by Ankit Agarwal, Ants Maran, Chris Broadfoot, Josh Marti and Nick Such
The prevalence of location-based services has been rising over the past few years, but they have yet to venture into the place where people spend 80% of their lives: inside buildings. Startups and large corporations alike are racing to build the infrastructure to make indoor LBS possible. Hear from a few of the players in indoor mapping and indoor positioning technologies as they discuss the future of indoor navigation.
by Ben Milne, Bo Fishback and Jeff Slobotski
With easy access to new technologies, resources, and ideas, more and more startups outside the Valley and the Alley are finding early success in places like Kansas City, Missouri and Des Moines, Iowa.Having assisted or launched several startups outside the traditional ecosystems, Dwolla’s Ben Milne and Zaarly’s Bo Fishback will discuss the role that the Internet has had in leveling the playing field for the builders of the 21st century. Moderated by Big Omaha and Silicon Prairie News founder, Jeff Slobotski, the candid conversation will provide audiences an unfettered, behind-the-scenes look at how one region is overcoming the odds and cultivating an entirely new kind of startup manifesto."
by Aimee Viles, Andy Cohen, Dave Serwatka, Lisa Hsia and Tom Colicchio
Bravo’s interactive late-night talk show, “Watch What Happens Live,” is coming to SXSW. Meet the on and off-screen digital mavens, including the show’s host Andy Cohen, Tom Colicchio (“Top Chef” judge), Lisa Hsia, Aimee Viles and Dave Serwatka. In Cohen’s SXSW Clubhouse, these visionaries will illustrate how “Top Chef 9” brought multi-platform storytelling beyond the linear screen. When Bravo embarked on their transmedia mission in the fall of 2011, they broke new ground with digital innovations and fostered a unique two-way fan/cast relationship. Dive deep with Bravo into their latest industry first and learn the return on investment for the network and for the fan. Through this soup-to-nuts presentation, discover why transmedia is the future of the entertainment industry.
by Cindy Au, Kellee Santiago, Matthew Kozlov, Michael Shirley and Ted Regulski
Independent game development is stronger than ever and this panel will highlight alternative sources of funding that are not dependent on the traditional publisher funding model. Did you know that the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) funds video game creation? The NEH's Michael Shirley will offer insight into their grant writing process. Kellee Santiago will discuss Indie Fund's commitment to help indie developers get, and stay, financially independent. Kickstarter's Cindy Au will review the new crowdfunding milestones reached with their vibrant, gaming community. Ted Regulski, from Sony (SCEA), will talk about Sony's PubFund. Matt Kozlov will explain how Moonshark, backed by CAA and Qualcomm, funds and publishes mobile games by pairing Hollywood creatives with developers. Join us in an informative panel that will walk through processes, present examples of successful projects funded and provide an occasion for attendees to discuss their projects with these panelists.
by Allan Leinwand, Ari Levy, Darryl Eaton, George Miranda and Megan Wohlford
Over 25 years ago, Super Mario was the only one who could say he was gaming in the cloud, stomping Goombas, eating mushrooms and occasionally using extraordinary leaping skills to jump from cloud to cloud in search of Princess Peach Toadstool. Fast forward to over a decade later and come hear from Rackspace, Zynga, EA Games and RightScale how they are also gaming in the cloud. Cloud Gaming is the next generation in online gaming. The main upside to using the cloud is that huge upfront costs are gone. Users don’t have to get expensive and bulky consoles - all they need is a reliable and fast Internet connection and service providers can provide an almost seamless and quick online gaming experience. The panelists will talk about how gaming leaders are using the cloud to keep track of in-game player achievements and building out the software. They can also discuss how they are relying on the cloud to provide the scalability needed as the games gain more users and functionality.
by Edward Morris, James Slezak, Tara DePorte and Paul D Miller (aka DJ Spooky)
Electronic musician, turntablist and author DJ Spooky (Paul D. Miller) joins Ed Morris (Canary Project), James Slezak (Purpose.com) and Tara DePorte (Human Impacts Institute) in an interactive session to explore how social entrepreneurs, artists and creative technologists are combining forces to reinvent the movement to evolve beyond fossil fuels.
20 years after the 1992 Rio Earth Summit and the first global pledge to stop climate change, major polluters in the United States can still emit unlimited quantities of carbon into our atmosphere at no cost. Meanwhile, a well-funded machine works 24/7 to convince Americans there's nothing bad happening - so oil, gas and coal companies continue business as usual. Clearly the green movement needs to take it up a notch. So what is being done to apply cutting-edge social organizing technology, smart branding, product design and the creative arts to solve this problem? How can this bottom-up work support the national and global challenge? What else do we need to do?
by Jess Zimbabwe, Suzi Sosa, Barbara Brown Wilson and John Peterson
A new movement is gaining momentum in the design world— a movement to expand the applications of high design beyond its elitist client base to solve complex social problems. This panel will engage an array of leaders in the public interest design movement who use design thinking in various ways to address global challenges and engender social innovation at different scales. John Peterson will bring his experience developing the largest interactive matchmaking database for pro bono design services between top architecture firms and deserving nonprofits to the discussion; Jess Zimbabwe’s contribution will be informed by work empowering civic leaders to use design thinking to solve public problems; John Bielenberg will bring his perspective on the influence of graphic design campaigns to bring awareness to complex social problems; while Barbara Brown Wilson will draw from her work in higher education to discuss the role of active learning and interactive online project evaluation to empower students to become social innovators. Suzi Soza, from the RGK Center for Philanthropy and Community Service’s Dell Social Innovation Competition, will moderate the panel.
by Jack Welde, Adrian McDermott, Christine Lagorio, Dave Altarescu and Holger Luedorf
Foursquare, Spotify, Zendesk and Smartling share how they leverage today's mega-trends - social, local, mobile, and cloud - to meet the challenges and exploit the opportunities of the New Internet. Users from India to Indiana expect to interact with brands on any device, from any location, in their native language, and via their favorite social networks. Companies that actively engage customers in this personalized way will reap the rewards of the New Internet. Do you have the tools and strategies to truly connect in this new online market? Join this session to get insight from the best. Moderator: Christine Lagorio, executive editor, Inc.com. This session is sponsored by Smartling.
by Amy Jackson, Gina Bianchini, Jason Putorti and Whitney Hess
”Matchmaker, matchmaker, make me a match, find me a find, catch me a catch…”,lyrics from Fiddler on the Roof about finding a perfect partner. Wouldn’t it be great if you could have someone to guide you towards what is a match for you, advise you in your career life, help you weed through the losers to find the fabulous ‘one’ that will make you whistle on your way to work AND whistle on the way home?
In Hunt or Be Hunted - How to get the Design Job you Really Want, you will be privy to the insights and success stories of three of the industry’s most respected representatives in their knowledge domains. You will also hear from a leading expert in the placement of designers. Each will relate real-world experience, guiding audience members through the maze of questions a designer has in this frenetic job market.
Who are you as a designer? What do you want to do, and how do you know it's the right thing.
What's your story? How to present yourself, your portfolio, and where you want to be.
Where should you be full time or freelance? What that means to your life, your career and how you are viewed.
When is it right? To look, to change, to know if this is the one.
How do you get there? Choosing the right company, assessing/selling to what they need, closing the deal.
Don’t be left in the dark. Don’t make blind decisions. Be informed, be guided, then be sure. Listen to these respected resources to help yourself to, “…find me the perfect match.”
by Christian Sandvig, Jason Rockwood, Michealene Risley, Nick Szuberla and Ed Lee
Earlier this year, United Nations special rapporteur Frank La Rue overwhelmingly declared access to the internet as "an indispensable tool for realizing a range of human rights, combating inequality, and accelerating development and human progress." In particular, the report focuses on the ability of the internet to facilitate communication and collaboration -- hallmark features of social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook, both of which played important roles in this year's Arab Spring uprisings. This panel aims to discuss the topic of social media access for populations which are typically denied internet-based contact with other humans: prisoners, the homeless, and the urban and rural poor.
The questions the panel explores will look at whether or not the reasons these groups are denied access is in fact justified, or if instead, efforts and considerations need to be made to revisit these communities. For example:
· Are the poor denied access because the free market simply hasn't trickled down to them yet? Or should the government intervene to provide internet access as a public good?
· Is the use of social media by convicts to commit more crimes reason enough to deny 2.2 million Americans access to connections to their loved ones and family back home? Could social media be used instead to support the prison systems aims of rehabilitation and preparation for society? Can we really expect someone
by Ben Siscovick, Chris Wiggins, Renee DiResta, Roger Ehrenberg and Zach Sims
New York is now the #2 startup hub in the country and rapidly rising; however, single most consistent reason given for NYC’s failure to nurture a culture of innovation is Wall Street: it sucks engineers in, drains them of their creativity, and stuffs them with so much cash they can never be “lean” again. This panel includes people arguing against Wall Street as a force for good, people arguing for Wall Street as a natural career path to startups, and people working to “keep kids off the Street” (i.e., keep engineering students from joining Wall Street hedge funds and I-banks).
by Steve Blank, Manuel Rosso and Patrick Vlaskovits
Talk by legendary startup guru Steve Blank on today's world of tech entrepreneurship, followed by an opportunity to hear from the authors of upcoming startup books.
by Jack Jania, Ryan Hughes, Toni Merschen and Gordon Beatty
The credit card industry in America has backed itself into a corner - the rest of the world moved to EMV while the U.S. drug its feet. The US is now the only G20 country not utilizing chip and PIN or contactless payment solution. The mobile payments industry is careening down a similar path. Each player in the mobile payment space is vying for control over the consumer and, in the end, profit. It is beneficial to have so many solutions to meet different consumer needs, but they must be backward and forward compatible with the ability to easily integrate into all available MNOs, FIs and other third party outlets. An open system where all of these payment methods can work together is essential to the mass adoption and success of mobile payments. This panel will discuss the history of payment (focusing on credit card use as it applies to mobile payment), security issues, open systems/competing solutions and hurdles facing the industry. This session is part of the Big Data Track sponsored by Gemalto.
by Amy Parnell, Benjamin Smithee, Elizabeth Sartin and Thomas Marks
In today’s online social world, most people maintain several different social profiles that span across friends, business networking, online dating and entertainment/lifestyle. One person’s public persona on each of these different types of social sites could be vastly different than the information they will share on the others. What are the psychologies and mental models at play that provide a preconceived notion of what personal information should be shared in different contexts? What challenges does each profile team face in overcoming such pre-existing beliefs?
Discuss why online social users create unique personas between these different sites, why the content that is shared across these different communities can be so dramatically different and what challenges the social media industry faces in regards to contending with fundamental human psychology. Particants on this panel include leads from Match.com, LinkedIn and TripIt.
by Archana Prasad, Nandu Madhava, Sean Blagsvedt, Sonny Caberwal and Anshuman Bapna
Most people immediately think of “outsourcing” when you mention technology businesses in India. However, there is a reason that Facebook, Zynga, GroupOn, LinkedIn, and a wave of other Web 2.0 businesses have recently opened offices in India – and no, it isn’t solely for outsourced technical support.
There are an estimated 100+ million Indians currently online, and with advancements in 3G mobile networks, that number is estimated to double over the next 2 years. The Indian market for internet services looks similar to the USA circa 1999, with several key differences – namely the preference for accessing the internet over lost cost mobile devices and payment methods that are not credit-card based.
In our SXSW panel last year, we brought you several start-up CEOs, angel investors, and a New York Times columnist to share their experience with capturing the Indian opportunity. If you create online or mobile services, and have a goal of reaching a massive user base, then you can’t miss attending our 2012 panel!
by Chris Bennett, Hadiyah Mujhid, Monique Woodard and Nnena Ukuku
This workshop session is taught by Black Founders Startup Ventures. Black Founders Startup Ventures was founded to increase the success of black entrepreneurs in tech through educational workshops and events. What is little known about Black Founders is the stories of its co-founders and how helping others has led to a path of opportunity for their own independent tech startups. Meet the co-founders of Black Founders, a coder, lawyer, marketing guru, and product guy, and learn how their contributions to their community has ultimately taught them to be better entrepreneurs.
by Karen McGrane, Kristina Halvorson, Mark McCormick, Erin Kissane and Joe Gollner
It's official: "content strategy" has become a trendy buzzword phrase that everyone is using to describe everything remotely related to content. SEO content strategy! Social media content strategy! Content marketing content strategy! Wait. This sucks. Weren't we just starting to focus on The Important Stuff? The messy, complicated content stuff that companies have been ignoring for years? What needs to happen now if we're finally going to get this content thing right? Four of the brightest minds in content strategy will tackle some the toughest issues our companies are facing: cross-platform distribution, governance, legacy content, distributed publishing, and trying to prepare our content for future technologies we can't possibly predict. This Future of Journalism Track is sponsored by The Knight Foundation.
Do you remember when you cracked open that shoebox full of snapshots in your grandmother's attic and discovered a past generation? Will your grandchildren be able to have the same experience? Will they be able to log in and dig up your Facebook albums? Will they be able to boot up your old iPhone? Hundreds of thousands of photographs are uploaded to online services every day with little consideration for the temporal nature of everything we put in the cloud. If Kodak decides to stop making film, the photographs in your closet will remain, but the same is not true if Facebook decides to shutter its photo business. And while a tattered photograph continues to tell a story, a corrupted hard drive or a hacked account can destroy a lifetime of photos in an instant. Is a shoebox full of photographs simply nostalgia, or is it more? Are the images we take just for us, or do we have a responsibility to leave behind more than just a pile of bits for future generations to discover?
by Kim Hart, Brian Stelter, Jake Bialer and Stacey Higginbotham
How did print and online coverage of SOPA impact the public's understanding of this proposed legislation? What outlets were most aggressive in tacking this story? If the blackout had not occurred, would this story have gained the attention it eventually did? Also, how will proposed legislation such as SOPA impact the media -- and how does this potential impact color various media outlet's coverage?
by Esther Dyson, Jerry Levin and Steven Krein
Legendary CEO Jerry Levin and Futurist and Health Investor Esther Dyson are interviewed by StartUp Health Co-founder Steven Krein in a dynamic session to discuss how to transform health and wellness entrepreneurship in America. Steve will engage Jerry and Esther and the audience in a thought provoking discussion on how entrepreneurs are the solution to changing healthcare in our country and how to establish the entrepreneurship culture throughout the nation in sectors like health and wellness. They will discuss how can entrepreneurs, investors, healthcare professionals and organizations can be collaborate in this revolution. This Future of Health Track is sponsored by Aetna.
by George Hotz
You are turing computable. Yet the three pounds in your head is orders of magnitude more powerful than all the silicon based compute power on earth, draws between 20 and 40 watts, and we have almost no clue how it works. In the coming decade, we will get our first glimpses into this magic box, and unveil age old questions such as the nature of consciousness. Coming from a reverse engineering background, I will propose some experiments to finally start cracking the problem open. Imagine implanting a communications cortex into brains before the regions are specialized. Envision a high bandwidth pipe into the seat of consciousness. Forget virtual reality, what if we mess with the brain's data structures on a lower level? I hope to leave you with a vision of what will be possible; the coming merger of man and machine may be crazier than we all think.
by Kevin Winston, Meghan McCain, Miles Beckett and Nathan Coyle
Lights, Camera, Log-on. The evolution of social media has provided personalities the opportunity to manage & build their brand online. Celebrities create & share original content with followers & often interact with them directly. Leveraging the existing fan base, celebrities are building huge online followings for their sites, Twitter, Facebook & more. Join the innovators of social media platforms for Lauren Conrad, Meghan McCain, the Jonas Brothers & Kraft and Walgreens as they discuss the impact for celebrities & brands. Online celebrity communities provide significant value to marketers & brands & financial opportunity for the personalities. This panel discusses the value, growth and phenomenon of celebrity brands online.
by Aaron Batalion, Dharmesh Shah, Joe Zadeh, Thomas Korte and Zach Nies
Startup Case Studies' from Airbnb, LivingSocial, HubSpot, & Rally Software on measuring success including lessons learned with pivots, metrics, and growth.
by Johan Bollen, Joshua Greenberg, Lee Dirks and Marguerite Avery
Data are the building blocks of information, fueling our algorithmic digital world. But with so much data being produced, how can we process it? Visualization techniques allow users to understand vast amounts of data that we can’t parse. Get up to speed on techniques of data visualization from scientific researchers and scholars working in informatics, computer science, and physics – and see how these tools can help you understand Twitter. And data analysis and visualization isn’t just for science. The digital humanities movement shows us that innovative data practices aren’t just for science anymore. See innovative digital humanities research in data mining and visualization that will have you thinking differently about literature and history. This panel focuses on developments in data visualization strategies but will also covers the basics of data, some major issues with data analysis and data visualization, and prominent theories of visualization.
by James Taylor, Kat Steinmetz, Philip Rosedale, Thomas Malone and Zach Ware
As technology has increasingly created a number of self-organizing online or real communities, companies are also experimenting with cultural changes having a common thread of decentralization. For example, anonymous surveys, voting systems for both customers and internal employees, organic management, and peer-based recognition systems are becoming more commonly used. Firms like Burning Man, Second Life, and Zappos are exploring and using non-traditional techniques to structure their organization and develop their people. What are these alternative strategies and why are companies using them? What’s worked and what hasn’t? We’ll show you specific ways to start experimenting with decentralization at your company, with questions and discussion amongst a diverse group of experienced panelists.
by Aziz Gilani, David Cohen, Frank Gruber and Gabriella Draney
It seems like just about every other day a new startup accelerator program is hatched. Is this a phenomenon or just a fade? This panel will explore the global startup accelerator explosion and share the latest quality rankings. The panel will consist of a well rounded group with representatives from the three top ranked U.S. accelerator programs as they look to share some of the secrets to their program success.
by Bill Squadron, Clay Walker, Greg Jennings, Stephania Bell and Jason Kint
Fantasy sports began in the 1960s as a way for sports junkies to "interact" more with their favorite sports by selecting their own rosters and competing against like minded sports junkies. Until the mid-1990s, distribution of the game was limited to newspapers and magazines and league scoring was done by hand, thus limiting the number of participants. Improvements in technology, specifically the Internet, led to unprecedented growth and it also helped spawn the first real online "social networks", as fantasy players went online to talk smack with one other, trade players and review expert opinions. Today, every major media company and every professional sports league operates some type of fantasy league. There are cable programs and entire satellite TV packages dedicated to serving the fantasy audience--NFL Red Zone on Direct TV. Updates come to mobile devices and there are hundreds of iPhone, Android and Facebook fantasy sports apps and games. Given the continued growth of fantasy sports, where does it go from here?
by Christopher Mooney, Corynne McSherry, Ethan Oberman and Randy Cadenhead
The Internet is a fantastic resource for sharing and storing ideas, information, and creative works. But users -- individuals and companies -- can't take advantage of that bounty without help from a network of large and small service providers, from social media services like Facebook to storage services such as DropBox and SpiderOak. Too often, these providers are cowed by legal threats into taking down perfectly legal material (like the Facebook page you use to network for your business) or revealing private information about their users. How can you earn your users' loyalty by doing better, and how can you help ensure that the services on which you rely do right by you and your customers? What legal risks do you need to watch out for, and how can you make them go away? A group of experienced lawyers and business owners will help you answer these questions from a legal and practical perspective.
by Bianca Bosker, Margaret Johnson, Susan Orlean, Tiffany Shlain and Lisa Ling
Women tend to pursue what has been called the 'iconic self,' a flawless version of ourselves that we project to the world: a woman with the right job, reputation, looks, home, family -- the list goes on. When it comes to creating that ideal image, technology has arguably raised the stakes even further. Now we have to construct a perfect self to present across many channels and platforms. Who should you be on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+? What parts of yourself should you expose, when do you draw the line, and what if you cross it? Is it even possible to be authentic online? On this panel we'll delve into the sometimes paralyzing performance anxiety technology produces, how we can mitigate it, and discuss thorny questions about what should and should not be revealed online. And, once you've solved that dilemma, how to know who you really are in the midst of all these iterations.
by Scott Cook, Todd Park and Macon Phillips
Lean Startup' Author Eric Ries hosts a fireside chat with Macon Phillips (Director of Digital Strategy, US White House), Todd Park (CTO, Department of Health & Human Services), and Scott Cook (CEO, Intuit) on how Silicon Valley is inspiring the government and enterprise sectors.