This is a breakdown of the various types of events being currently run at Interintellect.
Table of Contents
What Is a Salon?
A salon is an evening-length — 1.5 to 4 hours, typically 2-3 — conversation around a specific topic, carrying the atmosphere of a living room gathering.
Salons have limited spots, offer paid but affordable tickets, include a reading list so the discussion can start on a common ground, and respect the Code of Conduct and the Five Rules of Gathering.
ii salons are hosted by ii hosts who have received training, are invited into the online forum, look after their follow-up channel in the forum, and respect the Four Rules of Hosting.
Depending on the COVID rules of each geographical location where Interintellect is present, offline gatherings are again becoming a possibility. If you are interested in hosting an IRL salon, read more about how to run an offline event here.
Salons come in the following formats:
1. Salons
A regular salon is a facilitated discussion with a round of intros. Some hosts use slides and other media materials as part of their facilitation.
2. Workshop Salons
During a workshop salon, something is being made: we produce writing, art, mind maps, some kind of framework for later use, etc..
3. Reading Salons
Reading salons entail not just discussing texts previously read, but reading them aloud on the spot too. Poetry, prose, a scene from a play, or song lyrics may be on the menu. Sometimes, the host brings surprising new material the attendees encounter during the salon for the first time!
4. “Carousel” Salons
We’ve done two of these so far — the Singles Salon and the Friend-Finding Mingle.
At these salons there are breakout rooms and 1:1 sessions, icebreaker questions and a shared “reception hall.” The host decides about all the details and shares the house rules in the event description and at the start of the salon.
If you wish to experiment with the salon format further — music salon, dancing salon, meditation salon — you’re more than welcome!
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IMPORTANT: Salons involving sensitive topics and/or breakout rooms usually need a more rigorous Code of Conduct. There are some good examples online.
Some salons need to be made 18+.
As always, the host is responsible for the safety and comfort of every attendee.
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Salon Series
ii series used to be a loose category — something like “more than one ii salon under the same title” — in some cases selling both series tickets as well as individual tickets. We used to simply invite all who bought a series ticket to the community forum on Discord so the host can chat to attendees between salons within the series…
This structure is undergoing improvements now. This is where the thinking is at the moment:
- Miniseries – features between 2 and 5 episodes
- Series – features 6 episodes or more
Series will also, whenever possible, offer a series ticket at a significant discount compared to buying tickets to each salon individually.
Here is an example of a series page.
Purchasing series tickets entails becoming an Interintellect member. Members will be invited to the community forum on Discord and to our members-only events, both video/IRL and Discord voice hangouts. Memberships will provide not just the discount on this one series ticket, but to all other ii events as well.
Individual salon tickets may become available at the host’s discretion.
Series will have their own landing pages on interintellect.com (just like all ii hosts will get their own host page in the next months).
For now, please get in touch with the team via hello@interintellect.com to list a series, and we’ll get you started right away.
Salon “Tracks”
Tracks are series that don’t have end dates: the ii host starts a track around a specific topic on a specific day of the week or month, and continues indefinitely.
Here is an example of a track: a salon on the topic of physical wellbeing that occurs on the first Monday of each month.
For tracks we won’t sell series tickets. We heartily encourage those visiting our website to buy a subscription though, as a way of keeping in touch with fellow attendees between events, and to get all the other perks the ii subscription provides.
Listing a track is very much possible already: just submit the first salon or salons, specify when the salons will run, and add a Save the Dates section so people can make time for your salons in their calendars.
Other ii Event Types
Book Clubs
A book club is a salon for which the main goal is to discuss a book or other text. Book clubs therefore involve some required reading beforehand.
A book club may be a single salon, or a series or track. A major book club series we had was about the book Scientific Freedom: The Elixir of Civilization, covering one chapter every two weeks. These gatherings were shorter, the attendee circle almost the same each time, the focus being always on the same book. Other book clubs cover smaller pieces like short stories, with each event in a series being independent of the others. There could also be a track running indefinitely, for instance a “Tolstoy” or “Joyce Carol Oates” or “Harlem Renaissance” book club.
SuperSalons
These events feature special guests, sell high-end tickets, have one or two skilled hosts facilitating, are recorded, and tend to include more time carved out for the guest (although they always include extensive Q&A where everyone can share their questions and views). SuperSalons run for 1-2 hours.
See our YouTube for more.
Note that some earlier examples of this type of event were called Talks or Fireside Chats. From now on, they’re simply called SuperSalons.
We are open to anyone bringing in guests and leading these events. To discuss hosting your own SuperSalon, please contact ii Team at hello@interintellect.com.
Members-Only Events
Members of our online forum on Discord — fellow Interintellects — can organise members-only events any time they want.
We’ve had some amazing examples of this, from game nights to Werewolf nights, physical exercise and Scottish trivia, Christmas parties, a Wikipedia competition, introspective workshops, movie nights, and even advice on seasonal depression… Some fellow Interintellects read books such as Gödel, Escher, Bach together.
These events can be any length, tickets can be less limited, and we never charge for entry.
Members-only events are listed on our website along with other events. However, instead of requiring the purchase of paid tickets, they use an RSVP system that can be used only by fellow Interintellects.
In both cases, we add the evens to the public ii calendar, which is available on the website and in the info channel on Discord. It is recommended to add this calendar to your personal calendar.
Host Training Sessions
Hosting Interintellect salons is a fun but challenging experience. To help our hosts be at their best during hosting, we organise regular Host Training sessions. They are recorded, and then pinned into the Host Greenroom and added to Host Hub.
Since the end of 2020, ii hosts have been training fellow ii hosts. This is the direction we would love this to be going, so it is absolutely welcome and encouraged to list a Host Training session around a specific aspect of the hosting experience.
As for how such an event is listed: please refer to the Members-Only section above, for this is still manual as well. For examples of previous sessions and their topics, see the Host Hub.