IAM_CONFERENCE_final V2

Internet Age Media Weekend
2016#IAMW16
L MORETTI (EDITOR) / L VIGLIETTI (ART DIRECTOR) PUBLICATION

Internet Age Media Weekend | 2016 | #IAMW16
01
The Internet Age Media Weekend is a three-day annual
conference that runs over a weekend in Barcelona. This
year, the conference ran from the 7th – 10th April under
the theme of Complexity to Emergence. The conference
aims to explore the changing effects the internet and
digital technologies has on culture, media, public spaces,
learning and creativity.
Often we like to think of these topics as only being
relevant to businesses operating in the art/design, creative
or media industries. However, these topics naturally
lean into others and give way to discussions on strategy,
trust, transparency, networking, collaboration and talent.
What emerges from the multitude of voices, thoughts
and insights – the complexity – are essential lessons and
learnings that can be implemented in all businesses.
Because in the future, every business will be a
digital business.
About

02
Themes and lessons,
lessons and themes

03
LESSON 1: Get out your
ivory tower before it topples
It’s not often that foreign policy finds itself on the agenda
at a digital and technology conference. But that’s exactly
what Jonathan McClory brought to the stage in his talk
The future of foreign policy: soft power, internet culture, and
#digitaldiplomacy. What exactly is soft power and how is it
different to its assumed opposite, hard power? Hard power
is the exercise of influence through coercion. At foreign
policy level, this translates to tactics like military force,
payments and economic sanctions.
Soft power uses attraction and persuasion to change
minds and influence behaviour. It’s also on the rise thanks
to two key factors 1) the rise of networks and 2) an
increasingly digital world.
Power has always existed on a spectrum but it has never
before belonged to so many. Through an increasingly
connected world, power has lost its center of gravity as
it’s become diffused through digital networks. The only
way to exercise your power is through mass collaboration
in order to harness the power of the many. If you’re
struggling to bring about change in your organisation,
try switching from hard power to soft power. Wondering
how to action soft power? At a very basic level, it’s about
believing and acting like everyone matters. Not just the
men and women around the boardroom table. It’s about
public acts of diplomacy and concerted efforts to make a
positive difference. If that sounds like a load of mumbo
jumbo to you, it doesn’t matter. The world is changing and
you’re no longer as powerful on your own as you once use
to be.
“Hard power is
not going away,
but soft power
will become
more important
in driving
global change.”
-JONATHAN MCCLORY,
DIGITAL DIPLOMACY
SPECIALIST [PORTLAND
COMMUNICATIONS]
POWER

04
LESSON 2: Find a mentor
who was born in the 90s
Elise By Olsen is the founder of Recens; a Scandinavia
based creative agency promoting the young, unknown
artists and talents through publications, events. In
addition to that, she is also a freelance creative director,
the editor of Recens’ own publication Recens Paper and
the founder of Recens Studio – a creative project space in
central Oslo. Elise is 16 years old. The Creative Director of
Recens is 31-year-old Morteza Vaseghi.
I’ll just leave you to re-read that for a moment.
Elise and Morteza are colleagues, friends, business
associates. They’re an award-winning team where age has
nothing to do with experience or results in power struggles
because of a ‘I-know-more-than-you-because-I’m-older-
than-you’ attitude. They’ve won awards. They’re making
money. They’re proving that reverse-mentoring works.
Your challenge this month is to find an inspiring,
intelligent mentor who is at least 15 to 20 years younger
than you and to work with them on a real project for
a month. I have a feeling you will be amazed. There’s
nothing like a brilliant 16-year-old to make you want
to up your game.
“I wanted to fill a hole in the
established publishing and fashion
industries. Recens Paper gives a voice
to the youth and is what they want to
see, instead of perfectionism, gender
stereotypes, beauty standards and
commercialism.”
- ELISE BY OLSEN, FOUNDER [RECENS]
LEARNING

05
LESSON 3: Start looking at
your network in a new light
When last did you think about your personal and business
network as an asset? When last did you take stock at
whether it’s appreciated or depreciated in value? When did
you last try and calculate its potential maximum value? In
a world hurtling towards AI and automation, relationship
managers or chief network operators may well become
one of the most desired employees of the future. Those
who understanding how to care for this asset, how to
utilise it, analyse its value and how to unlock its power will
reap the greatest rewards in the future.
PS. Something else that Frederik said that was just so
against how most responded to wake of the 2008 crash.
Their niche magazine publication Freunde von Freuden
exists today because in 2008 they lost two clients. Instead of
having a massive freak out, the directors gathered and asked
themselves, “What can we do now that we have some free
time?” Freunde von Freuden was born out of that meeting
and is now a bit of a cash cow for their agency MoreSleep.
Just saying.
“The 250
contributors we
work with every
month are the
most important
part of our
business.”
- FREDERIK FREDE,
DIRECTOR,
PUBLISHER, FOUNDER
[MORESLEEP AGENCY,
FRENDE VON FREUDEN,
FVF PRODUCTIONS]
NETWORKS

“It’s not what’s on the cards, it’s
about the fact that they are cards.”
- JOHN V. WILLSHIRE – FOUNDER AND CREATOR
[SMITHERY, ARTEFACT CARDS]
06
LESSON 4: Play with
your ideas
John really likes to stare at things and figure out how they
work. That includes the Internet. He said something that
we all intuitively know but perhaps haven’t articulated
quite so eloquently ourselves: Change is occurring at such
a pace that we will never be able to replicate previous
successes ever again. As a result, it gets harder, impossible
even, to make future predictions based on past successes.
Where does that leave business strategy?
There’s no real answer to this.
But John has created Artefact Cards – a tool to support
the idea process and what is business if not the ambitious
pursuit of a great idea? Artefact Cards supports the
process of creating better ideas because people think twice
before writing something down – because they want it to
be good. Ah dear humans and our ego! Lay your ideas side
by side to analyse them. Shuffle them and deal them to see
new combinations. Pack them up and put them back in
the box when you’re done with them and pry the box open
again when you wish to interrogate them.
They’re not just cards. They’re a tangible metaphor for
the world we live in – one that serves up randomness.
Best we learn how to deal with an unpredictable hand.
CREATIVITY(thatdrivesstrategy)
PICCREDITS:ARTEFACTSHOP.COM

07
“Start small.”
- KATI PRICE, HEAD OF
DIGITAL MEDIA [VICTORIA
AND ALBERT MUSEUM]
LESSON 5: You have
an unconscious bias
against creativity that needs
to be addressed
One of the great things about digital, is that you don’t have
to turn it on all at once. It’s not an all-or-nothing kind
of decision. When Kati’s team at the Victoria and Albert
Museum (V&A) started to work with the digital agency
Made by Many they didn’t go from initial discussions to
full-blown digital transformation in 24 hours. They guided
stakeholders at the V&A through a number of steps to
reduce and eventually eliminate all uncertainty that was
driving any fear around future plans. Kati and Susan Li,
senior strategist at Made by Many, shared some great
practical steps that any change agent can execute to
reduce uncertainty.
1. START WITH SOMETHING TANGIBLE: Begin
by changing just one or two measurable things and then
let positive change speak for itself in a language we all
understand: data.
2. LET YOUR CUSTOMERS SPEAK: When was the last
time you spoke to a customer? Often customer feedback
– showing that there is a demand and expectation for
change from the people who keep you in business can be a
powerful catalyst.
3. START SMALL: Want to launch your business on
social networks? Start by getting key individuals in your
business contributing to a couple of LinkedIn groups. Or,
write a blog post for someone else’s website and link back
to your website. Or just launch one profile at a time. Not
five all at once!
4. ENCOURAGE PARTICIPATION: The more you can
introduce a culture of transparency and collaboration it
becomes everyone’s project, not just the project of one
person banging a drum to the tune of change. Get
people involved.
If you’re scratching your head wondering why people
talk about wanting creative ideas but ultimately end up
rejecting them*, there is a brilliant academic named
Jennifer S Mueller who has written a paper on this very
topic. It’s worth a read.
*Spoiler alert! Because creative ideas introduce uncertainty,
and uncertainty makes us squirm – and ultimately,
run screaming.
UNCERTAINTY

08
LESSON 6:
Integrate your
teams – even if they’re different.
Collaboration was a theme that kept cropping up and
if you study the current culture we’re immersed in, you
understand why. A world saturated in multiple, hyper-
connected networks shifts the focus away from the
individual working in isolation and towards multiple
individuals working together. If you’re not team player
and you hate sharing, my heart truly goes out to you
because you are going to find the future a very difficult
place to work.
From Kati and Susan (above) working together to
reduce uncertainty at the V&A, to Colin Burns and
Darren Bowles from the BBC and Moving Brands
talking about the secret sauce to their partnership,
nearly every keynote at the conference made mention
of teams, partnerships and/or collaborations. Some of
these partnerships came from the unlikeliest of places.
Luciana Leveratto, Academic Director of Masters at the
Institute of European Design (IED), shared stories of
how design, fashion and visual communication students
from Barcelona teamed up with engineers and scientists
at CERN in Switzerland to work on a series of global
challenges.
“At the CIID, we’re not focused on
building superstars but super teams.”
- EILIDH DICKSON, HEAD OF VENTURES [COPENHAGEN
INSTITUTE OF INTERACTION DESIGN]
Secret sauce recipe by Burns & Bowles
1. Be open, personable, curious, humble
2. Embrace crafts and lo-fi. Instead of designing
a website, draw it up on paper and pen first till you’re
happy with the prototype
3. Roll your sleeves up
4. Be creative within constraints. How? Fast, cheap, good
– pick two because you can’t have all three.
COLLABORATION

09
“Where once
computers used
to be the size of
buildings, buildings
are now becoming
computers. ”
-ARETIMARKOPOULOU,
ARCHITECTAND
PROFESSOR(IAAC)
Eilidh Dickson, Head of Ventures at the Copenhagen
Institute Of Interaction Design (CIID) spoke about the
multi-layered approach CIID has to business. They’re
divided into four parts: a world-renowned educator,
cutting-edge research team, award-winning consultancy
and a start-up incubator called The Hive. How’s that for
a collaborative business model that’s been designed to
win, win and win some more? While operationally each
division is separate, innovation, creativity and ideas flow
easily from team to team.
Another fantastic way that CIID collaborates is how
they work with the private sector. The entire education
programme that they run is supported by a faculty that
are all visiting teachers and lecturers from the corporate
world. The CIID is very focused on teaching skills in a
real, practical and multi-dimensional way.
Would you describe architects and urban planners as
tech people? One of the most interesting speakers who
took to the stage at IAMW was Areti Markopoulou,
a Greek architect and professor at the Institute for
Advanced Architecture of Catalonia (IaaC). She started
her keynote talking about how in 1964 people imagined
cities full of robots – cities that moved and performed
because they were brought to life by machines. As crazy
as that sounds, we’re living in a world not too far away
from the crude imaginings of the 60s. The rise of smart
cities and intelligent buildings means that architects
have been forced to collaborate with a world they never
imagined they would belong to. One filled with big data
and sensors and VR apps that connect the physical to
the virtual and bring humans into contact with digital
interfaces that extend far beyond just their personal
screens.
If you’re not quite sure why I’m so fascinated with
Areti’s talk, I’ll leave you to mull over this question:
What industry do you need to collaborate with in order
to stay relevant and in demand?
COLLABORATION

LESSON 7: You have a
choice on how you view
the world. If you don’t like it,
get another room.
If I said the word “data” or perhaps the word “database”,
what do you imagine? I’m sure visions of a spreadsheet,
a computer, perhaps even someone who looks like an
accountant-type comes to mind. You certainly don’t
imagine art installations and projects involving balloons,
crayons, ceramics and string. Domestic Data Streamers
blew the audience away when they presented their fresh
and novel take on data and demonstrated what is possible
when you change your perspective. They’re focused on
transforming data into art, knowledge and experiences in
order to turn data into something that is meaningful and
makes people feel something.
How could you present your next board report or
financial statement? How could you rethink how to deliver
your next end-of-year report? A fresh perspective is
always on trend.
10
“We’re into info-experiences.”
- PAU GARCÍA, FOUNDER (DOMESTIC DATA STREAMERS)
PERSPECTIVE

“More than just a youth programme,
Tate Collection has started to become
a think tank for the museum.”
- JEN AARVOLD & LEYLA TAHIR,
CURATOR AND PRODUCER ATTATE
More brilliant sound bites from Zach:
1. Every new product and innovation is
developed from a very well researched
conviction into human behaviour.
2. When the Quartz team build digital
products they ensure they don’t feel
devoid of human life. More real emotion,
less android.
3. When they built the Quartz app, they
wanted the app to be intentionally
polarising. If they made an app that
everyone loved, then it would be another
average news app. Quartz ain’t average.
LESSON 8: Adapting starts
with being brave
How big is your brave? How people answer this question
usually says a lot about how good they are at adapting. The
following people and businesses really, really impressed me
at IAMW because they are really good at being brave.
Zach Seward, Vice President of Product and Executive
Editor of Quartz, stood up and told the audience that
Quartz is a guide to the new global economy for business
people who are excited about change. That was impressive
because I don’t hear very many people being able to
describe their business in such an engaging way. Then he
said that internally at Quartz, they have a totally different
statement that describes what they do. And with that, the
words “Quartz is an API” flashed up on the screen behind
him. At that point I was ready to stand and give him a
standing ovation. You see, that internal statement has
the ability to mobilise everyone at Quartz – literally and
figuratively – because what lies at the center of this media
organisation is a brand that has the opportunity to go out
and be in multiple places at once. That is a fundamental
shift in thinking about what a business has the ability and
capability to do.
11
ADAPTING

12
Moving onto another smart human, Zachary Kaplan,
Executive Director of Rhizome, told the story of this
unlikely contributor to the art scene; founded in 1996,
Rhizome is a born-digital art organisation. They support
contemporary art that creates richer and more critical
digital cultures by commissioning, exhibiting, preserving
and creating critical discussions around digital art.
The key insight here is that digital networks are not just
technical. They are also social and material in nature so
don’t limit your thinking by assuming you’re a business who
cannot have an active, engaging and interesting presence
online because you’re in an industry that doesn’t easily lean
into digital. You can. You just have to be brave enough to
adapt to a new way of being.
There’s a good chance you’ve never heard of Tate Collective
because there’s a good chance you aren’t between the ages
of 15 and 25. But despite you not hearing about it, Tate
are creating a very loud youth movement in rooms filled
with art from the 1800s. Tate Collective was born out of a
smart question: How can we make Tate more open, more
meaningful and more responsive to youth?
The projects that have launched out of Tate Collective
have been radical, but effective, to say the least. From
hip-hop concerts in room 1840 to sharing high-resolution
images of famous artworks with motion artists who have
remixed them, turned them into gifs and made them viral
on Tumblr. By taking art and putting it ‘out there’, they’re
starting to pull people ‘back in’. More specifically, they’re
starting to capture the hearts and minds of a new audience
that is crucial to Tate’s continued existence. By clashing
old and new cultures together, Tate have changed their
perception of what belongs in a museum as well as taught
themselves how to be operational beyond their assigned
postcode.
So, if you find people aren’t understanding you, it’s time
to speak a new language. I can highly recommend emoji
ADAPTING “What does an
art institution
look like when
it has a network
at its core?”
- ZACHARY KAPLAN,
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
[RHIZOME]

CLOSING THOUGHTS
Scott Smith was one of the last few people to take the stage
at IAMW but his words continue to resonate with me. I’m
going to sum up this report, that has been largely inspired
by the Internet, by telling you to shift your perspective from
“technology or people” to “technology with people”. In the
future, technology with people with achieve far more than
man or machine will be able to achieve alone.
Do not become obsessed with technology products.
Rather become obsessed with how people live with
technology and the Internet. Because actually, this report
wasn’t about the Internet per se. It was about what people
created using the Internet. View technology as a tool to help
you create something, not as the final output to something.
As you plan the future of your business, don’t become
so focused on the technical end product/service, that you
forget who is actually going to buy ‘the solution’ from you.
People buy the things that you have to offer so it’s essential
that you make people the heart of your business and not
technology. Create a future with people while thinking
about how they can get the best out of the Internet. Be
inspired to create something that is connected to the
Internet but doesn’t necessarily have to live on a screen.
Lastly, start to believe in the power of randomness. Talk to
people. Talk to lots of different people. Go places. Places you
normally wouldn’t go. Read as much as you can about things
that aren’t in your line of work or industry you work in.
Generate some randomness in your life. It’s one of the only
ways to ensure that you’ll continue to bump into new ideas.
“If we treat the future as a theme
park, then we become passengers.
If we treat the future as a product,
then we become consumers. If we
treat the future as a spectacle, then
we are only an audience.”
- SCOTTSMITH, MANAGING PARTNER [CHANGEIST]
13

Speakers
14
[CLICK ON A SPEAKER’S UNDERLINED
TITLE TO VISITTHE RELEVANT SITE ]
ALBERTO BARREIRO
Chief Experience Officer, Grupo PRISA | MADRID
a.
b.
DARREN BOWLES
ECD, Moving Brands | LONDON
COLIN BURNS
Executive Creative Director, BBC Digital | LONDON
SERGIO ALBIAC
Visual Artist, BARCELONA
RASHID BIN SHABIB
Founders, Brownbook Magazine / Cultural Engineering |
DUBAI
SUSAN LIN
Senior Business Strategist, Made by Many | LONDON
WANURI KAHIU
Science Fiction Writer & Filmmaker | NAIROBI
ZACHARY KAPLAN
Executive Director, Rhizome | NEW YORK
LUCIANA LEVERATTO
Master Academic Dean, IED Barcelona | BARCELONA
JEN AARVOLD
Tate Collectives Producer, Tate | LONDON
EILIDH DICKSON
Head of Ventures, CIID – Copenhagen Institute of
Interaction Design | NEW YORK/COPENHAGEN
PAULO BARCELOS
Head of R&D, Oakwood Creative Digital Agency |
STOCKHOLM
d.
e.
ELISE BY OLSEN
Founder, Recens Paper | OSLO
f.
FREDERIK FREDE
Co-founder, Freunde von Freunden | BERLIN
g.
PAU GARCÍA
Founding Partner, Domestic Data Streamers | BARCELONA
k.
l.
TOBY MILNER GULLAND
Sr. Designer/Creative Technologist, Moving Brands |
LONDON
ALEXANDER SCHOLZ
Founder & Creative Director, HOLO Magazine | BERLIN
KATI PRICE
Head of Digital Media, V&A Museum | LONDON
m.ARETI MARKOPOULOU
Academic Director & Digital Matter Research Studio, IaaC -
Institute for advanced architecture of Catalonia | BARCELONA
JONATHAN MCCLORY
Soft Power specialist. Partner, Portland Communications |
LONDON
p.
r.ANJALI RAMACHANDRAN
Innovation Director, PHD Media/ Co-Founder, Ada’s List/
Writer, One Size Fits One | LONDON
s.

GARETH SELTZER
Founding Investor & Director, RYOT Media | TORONTO
Speakers
15
[CLICK ON A SPEAKER’S UNDERLINED
TITLE TO VISITTHE RELEVANT SITE ]
s.
LEYLA TAHIR
Assistant Curator on the Young People’s Programme,
Tate | LONDON
SCOTT SMITH
Critical futurist. Founder, Changeist | AMSTERDAM
ZACH SEWARD
Executive Editor / VP of Product, Quartz | NEW YORK
t.
RACHEL UWA
Founder, School of Machines, Making & Make-Believe |
BERLIN
u.
MORTEZA VASEGHI
Art Director, Recens Paper | OSLO
v.
STEVEN WATSON
Founder, Stack Magazines | LONDON
w.
WELLNESS
Founders, Dubai Water Foundation | MADRID
LUKE WHITEHEAD
Project Lead, UAL Futures | LONDON
JOHN V. WILLSHIRE
Founder, Smithery | LONDON
SAMIM WINIGER
Machine Learning Researcher. Chief Creative Officer,
AE (ArtificialExperience) @samim | BERLIN

IAM_CONFERENCE_final V2

Recommended

Recommended

More Related Content

What's hot

What's hot (20)

Viewers also liked

Viewers also liked (16)

Similar to IAM_CONFERENCE_final V2

Similar to IAM_CONFERENCE_final V2 (20)

IAM_CONFERENCE_final V2