Prince Charles speaks - as a hologram!

The Prince of Wales gave a powerful six-minute speech about the environment to 2,500 delegates at the World Future Energy Summit in Abu Dhabi on Monday. Except that he didn't. His content may certainly have been powerful but it was actually pre-recorded in the drawing room at Clarence House last November and then projected as a hologram. The 3D HRH didn't want to leave a massive carbon footprint by flying with his entourage to the United Arab Emirates so he chose an alternative and very newsworthy method of getting his message across:

Fascinating and environmentally friendly - but also perhaps a little worrying.

And it's not just the wonders of modern technology such as holograms, videoconferencing and podcasts which me make wonder about the future of speakers actually giving live presentations in the same room as their audiences, there's also the little matter of future generations' attention spans.

We live in a sound bite society and the clips you hear on news programmes are perhaps half the duration they were a few years ago - and they were brief enough then! Meanwhile, as a member of the audience at a talk I gave yesterday pointed out, TV producers often seem to believe that viewers cannot stay with a segment of speech on a programme unless it is accompanied by loud and, ironically, distracting music.

I am fortunate to speak to mature audiences who are used to listening to longer talks on a regular basis. They would feel short-changed if I only did a few minutes and certainly would not want me to be accompanied by music or other gimmicks!

And for my part, I have the excitement of a live performance, often in front of large groups of people I have never met before. And when I leave, I often feel as if I have made that many new friends - even if I sometimes never see them again.

About 20 years ago, my partner Val and I started regularly visiting  folk clubs. There seemed to me to be something romantic about the performers' lives: travelling, finding the venue, meeting the person who had booked them, setting up, performing for a fair fee to a small but appreciative audience in an intimate setting, chatting to some of the real characters afterwards, selling the odd recording and occasionally reaching a larger audience at a festival or even on radio or TV and earning bigger fees from private bookings.

I'm not musical but years later, public speaking gave me something comparable. My venues are usually hotels, community centres and village halls rather than pubs and I sell books not CDs but it's similar in most ways, right down to having the festivals, radio, TV and corporate work in my credits.

I love the whole business of public speaking, especially because, as an essentially very shy person, it's still sometimes hard for me to believe that I can do it. I love going past a venue where I have spoken in the past, seeing the lights on and knowing that the club or society still meets and is hearing a speaker.

The building next to my flat is a Natural Science Museum which puts on about 80 talks a year (I have, of course, been in there!) and I am always pleased to see their car park full.

And it gives me great satisfaction to know that I have trained a number of students who are now regular speakers on the circuit themselves.

But everything moves on. People lead busy lives and many organisations which book speakers are forced to close down because they cannot attract new, younger members or find volunteers to serve on their committees. I have seen so many disappear. We should all enjoy the luxury of attentive live audiences while we can.

Public Speaking Tip #119: If you are a speaker, then you should, as the saying goes, 'make hay while the sun shines' before new technologies, declining attention spans and changing tastes diminish the number of opportunities to speak. Few experiences can beat the satisfaction of delivering a decent length presentation to an appreciative audience who are just feet away from you.