Accelerating Change 2004-2005

Advances in computing and communications mean that we can cost-effectively store every book, sound recording, movie, software package, and public web page ever created, and provide access to these collections via the Internet to students and adults all over the world. By mostly using existing institutions and funding sources, we can build this as well as compensate authors within what is the current worldwide library budget. The talk offers an update on the current state of progress towards that ideal, which would allow us to bequeath an accessible record of our cultural heritage to our descendants.

Dan Gillmor, author of "We, the Media: Journalism By and For the People" and former Business and Technology Columnist for the San Jose Mercury News at the Accelerating Change 2004 Conference:

Grassroots journalists are dismantling Big Media's monopoly on the news, changing it from lecture to conversation. Dan Gillmor discusses the importance of this emerging phenomenon, a deep shift in how we make and consume the news. We the Media is essential reading for all participants in the news cycle: Consumers learn how they can become producers of the news through web journals (weblogs or blogs), Internet chat groups, email, and cell phones. [Accelerating Change 2004 Conference audio from IT Conversations]

Clark Aldrich, co-founder of SimuLearn and the author of, Simulations and the Future of Learning delivered this presentation at Accelerating Change 2004:

Six criteria are emerging as critical not just to simulations but to all successful educational experiences. Three are focused on content, and three on delivery elements. The key criteria for content are: 1. Linear content. 2. Systems of content. 3. Cyclical content. Additional criteria for delivery elements are: 4. Simulation elements that model reality. 5. Game elements that provide familiar and entertaining interactions. 6. Pedagogical (didactic) elements that ensure the students' time is spent productively. As we understand pedagogy (#6) and linear content (#1), we first mourn that they have become so dominant, but then realize how powerful they are in concert. It is only through the interelationships of all six criteria that we begin to get results that can truly transform people. [Accelerating Change 2004 audio from IT Conversations]

Within five years, our personal computers will be able to store everything we read, write, hear, and many of the images we see including a bit of video. Vannevar Bush outlined such a system in his famous 1945 Memex article. Since 2000 a team at Microsoft has been working on MyLifeBits to hold all cyberizable items from both personal and profession lives including articles, books, email and written correspondence, photos, telephone calls, video files, web pages visited. They are extending the reach to capture psychological data through wearable devices e.g. the SenseCam from Microsoft's Cambridge Lab, and BodyMedia.While such a system has implications for future computing devices and their users, these systems will only exist if we can effectively utilize the vast personal stores. [Audio from Accelerating Change 2004 by IT Conversations]

"Living the Dream: Business, Community and Innovation at the Dawn of Digital Worlds" presented by Cory Ondrejka, VP of Product Development, Linden Lab, creators of Second Life. (Audio from the Web 2.0 Conference by IT Conversations)

Reality Games - The Next Revolution.

Kuma Reality Games has gathered tremendous attention with KumaWar, an innovative PC game delivering accurate re-creations of actual events in the war just weeks after they occur -- and set off a storm of controversy. But behind its provocative subject matter is a challenge to traditional game publishers. The company's 'Episodic Games' are building new content demand, new sources of revenue, and competitive distribution.

In this talk, Kuma CEO Keith Halper discusses the techniques and technology which make episodic games possible, their cultural and financial impact, and the process of introducing revolutionary change in the buzz-driven market for games. (Audio from Accelerating Change 2004 on IT Conversations)

"Finding Humanity in the Interface: Capacity Atrophy or Augmentation?" A debate between Jaron Lanier and Will Wright, moderated by Mark Finnern from the Accelerating Change 2004 conference. (Audio from IT Conversations)

Fro Accelerating Change 2004 comes the Distance Infrastructure Panel: Broadband, Videoconferencing, and Telepresence with presentations by Milton Chen (Visual Communication and Collaboration Software for Afghanistan), Jeremy Bailenson (Collaborative Virtual Environments and Transformed Social Interaction) and Dewayne Hendricks (One Gigabit or Bust Initiative -- A Broadband Vision for California). Audio from IT Conversations.

"Innovation Managers Panel: IT, Nanotech, and Venture Capital" with Cynthia Breazeale (Intel), Steve Jurvetson (Draper Fisher Jurvetson), and Christine Peterson, Co-Founder and Vice President of the Foresight Institute. [Audio recording from Accelerating Change 2004 on IT Conversations]

From Accelerating Change 2004, IT Conversations audio. "Pervasive Computing Panel: Impacts of Persistent Distributed IT" with panelists Dana Blankenhorn (writer and consultant), Joachim Schaper (SAP Research Labs) and Andreas Olligschlaeger (TruNorth Data Systems).