Great minds
ICT research institute iMinds is holding the fourth edition of its networking conference on 8 November in Ghent. The Flemish organisation – which used to be known as IBBT but has recently rebranded itself – is a matchmaker for 1,000 ICT academics, companies and end users, with a sharp focus on contemporary societal needs.
Tomorrow’s technology tackles today’s problems at the iMinds conference
“We ask ourselves: What are today’s problems that we can solve tomorrow?” says Karen Boers of iMinds. “At this conference, we want to show the public what we have realised during the past eight years, but most importantly we want to start the conversation between users, industrial partners and academics. We want to create space for new ideas to bloom.”
This year iMinds plays host to 13 themed sessions with well-known lecturers, including New York journalist Robert Levine, author of Free Ride: How Digital Parasites are Destroying the Culture Business. He is part of a debate on intellectual property, defending the stance that “copyright is a human right”. Levine is up against Adam Sinnreich, professor at Rutgers University and author of Mashed Up, who thinks our cultural landscape should be available to everyone as “commons” from which we can all draw.
American computer scientist Jim McKelvey (pictured), co-founder of the revolutionary mobile payment company Square, will talk about a range of topics from art to entrepreneurship. Other high-profile speakers are Neelie Kroes, vice-president of the European Commission, and Markus Hofmann, head of the Bell Labs research group at global telecom corporation Alcatel-Lucent.
There will also be discussions about social media and security, visionary city technology and eCare – technological solutions to imminent problems in the health-care sector. In snappy one-on-one meetings that last for no longer than 15 minutes, everyone can engage in a discussion with iMinds coaches about starting a technology project or student entrepreneurship.
The manager of iMinds’ Singapore office will be available to help visitors explore opportunities for collaboration overseas. And of course, there will also be a thorough debate on how to reduce our ecological impact using ICT.
The conference is attended by policymakers, ICT developers, entrepreneurs and researchers, but it can be equally interesting to non-experts. “We’re not as broad as TEDx, but everyone is welcome to come and discover what the role of ICT will be tomorrow,” says Karen Boers.
This year iMinds is part of Creative Media Days, a much broader event that takes place in Brussels and Ghent over the course of seven days.
6-15 November
Creative Media Days
Across Brussels and Ghent
www.iminds.creativemediadays.be
