I had to check on my previous blogs to see how many Thinking Digital conferences I have attended. It turns out that this year is my 11th. I must admit that I did not have the same excitement about this year’s event as in previous years, partly as I am still trying to fit work things around the day. Not long now though. I was only able to attend the morning session in the end.
As usual the conference had its mix of subjects and delivery styles. The topics on offer opened my mind and made me think about the endless possibilities that life has to offer.
The first session started with Julian Treasure – An expert on sound. He spoke about the need to listen better and how this should be taught at school. Listening is not my super-power by any measurement and is something I could do well to focus on. Julian suggested taking a couple of minutes everyday just to shut up and listen to the world around you.
Next up was Natasha Boulding – A material sciences innovator, who told us how her small spin out was now leading the way in carbon efficient construction. My main takeaway from her talk was that we need to take 10 gigatonnes of carbon out of the atmosphere to get back to pre-industrial levels of CO2 and that the toilet animal biomass,excluding humans, was 1 gigatonne. So we need to take ten times the total weight of animals of carbon.
The last speaker for the first session was Conrad Wolfram – A math and commuting CEO thought leader. To be honest I don’t remember much from what he was saying, a lot of it went above my head. Perhaps I should have applied Julians’ listening techniques.
After coffee and a few chats it was back for the second session, which I found to be better than the first. It started with Alfey Joey – A supercommunicator, who told us how to tell our story better.. I always think there is nothing more human than a story and his talk resonated with me. He was funny and got the audience going.
Next up was Sophia Rose Long – An electromagnetic wave adventurer, the complete antithesis of Alfie in that it was clear that she was not used to presenting and found the whole thing a bit of a struggle. She spoke to us about masers, like lasers but using microwave energy. Her team has developed a way for this exciting technology to be used at room temperature. Masers have a big future. I spoke to Sophia over lunch and told her how much I had enjoyed her presentation.
Last up, for me at least, was Carl Miller – Host of the Kill List podcast. His presentation was amusing and frightening. He spoke of an online kill list on the dark web, where people could ( and did) pay to have people killed. Thankfully it was a scam and there were no actual hitmen for hire, though I am sure if you looked hard enough you could find them. What was most worrying and enlightening was that the people hiring the killers were perfectly ordinary. Many were professional people and they could well be amongst us in the audience. Fortunately the police are now taking this site seriously, though the experience has shown the limits of a geographically located police force, trying t9o foil a crime that knows no borders.
I wish I could have stayed for the afternoon but I am running out of time left at work. Perhaps next year, which I am already looking forward to.
Thoughts from a Guerrilla Worker 