This whole thing is being judged? Suddenly I’m really invested.

A dramatisation of a date between an inflatable saxophone and a picture frame. I’m not sure what’s going on, but I think someone might have spiked my coffee at lunch.

Another Christmas presentation. There seems to be a theme emerging in this Summer away day.

Up next, a story about Elton John at Glastonbury. This performance definitely wins the award for the best costume so far.

Now we have two reluctant presenters. They are up with the “12 trash gifts of Christmas”. Delivered with a real sense of disdain, that was up there with my favourites.

The next group are up with “The Wrong Show”. A parody of the One Show with some real focus on staging. Great acting gets it a thumbs up from me.

Next team are up to discuss “Basecamp Studios”, the new Guardian Hollywood film studio. They are performing “Partygate: The Movie”. Short, sweet and disturbingly accurate.

Now up we have a team talking about “Lego Fridays”. Four team members are now having their lego builds live judged by Nichola Johnson. It cannot be confirmed whether or not the winner will get a monetary prize.

The next team have brought a first aid kit to the stage. A little bit ominous …

The next team to take the stage have done so with an abundance of props and visual aids. Who’s to say what’s in store?

Next to take the stage “Chocolate coins as a new currency”. Sounds delicious. I’m in!

Kath is now taking questions from the floor. A variety of questions and some insight into her cultural influences (a lot of The Smiths).

Some of the perks of the job? Kath has met seven UK prime ministers and three US presidents.

Caspar asks, “Does the news ever get too upsetting?” Kath responds that the proximity to the news may not give her the chance to have those feelings. She says that something that probably helps her is the fact that she feels as if she is trying to make a difference to the problems every day.

Caspar then asks Kath about the value of print in the modern, digital-first climate. She explains the extent to which this is an important part of our identity and something that sets us apart from other publishers.

Kath talks to the department about how her day to day job works. The day is split into journalism focused work in the morning and then more strategic and organisational work throughout the rest of the day and afternoon. She touches upon the dangers and opportunities of AI in the future and some of her favourite apps (aside from our own of course).

Things are really ramping up. It looks like there will be everything from duelling elves to a puppet show and everything in between. Emotions are at fever pitch as the teams scramble to tighten up their scripts, presentations and cheap costumes.

There are rumours floating around that one of the presentations will be “a mixed media show combining found footage and live improvised action”. I may have undersold the amateur level of these dramatics. We could be seeing one of these performances debut at indie film festivals in the near future.

It’s looking like some of the teams are working on fully acted out scenarios. The anticipation is building here for the presentations. Who doesn’t love hurried amateur dramatics?

In keeping with tradition, Colin King has snapped a pic of me liveblogging while I was unaware. I’m not sure what I’m looking at here, but it looks like it is stressing me out.

There is a creative hum around the space. People are donning strange outfits and giggling as they create their wacky and wonderful stories. I can simultaneously see someone throwing a beach ball, two people shaking cheerleader’s pom-poms, a person playing an inflatable guitar and someone wearing reindeer antlers.

People’s names will be omitted for the sake of their own dignity.

Shervin is giving everyone the lowdown on the next activity. Everyone is to split into teams and pick up a random set of items from the stage. There are hats, scarves, novelty glasses, decks of cards and all other manor of joke shop accoutrements.

The teams are now groups of journalists after the big scoop. They are being given 40 minutes to create and report on a story related to the objects they have collected. At the end of the time, all of the teams will present their cutting edge journalism back to the room.

This could be interesting.

Alert. David Blishen has made a list. He has gathered thoughts from people around the room on what they are most scared of. From not being able to publish, to being locked out of the systems for six months and anything in between. I’m sure it makes for terrifying reading for anyone and that he is keeping it in a safe place.

First up, how would we rebuild the department from scratch. Group Product Manager Jess Lane shares some interesting details around restructure of teams and how this may impact speed of delivery. Then a bombshell … the group propose a change to the name of the department!

It’s nearly time on session two. I’m hearing there will be a brief summary of each discussion back to the room. Let’s see what the future holds for us all.

And that’s time on session one. For session two we have eight more topics for people to join. I can see a big congregation of people for a chat on AI. Maybe ChatGPT will be writing this live blog next year?

Philip McMahon takes to the stage and gives the 5-minute warning. The groups are being encouraged to wrap up their discussions.

A calm has fallen over the great hall. There are pockets people in focused and collaborative discussion on various big topics. It is lovely to see.

We are through the icebreakers now (mostly unscathed) and on to the real substance of the day. Next up, the “unconference”. The department have been asked to suggest topics for eight discussions that will happen in different groups around the room.

Sabina Bejasa-Dimmock takes the mic to explain the rules. You are free to join and leave a discussion as you please and are invited to move around to different discussions as you see fit. Don’t overstay your welcome if you feel you are not engaged or do not wish to contribute.

There are such topics of discussion as:

• The decline of mobile web
• The need for green software practices
• If we built the department from scratch, what would we do differently?

These are some big themes, I’m still trying to figure out the rules!

The first activity of the day is “Getting to know you Bingo”. The aim of the game, find someone in the room with every characteristic on your list. The floor is suddenly awash with people striding around trying to fill their Bingo sheets. Who loves Beyoncé? Who has never been on a plane? Who hates summer? All will be revealed.

Wow, it’s good to be back! Today we’re at the wonderful Bishopsgate Institute. David Blishen (Group Product Manager) has informed me this is the venue of his finals exams, although he would not disclose the year.

The day kicks off, as always, with an introduction from our Chief Product Officer Caspar Llewellyn Smith. There was something about a statue of a goat that I didn’t quite catch… hope it wasn’t important.