Today, I moderated a remote meeting of 80 members.

Japanese are said to be punctual, but that seems to be "only at the start".

"Many Japanese, when asked to give a presentation, usually fail to finish it in time"

They are too unaware of how uninteresting and boring their presentations are to almost everyone else.

I must have warned them at least five times, 'You have six minutes,' but the shortest presentation was eight minutes, and some exceeded 12 minutes.

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I, as the moderator of the meeting

(1) Declared skipping of question-and-answer session of a session whose time has expired.

(2) Forced to stop accepting questions one minute before,

(3) Waited for 5 seconds for questions only, then nominated attendees in a person directly

The meeting was forced with a declaration of the adoption of a method called

"The moderator's job is to complete the event on time"

A moderator who cannot control the occasion and time is as good as "not there".

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By the way, Ebata's column is described as 'long' in over 90% of the comments -- however, I am not

If you feel painful for "long" sentences, you don't have to read them.

To begin with, what I am writing is a column.

"Column" is a form of literature, the same genre as the novel.

The subjects my columns deal with just happen to be technology, mathematics and statistical results.

Where in the world does anyone complain that "a novel is too long"?

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In contrast, no one can "escape" from the organization's meetings.

An uncontrolled, lazy meeting is pretty much hell for the audience.

Therefore, it is no problem to say that a moderator who cannot control the occasion and time is "annoyingly low".