Oct 27, 2011 admin
I recently attended the Emerging Technology conference at MIT. I’d attended it several years ago and totally enjoyed myself. I went this year as the event photographer and thought it was even better.
Here’s what made this event so special. First, even though the topic was technology, very few of the people presenting were there to talk about products. Most were talking further in the future – where cool things happen. The people presenting were also very deep into their areas. Many were academics, several were from business (R&D types who might as well been academics) and a few from government.
Here were a few of the highlights that have stayed with me since the event. I’ve provided links to each of the presentations if you’re interested.
Juan Enriquez, of Excel Venture Management, discussed how silly our view of the universe is if we believe we are the sole purpose of its existence. He talked about evolution and how our species overlapped with other hominid species at several points in history and why there’s no reason to assume we won’t co-exist with other hominid species in the future. He questioned what went into defining a species and how different people would need to be for them to be considered a different species and how we might impact the development of variations of our species in the future.
Craig Gentry, of IBM, explained homomorphic encryption to allow functions in the cloud. Even though the concept was incredibly dense and complex, Craig managed to explain it so clearly and in such an accessible and engaging way that people not only seemed to understand what he was talking about but really enjoyed hearing him explain it. I know I felt that way but try as I might I can’t explain the idea to anyone. ☹
Jim Mainard, of DreamWorks, talked about the future of 3D. This one was especially cool to me for three reasons. First, I like to fool around with video so it was neat to hear from the person who heads production at DreamWorks. Second, I just got a 3D TV and was curious about what’s next and just how obsolete what I have is. Finally, I dug the geek out that was this session. Mainard talked about how our eyes can be tricked into seeing stereoscopically by technology and it was fascinating. During the Q&A session an engineer from Intel – who also works on 3D technology – got up and it lead to a really interesting exchange.
Deb Roy, of BlueFin Labs, shared how they are looking at the relationship between television and social media. It was interesting to hear about how impressions generated by television were leading to expressions in social channels. Word of mouth has obviously been around for a while but BlueFin has systemized an approach for developing an understanding of how word of mouth functions in the social media space. They started by building a machine able to ingest ALL television and then layered conversations over it to see the connections. It was very impressive. Roy suggested that their approach could be used to adjust content to meet the needs of the audience engaged through social channels or to target advertising more effectively based on a real understanding of audience interests. It all sounded good to me until I spoke with another attendee who pointed out just how small the Twitter audience they were analyzing was. She made an excellent point. Nevertheless, what Roy and his colleagues are doing is pretty neat.
Joi Ito, the director of the Media Lab, talked about his thoughts on the Lab, his imaginings of the Lab as a network, his approach to investing, World of Warcraft and how all of these things are connected and influence each other. He’s an incredibly appealing guy with a great story and a fascinating view of the world.
One of the highlights of the event is the TR35, 35 innovators under 35. Unfortunately not all of the presentations were recorded, which is too bad. One of my favorite presentations was about photography and how it could be used to generate more immersive experiences of space. Another innovator talked about approach being used in India to help kids with cerebral palsy communicate more effectively and become more integrated in their communities. One woman presented on developing AIDS education in a way that is being embraced – even in countries where sex education is forbidden.
I am not an expert in any of these areas but, as is always the case when one steps out of bounds, I met a lot of people who were just plain interesting: The woman from Tokyo with whom I had lunch and a fun discussion about music; a woman from Toronto who seemed like I’d known her for years; a student from China who had developed a matching system for companies at events; and so many more.
I enjoy stepping outside the lines of my professional life because it feeds fresh perspectives and creativity. I might have even taken better pictures that day. And I certainly added a few shots to my 1,000 faces project.
