無聊大會受熱捧 活動非常賣座

Most conferences tend to be boring, although not intentionally so. But there is one event that is deliberately dedicated to all things dull and tedious – the 'Boring Conference' hosted every year at London. Believe it or not, it's a sell-out event where attendees are treated to talks on all sorts of boring things like paper bags, toilet roll quality control, lamp posts, and bricks.

大多數會議往往都很無聊，儘管這並不是組織者的本意。但是有人故意組織一場會議，說的都是全然無趣又乏味的事物，那就是每年在倫敦舉辦的“無聊大會”。信不信由你，這個活動非常賣座，與會者能聽到的就是關於各種各樣無聊事情的講話，比如紙袋、捲筒衛生紙的質量控制、燈柱，和磚塊。

How did such a thing as a Boring Conference come to exist, you ask? Well, it all started in 2010, when the man in charge of organizing an event called the Interesting Conference canceled the whole thing, saying that he was too busy. James Ward, an English book author and marketer, replied to the announcement, saying that he liked boring things and that they should be celebrated too. His social media post got a lot of people interested in a possible event about boring things and he started getting questions about where to buy tickets for it. That year, Ward organized the world's first Boring Conference.

你要問了，像“無聊會議”這樣的活動是怎麼發展起來的呢？是這樣的，它起步於2010年，當時負責組織一個叫做“趣味大會”的人說他太忙了，就取消了那次活動。詹姆斯•沃德是一位英文圖書作者兼營銷人員，他在社交媒體上發帖迴應這一聲明說，他喜歡無聊的事，無聊的事也應該慶祝。他的帖子引發了許多人對這個可能會存在的關於無聊事情的活動的興趣，於是人們開始問他在哪裏能買到這種活動的票。那一年，沃德組織了世界上第一場“無聊大會”。

This year's Boring Conference, held at London's Conway Hall on 7 May, was the sixth consecutive event in the last six years and all 425 tickets were sold out in just a few days. Ward always opens up the event himself, because he likes to "set the bar low". If people start with poor expectations, then the show can only improve, he says. Last year, he spoke about postcard photos of the old Post Office Tower.

今年的無聊大會於5月7日在倫敦康威會堂舉辦，這是過去六年來連續舉辦的第六次活動，一共425張票，短短几天就賣光了。沃德總是第一個講話，因爲他想把“目標設低”。他說如果人們一開始就不抱什麼期望的話，演出就只會越來越好。去年他講的是明信片上老郵政大樓的照片。

According to the event's website, "The Boring Conference is a one-day celebration of the mundane, the ordinary, the obvious and the overlooked; subjects often considered trivial and pointless, but when examined more closely reveal themselves to be deeply fascinating."

根據此活動的網站，“無聊大會爲期一天，是一場慶祝平凡普通、顯而易見卻又容易被忽略的事物的活動；那些經常被視作微不足道、毫無意義的事物，一旦更仔細地審視它們，就會發現其中深藏的魅力。”

Past topics of discussion at the Boring Conference have included – sneezing, IBM tills, toast, vending machine sounds, barcodes, the Shipping Forecast and other such topics of no interest to anyone. This year's event had 20 speakers cover similar snoozeworthy subjects – such as the domestic inkjet printers of 1999, German film titles, cooking elaborate meals with hotel room equipment, and the similarities between the world’s national anthems – in 10-minute slots.

無聊大會過去討論的話題包括打噴嚏、IBM收款機、烤麪包、自動售貨機的聲音、條形碼、海上天氣預報，還有其它類似的沒人感興趣的話題。今年的大會有20位演講者，話題也同樣讓人聽了打瞌睡——比如說1999年的家用噴墨式打印機、德國電影的名字、怎麼用旅館房間裏的設備做出精緻菜餚、還有世界各國國歌的相似性，每個人的發言時間爲10分鐘。

If you're wondering about the purpose of such a pointless conference, Ward says that it's meant to be "a one-day celebration of the mundane, the ordinary, the obvious and the overlooked." He adds that the topics covered may be considered "trivial and pointless, but when you look at them more closely, they reveal themselves to be actually deeply fascinating." So it's actually only the topics that are boring – the speakers are expected to find a way to make their talks interesting.

如果你想知道舉辦這種沒有意義的大會目的何在，沃德說“這一天是爲了慶祝平凡普通、顯而易見卻又容易被忽視的事物。”他補充說，人們可能認爲涉及的話題“瑣碎無味，但當你更細緻地審視它們，就會發現它們深藏的魅力。”因此，事實上只有話題是無聊的——人們期待着演講者能夠找到方法，讓他們的講話變得有趣。

"The basic idea is that the theme needs to be boring, but the content shouldn't be," explained Ward, who works in marketing and has also written a book called Adventures in Stationery: A Journey Through Your Pencil Case. "There has to be something in the topic that a speaker with a real enthusiasm for it can bring out and make interesting. In fact most things, if you look at them in enough detail, can become fascinating. There's almost always something there."

“基本理念就是，主題是應該是無聊的，但內容不無聊，”沃德解釋道，他在營銷領域工作，還寫了一本書，叫做《在文具中冒險：鉛筆盒之旅》。“話題中必須有演講者真正熱愛的東西，這樣纔可以把它挖掘出來，使它變得有趣。事實上大多數東西，只要你足夠細緻地觀察它們，都會變得迷人。幾乎總會有迷人的地方。”

So in the past, a talk about electric hand dryers has been made interesting with a story about "a man so fascinated by them that he had installed a Dyson Airblade in his house." And a speaker scheduled to talk about the relative weights and densities of different kinds of metals enthralled the audience by rollerblading around the hall the entire time. It's no wonder that the Boring Conference is sold out every year, then!

所以之前關於幹手機的演講就因爲一個故事而變得非常有趣——“一個男人對幹手機非常着迷，於是就在家裏裝了一臺戴森Airblade幹手機。”還有一個演講者，本來計劃講不同金屬的相對重量和密度，可他全程都在大廳裏溜旱冰，觀衆們都被他迷住了。怪不得無聊大會每年都這麼賣座！