After yet another splendid welcome reception, filled with flavoured popcorn ranging from Madras curry to Espresso caramel, we all settled in for Zeitgeist 2013. This is my 4th Zeitgeist and it remains a highlight in my year due to the exceptional speakers, attendees, content and entertainment. The highlight was getting to try Google Glass. I have lots of thoughts on this, but that will be saved for another blog post!
My day began with a run around the beautiful Grove golf course, culminating in a stretching session outside the reception while Sir Martin Sorrel was being interviewed on camera next to me. Not exactly the typical start to one's day! Below is my not-so-short summary, which is tribute to the level of interesting content coupled with my inability to describe this event in 1 single paragraph. Furthermore, if you attended this event, you may notice how much I've left out! That's the beauty of blogging, you can just skim or skip to the parts you find most interesting.
Nikesh Arora (@nikesharora), the Chief Business Officer and SVP Google, introduced the theme of Rethink and Reset. According to Bloomberg, Nikesh earned a meagre $51 million in fiscal year 2012.
He also introduced the crazy challenge to wear casual clothing for day 2 which most participants simply couldn't comply with (myself included).
I can honestly say that as a result of attending, I did actually rethink and reset during this conference. Well done and thank you Google, for pulling off a spectacular event yet again.
The overall content of Zeitgeist was top notch with a good mixture of intriguing and thought provoking speakers ranging from politicians to robots. I did not take notes for the entire event but was actively tweeting, with some appreciated retweets like from @nikesharora.
Action This Day
The first speaker of the day was Frans Timmermans, the Dutch Foreign minister, who kicked off with a superb un-Dutch accent on the topic of the EU. He talks about the historic blame culture and how the EU is now the target of blame for all problems which simply isn't right. Context is now key so while it may be legal to evade taxes, is it moral? A really interesting point given the grilling Google received about their low tax contribution in the UK this week. Despite all the EU turbulence, he highlighted that we have never seen so much peace and stability in Europe in history! He talked about the fact that for the first time our children's future may be worse than ours. He ended with the quote "If we die. We die. But first, we live".
Prof Michael Sandel then spoke on the topic of the shift from a market economy to a market society where a value is given to almost every aspect of life. Look at linestanding.com, where you can buy your way to front of room (I wish that was around when I queued for hours at Peppa Pig World last weekend!). You can buy a prison cell room upgrade for $90. Many US schools have tried to motivate kids with cash incentives to study/get good grades/read a book. A lively discussion ensued whether it was good or bad to financially incentivise education. Michael then revealed that the system actually didn't work and there is a concern that money can drown out the intrinsic love of learning. Interestingly, the kids who were paid for reading books, actually did read the books though they did land up choosing shorter books. ;-) I personally think the truth lies somewhere in the middle i.e. sometimes an incentive (financial or otherwise) is the best method for results and it can catalyse new behaviours. 'Marketising' everything means that people increasingly live separate lives and is not good for democracy.
Eric Schmiedt talks about his book a The New Digital Age. He feels that we are not optimistic enough! Chrome is now the number 1 browser for speed, price and security whereas Android has had 900 million activations and is installed on a billion smartphones. This shows the scale of demand for services and platforms that solve problems. The Internet is pivotal to impact society positively even as far reaching as empowering individuals in North Korea or warring tribes in Sudan vs. South Sudan (the latter who currently use micro SD cards as means of sharing information). There are no countries where the arrival of the Internet has made things worse. Mobile devices take this further.
The Pleasure Principle
"Money can buy happiness and if you think it can't, you're just not spending it right" purports Michael Norton, Neuroscientist. He showed how winning the lottery often ruins people's lives because mainly when we think about having money we think about buying stuff for ourselves. So what if we asked people to shift the spending on others to see if they were happier? He showed us the results of various experiments across different countries showing that while the amount of money didn't matter ($5 vs $20) but does matter to your happiness whether or not you spent it on someone else. So basically you should try giving some money away!
Even more interesting from the perspective of organisations is that the team dynamic changes from prosocial behaviour i.e. teams helping one another. Prosocial behaviour benefits the organisation 5x more due to sharing - very significant when preparing bonus schemes.
Paul Bloom, author of "How Pleasure Works", talked about the strange paradox of pleasure and how your pleasure is effected by your beliefs. E.g. golf clubs, gum and shoes may be meaningless however when you find their previous owners or origins, the pleasure changes i.e. golf clubs (owned by JFK), gum (by Britney Spears) and shoes (thrown at Bush). He showed an interesting sweater example of one owned by George Clooney vs. Bernie Madoff. Forbidden the owner to boast or resell reduces the price but washing decreases (Clooney) or increases (Madoff).
Why aren't we happier now? There is enormous choice and little or no effort. This is the current paradox of choice: too much choice makes you miserable. Self-binding is the only solution to the paradox of pleasure e.g. Staying faithful or losing weight.
David Halpern, Director of Behavioural Insights Team for UK Government, then gave his perspective. The insights help the government in a variety of ways to affect behaviour e.g. it can help increase those paying tax on time by adding to a letter that others in their area pay on time and you are one of the few who don't! They try get people to think about what they can do and not can't.
I'm very pleasantly surprised to learn that the UK government employs this intelligent approach and it no doubt delivers great results both for the government and the people.
Matthieu Ricard showed us that meditation increases happiness. Matthieu is a Buddhist monk and author of "The Art of happiness".
The session ended with Apollo Robbins, Experience Designer according to the agenda but basically performing as an illusionist-come-pickpocket.. He magically manages to pickpocket a member of the audience and then explains the insights. It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see - Thoreau. His tricks use visual, verbal and spatial elements. Space is social, then personal then intimate. Our reality is really built on faulty perception tools. It's fascinating how illusion plays on how the brain functions.
Courage in a Connected World
Marc Goodman, Futurist at FBI. Criminals are also entrepreneurs e.g. when the train was invented, criminals simply discovered train robbery. With the Internet, 100 million Sony play station accounts were compromised. This is the asymmetric nature of the threat. There was recently a criminal flash mob who managed to take $45 m from ATM's.
On a very scary note, new technology is creating new forms of crime e.g. 3D printing is allowing for 3D weapons, making arms control futile. Global security paradigms don't work in this new connected world.
Lindiwe Mazibuko, leader Official Opposition Party for South Africa spoke eloquently about her path to becoming party leader at the age of 33. She was inspirational in her confidence and intelligence. Despite challenges received for being black, female, single and young. I can certainly relate on some of those points and take my hat off to her. She said that she actually revels in the criticism she receives as it confirms that she is relevant.
Toomas Ilves, President of the Republic of Estonia, spoke about his initiative to connect all Estonian schools online. He showed how leadership and vision can leverage ICT to help a country leap forward.
Pakistan former president, Shaukat Aziz, spoke humbly about his experience going from banking to politics driven by a pure love for his country. Taking no sick or vacation days for many years, he survived an assassination bombing to deliver impressive economic growth.
Finally Moran Cerf, a neuroscientist who hilariously told his story from being a hacker and prisoner in the Israeli army (for hacking) to executing a real bank robbery as part of his security company. This session got a whole lot of laughs and is worth a watch (see link to YouTube channel at the end of this post).
Our Legacy
Leymah Gbowee, Nobel Peace Prize winner and Liberian peace activist, was another impressive speaker. Mother to 6 kids, former alcoholic and abused wife, she managed to play a key role in the end to Liberia's 14-year war. She smartly organised a 'sex-abstinence' protest for example, which naturally got significant media attention. This powerful and relatable woman was inspiring in showing how everyone can make a difference, no matter who you are and no matter how big or small as she told a story how she helped a young girl who was bullied. She highlighted that there is good out there, though we tend to only hear about the bad. A real problem as a result of today's media in my opinion. This is the kind of leadership and inspiration which will ignite the next generation of those who will affect change.
Bianca Jagger spoke about her dedicated work over the last 3 decades to help 'most vulnerable members of society'. I was totally unaware of her work in campaigning for everything from human rights to environmental protection throughout the world.
Day 1 ended with the cocktail reception and evening event in a beautifully clad venue made to resemble a magical indoor tropical jungle, complete with trees! There were amazing performances from a YouTube contemporary dance violinist, Jessie J (!) and 2 cellists who were simply phenomenal to watch (doing everything from Coldplay to U2 on the cello!). Here's a small clip of the performance. All this took place while we consumed homemade fudge and exotic Elderflower cocktails.
Day 2 started with an interesting topic on education entitled Generation Tomorrow.
Sugata Mitra, Professor of Educational Technology at Newcastle University, showed us the results of his experiments in India and the UK around 'minimally invasive education' (MIE) which involved placing a computer in a slum and asking key questions. Essentially the days of researching via the encyclopaedia Britannica are now repeated using a PC (and Google!). This has interesting implications for teaching and the experiment has been repeated successfully.
Eddie Obeng, from the virtual Business School, energetically grabbed our attention in a humorous engaging style to show us the steps he uses to gain the attention of an audience. He humorously showed how organisations can squash innovation purely through hierarchical structure i.e. you start at the bottom but have an illusion you are moving up when new people come into the organisation beneath you except the organisation is basically just growing underneath you and the people at the top, well "none of you are going anywhere, now are you".
Jack Andraka, a 15 year Glee fan, talked about how he came to develop a new diagnostic test for pancreatic cancer (!). After reading a multitude of articles online which didn't make sense, eventually things started to click into place. An interesting connection to Sugata Mitra's conclusions on learning. Naomi Shah, the 17 year Google Science Fair winner, talked about her development of a bio filter for respiratory disorders. Her research started at the age of 11 and involved cold-calling universities. She has developed a mathematical model and interactive app to quantify the impact of harmful pollutants. Both of these kids were just inspiring to see and I'm really grateful to be made aware of such greatness in today's youth.
The Way We Live
I really enjoyed this session, especially the profound mixture of humility with creative inspiration in the presenters since their work has improved and impacted the lives of so many.
Thomas Heatherwick designed the 2012 London Olympic cauldron by making it something collaborative between the participants and spectators which is different to just being a "bowl and a stick". Whilst it was not meant to having moving parts (and ended up with 220 petals representing the different countries), it was made from copper (as the gold, silver and bronze production was 'rather busy at the time'). The result was simply magnificent and a cauldron which was so much more. Thomas also talked about a design in Singapore for a university building with 'no corners' and the new London bus combining and old icon with new design built for greater efficiency taking considerations into account like seat fabric which disguises dirt and stains since they are only cleaned once daily.
Scott Harrison, former nightclub promoter and now founder of Charity: Water, spoke about the reinvention of charity with his 100% model (100% of the charity gets used, the organisation is funded separately to the charity fundraising). Using GPS, givers can see exactly where they are helping, thereby providing greater transparency. He has already brought water to > 3 million people with more ambitious goals. I really liked his "give up your birthday" initiative encouraging people to donate the amount of their age.
Alastair Parvin, Co-founder of Wikihouse, showed us how he designed a DIY house made possible with 3D printing, not requiring any tools. The parts wedge together and even the mallet is printed with the parts. This has massive implications for third world or developing countries and I hope this will reach South Africa which still has shanty towns using cardboard, plastic bags and corrugated iron.
From Star Trek to Zeitgeist
The final session of Zeitgeist took the conference from the commercial to the scientific in a session moderated by David Rowan (Wired Magazine). Rich Walker and Bertold Meyer kicked off with a freakish man made purely from artificial organs. The sheer sophistication of modern medicine is evident when you realise that every part of the body, even the skin, can be replicated for medical purposes. Prosthetics and robotics have developed to a level where a limb is amputated in favour of a more functional prosthetic. Bertold's 360 degree wrist swivel (his party trick) shows us that artificial limbs (or bionic limbs if you will) can do even more than their real predecessors.
There may be a point where artificial parts a better than healthy people so a musician could always have a cochlear implant.
Reality is that this is still niche, and while Bertold got his bionic hand funded in Switzerland, 14 year old was denied the same thing on the NHS (generally costing around $60k), he resorted to offering advertising for formula 1 Mercedes on his prosthetic arm. Bertold's current hand has 24 grips controlled by an app (which is presently completely hackable!).
Also amazing to see is the fact that the hand is transparent not flesh-coloured, looking more like a gadget than something for the disabled, so gives the wearer more confidence.
Walter de Brouwer. CEO, Scanadu, told us how his son suffered brain trauma, he analysed all the numbers and even hired doctors as information consultants. Decided to put that in a company and give them all the numbers. He has created a real life Tricorder (the device in Star Trek used by Dr. Spock for instant diagnoses). The Scanadu scout sells for $149 (£99) - and carries all vital signs. Walter believes that medicine will disappear i.e. preventation will be ubiquitous. This is a topic I'm personally very passionate about so it's very exciting to see the technological progress in the medical field in the area of prevention.
Walter's big concept is this: our bodies are data and we can change it! Quantification is the end of nature and the beginning of engineering.
Dr. Jakob van Zyl, Associate Director at Jet Propulsion Laboratory, spoke to us in a quasi-South African/American accent about his robotic investigations looking for life on other planets. He showed us the roving chemical laboratory which travelled several months 800 M km to Mars. This is when you know that your current job just isn't cool enough. It was intriguing to realise how far the investigations have gone to identify that there in fact are factors showing potential presence of life on other planets! Cue X-files music please.
Then Shin Kubota from Japan, with translator, spoke about his research into the immortality of jellyfish. A fascinating topic and amusing to see David Rowan keep a straight face when talking about his 19 songs released about ... jellyfish. 8 of these can be sung in Karaoke bars around Japan.
The final session of the day was by Astro Teller, the so-called Captain of Moonshots at Google, who spoke to use about the process and mindset to develop moonshots. How uncanny that the head of moonshots has a name like that! The first question from the audience related to the picture in the background, and it turns out this is an elevator into space, the picture representing this division. He did inform us reasons why this isn't actually feasible (yet) though pretty inspiring to know that the topic was even addressed on a serious level!
A highlights video clip gives a good flavour of the event and full sessions clips can be viewed of course on YouTube at www.zeitgeistminds.com.
Twitter stream can be viewed on hashtag #zeitgeist13.
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