The use of Twitter hashtags to promote conferences and share presented content is on the rise — an example is the World Seabird Twitter conference, now in its third year. Twitter and other social-media platforms can boost outreach, engagement and peer-to-peer networking beyond conventional conferencing (see also S. D. Silberberg et al. Nature 548, 153–154; 2017).

Twitter accounts that rotate their curators, such as Biotweeps (@biotweeps), are improving science communication (see go.nature.com/2h2wdpu). In June, Biotweeps hosted its first annual conference, featuring 60 presenters from 12 countries covering a range of biological topics. They had just 15–30 minutes to present their tweets. Forced to be creative by the medium's limit of 140 characters, many used GIF images and infographics.

Conference tweets were collected by the hashtag #BTCon17. More than 1,200 people responded worldwide (with a theoretical reach of some 22 million followers). By contrast, 573 participants tweeted at an international urology conference that was promoted on social media (S. E. Wilkinson et al. BJU Int. 115, 839–846; 2015). According to a hashtag report (talkwalker.com), the Biotweeps conference resulted in 9,500 engagements with conference tweets.