Mini Austin

Creative Social bring an overview of SXSW Interactive to London at DigitasLBi. Whether or not you made it to Austin this year, we bring you a selection of keynote talks from key players in the industry alongside panel discussions and all the biggest trends and latest technologies from the festival.

There will also be a special performance from the fantastic Mogees Play The World

Speakers include:
* Gareth Jones, DigitasLBi
* Simon Goodall, Chief Strategy Officer, Lowe Open
* Dan Machen, Director of Innovation and Felix Morgan,Innovator,
Hey Human
* Libby Powell, CEO, On Our Radar
* Paolo Nieddu, Managing Partner and Tom Brandhorst, Editorial
Producer, Holler
* Dr James Morris Subject Leader in Web Media, Ravensbourne
University
* Nadya Managing Director, Lost Boys & Co-Founder of Millennial
Mentoring and Innovation Social
* Bruno Zamborlin, Director, Mogees

Talks include:

Gareth Jones will be our host for the evening

Simon Goodall will host our panel on the latest trends from SXSW

Neuroplasticity – Dan Machen, Director of Innovation and Felix Morgan, Innovator, Hey Human
Dan and Felix will present the highlights from their super successful SXSW talk. With the major shifts of the web, social media and mobile, and the levels of messaging they’ve ushered in, the nature and pace of change heralded by the age of technology is unprecedented.

Since every new experience changes our brains, they set out to explore the question: What is looking at our inbox and phone 100s of times a day doing to our heads and, importantly, what does this ‘hyperstimulation’ mean for attention spans, cognition and brand recall?

They will get specific about the concept of ‘neuroplasticity’ and share their latest research on how technology is fundamentally altering the way we connect. Working with neuroscience experts, they explore the challenge to marketers in the digital age – whether technology represents a new way of communicating, or if it requires us to communicate in new ways.

As technology continues to dominate our lives, they explore our evolving relationship with it – and the ways in which brands can ensure they play a positive role in this process.

On Our Radar Panel – Libby Powell, CEO
Libby was one of the honourees of SXSW’s Dewey Wimbourne Community Service Awards for digital do-gooders! The Radar panel will talk through their model for training networks of citizen reporters from some of the world’s most marginalised communities, and empowering them to bring their stories into the public dialogue via basic mobile phones.

The Influence of Influence – Paolo Nieddu, Managing Partner and Tom Brandhorst, Editorial Producer, Holler
Paolo and Tom will delve deeper into one of the biggest debates from SXSW – the influence of influence. Bloggers / vloggers / internet superstars / social media celebrities / platform power users…Whatever we choose to call them, they matter.

They matter because for many brands, they are the magic wardrobe-esque shortcut to reach and engage large passionate audiences who value the emotional connection they have with their online idols over and above anything that a brand says or does.

However, this all raises a pertinent question: with all this power, should online influencers with their vast, sometimes TV dwarfing reach be aligned to the more important issues on the cultural agenda for the next generation? Should they be promoting good? And persuading people away from the bad? And just how influential could they become in the future?

Millenials and The Pirates Within - Nadya Managing Director, Lost Boys & Co-Founder of Millennial Mentoring and Innovation Social Powell
Nadya has long been a champion of young talent, most recently as the co-founder of Millennial Mentoring, and so spent a lot of time sourcing and attending sessions at SXSW on managing, developing and understanding millennials. Nadya’s talk will highlight key features of the ‘millennial generation’ as well as provide four insights into how to make the Pirates within, work for you.

Shakespeare and the future of Interactive Storytelling – Dr James Morris, Ravensbourne University
James will present an overview of his panel discussion exploring the future of theatrical storytelling in a world where content is increasingly being delivered via the Internet. He will share some of Ravensbourne and The Royal Shakespeare Company’s pioneering online projects. The presentation argues that screen narratives are entering an era where the data-oriented culture of the Web will become increasingly influential in shaping story form and content. In particular, the latest Internet standards, including HTML 5 and Semantic Web implementations, allow Internet content delivery much greater integration between audio-visual, textual, and social elements