: RT @gchicco: RT @ConfBasics: Laurent Haug (@laurenthaug), founder of @liftconference on The Future of Conferences http://ow.ly/1q37Us #
Looking oversea
Six years ago, when I first started Frontiers of Interaction, I wouldn’t have imagined to start talking about exporting the conference abroad. Well.. now read what I’ve just posted on the conference blog:
While all the Frontiers of Interaction team is strongly focused on the organization of the Summer conference in Italy (Rome, June 3rd-4th) we have started thinking to the international version of the event.
We have clear in mind which are our conference points of strength and really want to invest in them, and producing an abroad version of the conference as cool as what we’ve done in Italy for years, just sounds terrific!
There’s a city in US that’s probably the most European, that has the nicest fall in the Country, that’s probably the only eastern US city that comes in mind when speaking about technology and innovation (does anybody ever heard of the MIT?) and that city is Boston.
We believe there’s space in US for “yet another innovation conference” because of the specific format Frontiers has: it’s not only a conference, it’s not only a show, it’s the both of them perfectly mixed up. We believe that there’s need and space for italian makers and innovators on the American conference scene. And we want to be the ignitors.
Giuseppe, PhD Boston Univeristy, docente di Applied Innovation in Mobile Computing at Harvard University, è tra i fondatori del Mobile Group di Boston (il più grande del mondo).Recidivo della top10 su AppStore è un Guru del mobile, ma sopratutto una intelligenza italiana che ha saputo coniugare una vita nella culla della Ricerca hightech con le proprie radici più profonde. Vedi il suo profilo su wikipedia.Giuseppe Taibi, PhD at the Boston University, teaches Applied Innovation in Mobile Computing at Harvard University, he is a co-founder of the Boston Mobile Group (the biggest of its kind in the World). As a mobile Guru he’s a frequent appearance in the AppStore Top10, and he’s a great example of Italian intelligence that has been able to merge a life in the World capital of high-tech research with his own mother country culture.
Giuseppe is joining us taking the role of Boston conference co-producer. And as you can see from the above image we’ve already started working together at the US Fall event. Welcome aboard Giuseppe!
Business Social Networks
It’s been a while since I was first involved in the business social networks stuff; I think it was late 2004 when I subscribed to this new service named Linkedin which aim was to store and improve your network of people.
It was love at first sight and helped me finding some of the best programmers I’ve ever worked with. It was also a chance for my first appearance on a national magazine (it was Class Magazine, if I remember well) in an article on the usage in business environments of this new thing named “social networks”.
I then helped BJ Fogg with my contributions to the designing of the user interfaces and of the interactions of a different type of (then) business social network (centred on the voice interaction between users of the same community) named YackPack.
And then came Twitter, Flickr, Facebook and all the rest of the family; and today – if you live in Italy or can read Italian – the book written by my dear friend Roberto Marmo “Promuoversi con i business social network” (Promote yourself using business social networks) with all the how-to’s, the do’s and don’ts for the main social networks here around.
Roberto asked me to write a little paper on my BSN usage strategies that you can find in the book and that I summarize here below:
- the number of your contacts doesn’t makes any difference. It’s the quality of your relationships that matters;
- be methodic: every new relationship has to become a new contact in your network;
- don’t be shy: ask to your contacts for help if you need it in your business;
- be unprejudiced: I’ve dropped some magic in the first email I used to contact Keith Ferrazzi, the guru of social networking. And he replied! (note to self: need to create a dedicated post on this anytime soon)
Frontiers of Interaction conference on the 4th of June
(note: as you can read in the About section I’m one of the two co-founders of this conference)
Today we unveiled the official date of the 6th edition of the Frontiers of Interaction conference, that’s going to be held in Rome (Italy) on the 4th of July 2010.
“Frontiers of Interaction was founded in 2005 to explore topics and ideas in the field of Interaction Design. In a very short time, it has become known as the leading Innovation conference in Italy. The unusual format creates an immersive experience featuring music, interactive and artistic installations, demo sites and keynotes, and makes it an ideal venue for thinkers and doers, innovators and academics, early adopters and long-term geeks.
Frontiers of Interaction is a hybrid show that attracts inspiring international speakers and Italian talents, creating a bridge between Europe and Silicon Valley (digital cultural “hot spots” around the world).”
