Officer Harnett stated that V.M.L.’s mother’s deportation was certain and that he believed they were all in a hotel, but would not say where. He was not able to provide a legal call between the attorney and V.M.L.’s mother.

Around 7:30pm the same day, V.M.L.’s father received a call from an ICE officer, who spoke to him for about a minute. The officer said that V.M.L.’s mother was there, and that they did not have much time to speak to each other and that they were going to deport his partner and daughters. V.M.L.’s father was able to speak with his partner for only about or less than a minute. He heard his daughters crying and his partner crying. He reminded V.M.L.’s mother that their daughter was a U.S. citizen and could not be deported. The officer overheard and said that V.M.L. would not be deported and explained that V.M.L.’s mother and sister had deportation orders. V.M.L.’s father began to give V.M.L.’s mother the phone number for their attorneys, but before he could, he heard the ICE officer take the phone from her and hang up the call.

Also on April 22, 2025, V.M.L.’s father executed a Provisional Custody by Mandate under Louisiana Revised Statutes …, temporarily “delegat[ing] the provisional custody of” his two daughters to his U.S. citizen sister-in-law[, Trish Mack], who also lives in Baton Rouge, LA. The Mandate was notarized by a valid notary public in the state of Louisiana.

On April 22, 2025, at about 9:30pm, an attorney representing V.M.L.’s father sent an email to … Mellissa Harper, expressing concern for his youngest daughter, V.M.L., and identifying key directives that the family’s detention violated.

The attorney spoke with … Harper over the phone the next morning, April 23, at which point … Harper began interrogating the attorney as to V.M.L.’s father’s immigration status. The attorney declined to answer any questions about V.M.L.’s father, asking about the location of V.M.L. … Harper refused to honor a request to release V.M.L. to her custodian, stating that it was not needed because V.M.L. was already with her mother. … Harper stated that the father could try to pick her up, but that he would also be taken into custody. … Harper later sent an email further evincing her refusal to release V.M.L. to her custodian … and stating that she would instead require V.M.L.’s father to turn himself in for detention and deportation, indicating that she was detaining V.M.L.––-a two-year-old U.S. citizen––-in order to induce her father to turn himself in to the immigration authorities.

The attorney sent a follow up email shortly thereafter, reiterating her questions about the whereabouts of V.M.L. … Harper has not replied to that email.

Also on April 23, 2025, Mack made a series of calls to check on the welfare of V.M.L., her mother, and her sister. … She spoke with an officer by phone who informed her that the family was in a hotel, but she was not given their location or any way to contact them.

On April 24, 2025, the mandatary named in the Provisional Custody by Mandate terminated the agreement for personal reasons, and V.M.L.’s father and … Mack executed a new notarized Provisional Custody by Mandate, delegating custodial authority to … Mack.1

Reading 2

I am Kilmer [Abrego Garcia]’s wife. He is a father, a son, a brother and a proud member of CASA and SMART Union member who has dedicated himself to make our family the American Dream reality. That dream was shattered on March 12, when he was abducted and disappeared by the United States government in front of our 5-year-old child.

Today is 34 days after his disappearance, and I stand before you filled with spirit that refuses to bring down. I will not stop fighting until I see my husband alive.

Kilmar, if you can hear me, stay strong. God hasn’t forgotten about you. Our children are asking: When will you come home? And I pray for the day I tell them the time and date that you’ll return.

As we continue through Holy Week, my heart aches for my husband, who should have been here leading our Easter prayers. Instead, I find myself pleading with the Trump administration and the Bukele administration to stop playing political games with the life of Kilmar.

Our family is torn apart during this scary time. and our children miss their dad so much. Despite the challenges we continue to face with the U.S. and the Salvadorian government, I hope that the strength of faith and the resilience within us will keep us standing after all the punches we continue to receive.

Our ability to fight back against these governments are testimonies to the spirit of fight and restraint that God has given us. We will continue standing strong, and we will never give up on you, Kilmar.

Even though my heart is heavy, I find hope and strength in those around me. … I pray that the same community strength that has lifted me flows through those judges, supporting her to bend the powers toward justice.

Kilmar needs to come home. And it’s time we see how justice will be fulfilled. Enough is enough. My family can’t be robbed from another day without seeing Kilmar. This administration has already taken so much from my children, from Kilmar’s mother, brother, sisters, and me.2

If you’re ready to start (or start back) reading your Greek New Testament,

be happy to send you my free Greek New Testament reading plan, along with a couple other related resources. (+ without cheating)

You can use the reading plan as-is. Or you can download it as a basic spreadsheet (a “CSV”) that you can import into your calendar.

Then, you can see your readings for the day there in your calendar along with any other appointments. The spreadsheet is specifically formatted to work with Google Calendar but may work with other calendar tools also.

These readings are the same ones that my students and I are doing this semester, and it would be wonderful to have you join us!

Conclusion

So, when you read a critical text of the Greek New Testament, you need to read the apparatus too. You need to read the apparatus vertically to take account of the different places of variation in themselves. And you need to read the apparatus horizontally to take account of relationships that different variants might have with each other.

As a tool to help you engage the apparatus in the Nestle-Aland’s 28th edition, I’ve prepared a condensed, searchable table of its signs and abbreviations. I’ll be happy to share this table with you entirely for free. In it, I’ve also included the Unicode equivalents for several of the signs—in case you find yourself wanting to type them.

I hope you find this table a helpful reference as you read your apparatus—both vertically and horizontally.

How You Can Read Original Manuscripts

If all that sounds good, you still might be thinking, “Yes, but how do I access these manuscript images?” They’re not exactly the kind of thing you can find at your local library. And Google isn’t liable to be very helpful.

That’s why I’ve prepared a free guide about how to read Greek New Testament manuscript images online. This guide will walk you step-by-step through finding troves of images of Greek New Testament manuscripts online.

That way, you can avoid the time and hassle of casting about Google searching for these manuscripts. Instead, you can use the technology at your fingertips to let you focus on these fascinating Greek manuscripts themselves.

Insert from the Christmas Post

To help you do that, I created a vacation planning workbook. It’ll walk you step-by-step through several things you can do to help you make the most of your time away.

Help me take time away and make the most of it

Where Paul Uses τὲ καί

In total, the phrase τὲ καί appears twelve times in Paul’s letters. Two of those instances are in Rom 1:14.((The other ten places where Paul uses τὲ καί are Rom 1:12, 16, 20; 2:9–10; 3:9; 10:12; 1 Cor 1:30; 2 Cor 12:12; and Phil 1:7.)) There, the phrase joins Paul’s references to Greeks and barbarians, as well as wise and foolish people (Ἕλλησίν τε καὶ βαρβάροις, σοφοῖς τε καὶ ἀνοήτοις).((Greek NT quotations reflect the text of the NA28.)) And these τὲ καί phrases immediately follow a comparison that Paul draws between the audience and the “rest of the gentiles” (ἐν ὑμῖν καθὼς καὶ ἐν τοῖς λοιποῖς ἔθνεσιν).

This phrase is a key point of debate between the proponents of a mixed or a gentile-only audience for Romans. Does the comparison mean that

  • the audience is geographically where gentiles are? If so, the phrase doesn’t necessarily say anything about the audience’s ethnicity.
  • the audience is ethnically a subset of the larger whole of gentiles? If so, then this phrase would render less likely an audience composed of both Jews and gentiles.

What Paul Does with τὲ καί

Certainly, the entries for τέ and καί in BDAG or other standard lexica don’t directly address the problem of Romans’s audience. But what does is the function of the two words used together as a phrase like Paul does.

Each time Paul uses τὲ καί he uses it to specify some other element in the text. Sometimes, there are multiple options for which element this may be. But across the various options, the phrase’s specifying function remains.

Often, the terms Paul unites with τὲ καί have the same case as what they specify. Other times, this case consistency gets disrupted by attraction to or lexical pressure from another element in the text.

How τὲ καί Clarifies Paul’s Audience

From these observations emerges the question of why Paul uses the dative case with the elements he unites with τὲ καί in Rom 1:14a.

Do these elements appear in the dative case because they

  • stand in apposition to ἔθνεσιν in verse 13b? If so, then the classes of people in verse 14a define what Paul means by his reference to gentiles in verse 13b. The gentiles are gentile people, which implies that the audience has a gentile ethnicity, not merely a geographic location that places them outside Palestine.
  • have had their case attracted to ἔθνεσιν in verse 13b, while they more closely modify ὀφειλέτης in verse 14b? If so, then this attraction still shows a conceptual linkage between the gentiles in verse 13b and the specific classes of people Paul mentions in verse 14a. So again, the text would characterize the audience as gentile people.
  • take this case under lexical pressure from ὀφειλέτης for a dative complement? If so, then an argument could be made either for ἐν τοῖς λοιποῖς ἔθνεσιν to be either a geographic or an ethnic description. But the τὲ καί framework suggests that this is the only reading on which a geographic interpretation can be sustained.

Other Indicators

And unfortunately for the geographic interpretation, three other factors mean that the text won’t ultimately withstand this interpretation.

  1. Paul doesn’t always complement ὀφειλέτης with the dative. Sometimes he uses the genitive (e.g., Rom 8:12; 15:27) or an infinitive alone (e.g., Gal 5:3). This fact raises afresh the question of whether the elements in verse 14a have the dative case at least partly by attraction to ἔθνεσιν.
  2. Although it doesn’t use a conjunction to articulate the relationship, verse 14 explains verse 13. So, the elements that verse 14a unites with τὲ καί naturally align with ἔθνεσιν in verse 13b.
  3. Elsewhere, the language for ἔθνη and the classes of people in verse 14a is predominantly personal and never clearly geographic.

Conclusion

Thus,

In addition, in compliance with Federal Trade Commission guidelines, the list below identifies the books that I have received because of this site. In addition, Amazon, Logos Bible Software, and Westminster Bookstore links on this site are typically keyed to one of these vendors’ affiliate programs.

Craig Bartholomew headshot

Craig Bartholomew headshot

Craig is the director of the Kirby Laing Centre for Public Theology in Cambridge and the author of volumes like Contours of the Kuyperian Tradition: A Systematic Introduction (2017) and Introducing Biblical Hermeneutics: A Comprehensive Framework for Hearing God in Scripture (2015). Craig is currently working on his multi-volume series on Old Testament Origins and the Question of God, the first volume of which appeared in 2022.

1. Create a working Zotero OCR extension.

As of this writing, Zotero OCR hasn’t yet been updated to work with Zotero 6, which you’ve probably gotten via an automatic update. By chance, if you’re still running Zotero 5, you can install the prebuilt Zotero OCR extension just like you would any other extension for Zotero.

Assuming you’re running Zotero 6, however, you’ll need to build the extension for yourself. (Or if you’d rather, you can drop your email into this form, and I’ll be happy to send you a built version of the extension that works for me.)

1.1. If you use Windows, install a Linux terminal client.

If you use Linux or MacOS, you can skip to the next step. But the process for building the Zotero OCR extension requires some command line interaction that Windows doesn’t support by default.((For the essentials of these instructions, I’m grateful to Chris Hoffman, “How to Install and Use the Linux Bash Shell on Windows 10,” How-To Geek, 5 March 2018.)) To install a Linux terminal on Windows 10 or 11,

  1. Search for “Windows features” in the Start menu, and choose the option to turn Windows features on or off.
  2. Find the “Virtual Machine Platform” and the “Windows Subsystem for Linux” options, check them if they’re unchecked, and click OK.
  3. Reboot your computer as prompted.
  4. When you’ve logged back into your computer, install the Ubuntu command line from the Microsoft Store. You can use a different Linux distribution if you like, but the instructions below will assume you’ve installed Ubuntu.
  5. Open the Ubuntu command line app. If prompted, you may need to install the Windows Subsystem for Linux update or other dependencies.
  6. After you’re able to open the Ubuntu command line app successfully, you’ll follow the prompts to create a username and password, which you’ll only use for the Ubuntu command line in Windows. When you’re done, you’ll get to the prompt [username]@[computername]:~$, enter sudo apt install zip unzip to install a needed Linux utility. Once that installs, you’ll be ready to build the Zotero OCR extension.((For this suggestion, I’m grateful to “Update to Allow Installation on Zotero Beta 6,” GitHub, 19 February 2022.))

1.2. Build the Zotero OCR extension.

To build the Zotero OCR extension, open a terminal window on Linux or MacOS or your Ubuntu app on Windows. From there, you’ll then enter the four following commands:((See “Update to Allow Installation on Zotero Beta 6.”))

  1. git clone https://github.com/bbraunj/zotero-ocr.git
  2. cd zotero-ocr
  3. git checkout zotero-beta-6
  4. ./build.sh

When prompted for a version number, enter 6. The build should then successfully complete, leaving you with a zotero-ocr-6.xpi file in your zotero-ocr directory. In Linux or MacOS, you can have Zotero install the extension from there. In Windows, you’ll probably want to move the directory (currently embedded in your Linux subsystem) to somewhere easier for Zotero to access it. To do so, you can enter

  1. cd .. to move into your user directory where you have the zotero-ocr folder and then
  2. mv zotero-ocr /mnt/c in order to move the zotero-ocr folder out your Linux subsystem user folder and onto the root of your C drive.((For information about accessing Linux subsystem files in Windows, see Chris Hoffman, “How to Access Your Ubuntu Bash Files in Windows (and Your Windows System Drive in Bash),” How-To Geek, 26 June 2019.))

In Windows, you can then point Zotero to C:\zotero-ocr\ to find and install zotero-ocr-6.xpi.

The past few weeks, we’ve considered how to expand your research materials by using:

These online repositories like we discussed last week are great for getting access to public-domain titles. But what if you need something that is still under copyright?

Aside from purchasing the resource outright, one obvious way to access a title still under copyright is through a library, whether at your school, simply nearby, or via inter-library loan.

there are also a couple good places online that you might also find helpful. This is particularly true if you need only a modest section of a particular book (e.g., a chapter). Here we’ll focus on just one of these places—Google Books.

In recent days, there’s been no shortage of announcements about plan changes and cancellations in the States due to increasing efforts to halt the spread of COVID-19.

Education and biblical studies have been no exception.

The Society of Biblical Literature and Association of Theological Schools have both announced changes in plans or other advisories for upcoming meetings.

And a growing number of institutions have altered plans for spring classes. Many of these are at least temporarily moving online and away from the classroom.

Problems with Online Education?

Publishable Research

Purpleness takes priority over following discrete rules or lists of criteria. Sometimes you can (and should) break standard rules if that’s what’s needed to create purpleness. E.g., a lack of other recent publications on a topic.

(Of course, you might have sent your submission in a purple font. And in that case, that was definitely the wrong purple. :-) )

Sometimes, you might still find yourself a bit farther afield from where you’d hoped to be. But you’ll be much more likely to be closer.

Having your goal for your research clearly in mind isn’t a foolproof method of ensuring you’ll hit that mark out of the gate

Electronic versus Print Libraries

A great thing about electronic resources is that you can sync them to and store them on multiple devices. That way, they can’t get lost, destroyed, or stolen like physical books can.

Maybe the academic books you use aren’t going to appear on any bestseller lists. But things can still happen.

Years ago, I took a copy of the Florentino Martı́nez and Eibert Tigchelaar’s study edition of the Dead Sea Scrolls with me to Walmart. The checkout line was always long, so I figured I could get in some reading after shopping.

But nope. I turned my back on my cart to pull something off a shelf opposite me. When I turned around, the book was gone.

So, print books aren’t inherently safe. But neither are electronic resources completely foolproof. Files can get corrupted.

How to Take Time Away

can also start to triage what might need to wait for the new year. (With this triaging may come renegotiation with others who might be affected by your possibly completing something a bit later.)

Start by asking yourself questions like:

  • What will have to be true over the coming days for you to unplug from your regular demands?
  • What will need to happen for you to be fully present on your other interests or with your friends, loved ones, or whomever you’ll be spending time with?((For suggesting this general kind of question, I’m grateful to Michael Hyatt.))

With this vision in place, you can then plan your time between now and the start of your holiday activities. You can prioritize the critical few items that help will make your holiday as enriching as possible.

, but also someone who lives a full life as a whole person.

But it’s important time to take. Academic work can be highly engaging, but it’s not the only thing that’s worth your attention.

In the next post, we’ll explore four more strategies for creating space to recharge and engage more fully with life outside the academy.

Is Scripture Food or Drink?

In addition to the main post I’ve been making on Monday each week, I’d like to try adding one on Wednesdays with a bit different focus. In particular, I’d like to discuss briefly select quotations from reading I do that may be valuable for you all.

!\[Alt\](/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/220px-Henri\_de\_Lubac\_S.J.jpg)\[Image courtesy of Wikipedia\](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri\_de\_Lubac)
In Henri de Lubac's magesterial \_Medieval Exegesis\_, the notes are (sadly) endnotes, but they document an extraordinary wealth of supplementary information and comprise about one third of each volume's total pages (!).

In vol. 2, De Lubac quotes Autpert:

> Holy Scripture is sometimes food, and sometimes drink. For in the more obscure matters that can in no way be understood unless they be cleared of knots, it is food; for whatever is explained so as to be understood is, as it were chewed so as to be swallowed. In the clearer matters, however, it is drink; for we swallow drink without chewing (299n85)

Of course, precisely which texts

A Pauline Perspective

In 1787, J. P. Gabler gave his inaugural address at the University of Altdorf. A core point of Gabler’s was to distinguish between the theology of the biblical literature itself and the theology of the church.((Cf. Sandys-Wunsch and Eldredge, “J. P. Gabler,” 157; Scobie, “History of Biblical Theology,” 13; G. E. Wright, “God Who Acts,” 33.))

The way Gabler articulated this distinction entails certain theological losses, some of which may be highly problematic. But Gabler still rendered a valuable service.

He crystallized by afresh the distinction between the meanings of the biblical texts’ own assertions in their own contexts and the meanings frequently assigned to these texts in later interpretation.

Awareness of this distinction is a basic prerequisite if the biblical text is going to push against a problematic interpretation.((Cf. Vanhoozer, Meaning, 218–63; N. T. Wright, New Testament, 50–64.))

If we are to break “the spell of our own fore-meanings,” we must first see that they susceptible to question.((Gadamer, Truth and Method, 281.)) We must see whatever interpretation we hold as one upon which improvement is possible.

After Gabler, some interpreters aimed the text’s voice almost exclusively at critiquing the church’s theology.((E.g., C. F. von Ammon, G. P. C. Kaiser; see Scobie, “History of Biblical Theology,” 13.))

Arguably, these interpreters’ enthusiasm for a distinction between biblical and churchly theology extended too far. But the idea that Scripture can address the church critically lies very near the constitutive, Protestant principles of sola scriptura (scripture alone) and semper reformanda (always reforming).

Thus, Protestant scholars—precisely when they operate as such—are committed a priori to the idea of a Pauline perspective. And part of this commitment means that the Pauline perspective that could exist independently of any perspective currently being propounded in discussions about Paul—whether it be old, new, apocalyptic, within Judaism, or whatever.

To what extent any of these perspectives on Paul has succeeded or will succeed in getting him quite right is a separate issue.

Very likely, the currently available perspectives on Paul do indeed have some important and substantial things right. But those who want to learn—or at least, to be open to learning from Paul what he himself wanted to communicate, must first allow the possibility that Paul may differ from them—that he may affirm or critique their previous understandings of him.

Unless this first step is taken, readers of Paul cannot adequately perceive the range of options for what he may have wished to communicate. And these readers, therefore, will simply and inevitably choose the reading of Paul they find most congenial, irrespective of how their own hermeneutical situations may resemble or differ from Paul’s.((Cf. Gadamer, Truth and Method, 304, 369; “Hermeneutics and ’the Near’”; “The Power of Private Presuppositions”; Sandys-Wunsch and Eldredge, “J. P. Gabler,” 144))

Online Conferences

And now atop that usual challenge are all the additional factors that go along with having a meeting that’s designed to be both in-person and online. This dual mode has some definite upsides. In particular, some of it’s online sessions have been scheduled at times convenient for other parts of the world besides just the time zone for the annual meeting location.

That said, this first run at a dual-mode meeting also presents special challenges. Among these are how, by definition, we’re very much still all re-learning as we go to varying degrees—as has been a common thread the past few years.

Some of what it means to do the conference well will be the same whether you’re attending in person or online or some of both. Other practices will depend on that mode or mixture in which you’re attending. But however that is, the following tips can .

If You’re Attending Online

  1. Observe the appropriate public health protocols.
  2. Have your software and hardware ready.
  3. Set up your microphone for capturing just your voice.
  4. Connect early.
  5. Don’t be afraid to break the ice.
  6. Don’t hog the line.

8. Observe the appropriate public health protocols.

The whole guild of biblical studies will breathe a collective sigh of great relief when COVID-19 is behind us and the “public health” measures necessary on a regular basis go back to things that go without saying. And hopefully, we’re getting really close to that point.

But for the time being, it will improve your in-person attendance if you continue to follow any pertinent guidance about masking, distancing, and the like.

It will help keep you healthy. And even if that’s not particularly a concern for you, it will help keep you from picking something up that you then unknowingly spread to other attendees. And those other attendees not falling ill will definitely help optimize your own conference experience too.

Of course, masking and distancing make in-person meetings rather more awkward. But the burden of asking for those measures shouldn’t have to fall on other attendees.

Instead, take the responsibility on yourself to do what you can to ensure a safe and healthy meeting for everyone. And take that responsibility not grudgingly but charitably and as a way of exercising good, polite neighborliness to the others who are attending in person with you.((Similarly, see also Martin Luther’s Whether One May Flee from a Deadly Plague, reproduced with permission in 2020 by Christianity Today.))

If You’re Attending Online

If you’re attending a conference online, there are also some specific steps you can take to enhance that experience.

9. Have your software and hardware ready.

Well before your first session, be sure to install (or update) and test any software as needed, like Zoom. Also, test your speakers and, if needed, your microphone.

By getting all of your technology set up early, you’ll avoid last-minute troubleshooting frustrations or delays immediately before a session.

If you’re moderating an online session, you might also want to take a few minutes to put together a simple timer background for your webcam.

10. Set up your microphone for capturing just your voice.

If you’re presenting or otherwise likely to speak during the session, the microphone built into your webcam, laptop, or mobile device can do in a pinch. But the audio will be much better for the rest of the attendees if you use a dedicated microphone.

10.1. Choose the right microphone.

One good option is the Samson Q2U. Others can certainly work well also. But you probably do want a “dynamic” microphone and not a “condenser” microphone—however popular some condenser microphones may be.

One of the basic differences between the two is whether they have a “dead spot” where sound gets muffled and, if so, how big that is. Condenser microphones will tend to pick up sound from all around. Dynamic microphones will tend to pick up sound only from the “front,” whether that’s the tip or some specific side of the microphone. Sound from elsewhere will get muffled.

So, a condenser microphone is great if you want to record or stream a conversation in a single room. A dynamic microphone will tend to be better if you want the audio to focus on just one thing—as when you’re the only one talking at a computer.

10.2. Minimize background noise.

But whether you get a dynamic microphone to help you or not, you’ll want to situate your space to minimize background noise as best you can. Your pets are cute, but they’ll be a distraction if they make noise while your microphone is open during the session.

The same is true for other kinds of noises, even if you’re so used to them that you don’t notice them. To help check whether you’ve developed “selective hearing” to tune out certain things that might annoy your audience, try recording on your phone just the audio from the room where you’ll do your online conference session. Then, play back that audio.

What do you hear? What do you hear that you wish you didn’t? If you find something, try as best you can to eliminate it so that it doesn’t become a distraction for your audience.

11. Connect early.

In my first fully online conference, I was scheduled to presented a paper. The morning of my paper, I got on to connect to my session in what I thought was enough time.

It just so happened, however, that my computer also decided that it needed to reboot to install an update that had just come in that morning too. :-|

I ended up still connecting to the session on time even after rebooting and even though I was a bit tighter on the time than I would have liked. But if I hadn’t had the buffer provided by trying to connect to the session early, I could easily have been late for my own paper.

Don’t let that happen to you. Instead, connect ahead of a given session with enough buffer to handle any last-minute issues that arise.

12. Don’t be afraid to break the ice.

“Zoom rooms” and the like do a great job facilitating the structured interaction that occurs in person during paper presentations and discussion times. For the unstructured times before and after a conference session convenes, virtual rooms introduce some special awkwardness.

When you attend a conference in-person, the room allows any number of things to happen before and after the session.

You can sit quietly by yourself. Or you can converse with one or a few other attendees in that session. There might be still more people in the room sitting by themselves or talking in their own groups.

But in a virtual room, everyone attending the session is all in the same group. That can make interaction before and after the session pretty awkward.

If you’re talking to one other person, all the rest of the attendees are listening to your conversation. But the alternative is for you all to sit around staring at each other while you stare into your webcams.

Any way you slice it, the unstructured time before or after a session is going to be awkward. So, try your best not to worry about it.

If everyone’s having a staring contest, feel free to do the same. But also don’t be afraid to break the ice by making some light small talk, especially if you know someone else in the session.

You’ll get to catch up with a colleague. And if anyone else jumps into the conversation, you might meet someone new too.

13. Don’t hog the line.

At the same time, there’s another principle that goes closely along with the fact that you can break the ice. And that is that you shouldn’t hog the line.

A virtual meeting room is a shared communication space. So, in one way, that room is simply another iteration of the concept of “party line” telephone service.

Given that similarity, similar etiquette applies. If you break the ice, be sure also to leave enough space between or after you do so so that others can chime in if they want to as well.

And particularly before the session, it should go without saying that the small talk needs to give way immediately and easily to the moderator when it’s time to bring the session to order.

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