Digital Lifescapes

I recall when I first met Kam Star at the SXSW 2012 Festival, he shared his aspiration to make the Digital Shoreditch Festival as successful as the now infamous annual vent in Austin, Texas. After I attended the UK event that his team organized in 2012, I offered some suggestions for his consideration. I still believe that the creative culture in London is different -- and that's a good thing. London's creative digital talent strengths tend to be focused on the fashion, architecture and design sectors. The financial services sector also has a renewed focus on technology-enabled innovations. Digital Shoreditch Festival 2013 is expected to double in size, bringing together a community of 15,000 digital creatives to showcase and debate the latest advances in digital and technological innovation. The event held in East London last year attracted over 6,000 delegates with support from more than 40 sponsors and partners. This year the event is even bigger -- reflecting Lon...

I wasn’t able to attend the full Digital Shoreditch Festival, just a few days from the second week of scheduled events. That being said, I’m really glad that I witnessed part of the second annual festival of creative, cultural and technological developments within this evolving East London community. I had mentioned – before my visit – I believe that London, England has some things in common with the emerging tech and digital creative clusters in Austin, Texas. But based upon what I saw and heard during the insightful Digital Shoreditch activities, I’m now thinking that there are more similarities with the New York City clusters. London has a wealth of creative talent focused on the fashion, architecture and design sectors of the global networked economy. Few places in the world can likely match this amazing combination of artistic assets and intellectual capacity. Besides, the local higher-education and professional mentoring opportunities are clearly more attuned to the app...

I’ve previously shared a summary of observations during my attendance at the 2012 South by Southwest (SXSW) Interactive events earlier this year. What I didn’t mention was that I had the opportunity to briefly meet Kam Star, while he was in Austin, Texas attending SXSW. As the founder, Kam explained his aspirations for the Digital Shoreditch Festival -- to replicate some of the success of the SXSWi legacy within the London marketplace. Why should this bold goal matter to the British public. For starters, it’s about the potential economic impact. Case in point: for the second straight year, in 2011 the SXSW Interactive attendance fueled the impressive increase in event attendance -- although SXSW Film and SXSW Music also enjoyed banner years as well. The City of Austin’s hospitality industry benefitted from the outside visitors with two very profitable weeks. SXSW’s direct booking of more than 10,500 individual reservations totaling 47,500+ room nights -- that was an in...

The following is a list of exhibiting vendors or companies that presented at panel sessions and captured my attention at the SXSW Interactive event -- last week in Austin, Texas. I encourage you to check out their Web sites to learn more. Music Metric provides insight and understanding into consumer behavior online globally for the entertainment industry. They aggregate and analyze all music related information available on the web. From websites mentioning an artist or release, the social networks frequented by music fans, peer to peer networks used to trade music and anywhere music fans leave a comment, they aim to be there and to be tracking the activity. OverBlog is a blogging platform in constant evolution. They say it's the biggest blog platform in Europe (based in Paris, France) and right now is undergoing massive development for a new release in 2012. OverBlog already has many features: including communities, monetization agreements, lots of statistics and a user g...

Preparations for the London 2012 Olympics includes plans for broadband infrastructure upgrades across the UK. Coverage of the sporting events will create a multitude of digital media content, but the ultimate legacy will be a platform for long-term socioeconomic development within the nation. Point Topic predicts there will be over 10.5 million superfast broadband lines in Britain within the next five years. With another 4.6 million cable broadband connections this means that almost 60 percent of broadband customers -- and more than half of all homes and businesses -- will be using superfast speeds of 30 megabits or more by the end of 2016. "It's still a risky and controversial forecast," says Tim Johnson, Chief Analyst at Point Topic. "It is always difficult to predict something which is expected to grow so fast. If the forecast is correct, the number of superfast lines will grow 50 times over between mid-2011 and the end of 2016." But there's unce...

I’m attending SXSW Interactive once again in March. As in prior years, over the course of five days, I’ll assess the overall themes that garner my attention and then write a summary of the most compelling storyline that emerges. Based on the buzz leading up to the event, and having reviewed the current schedule of SXSWi Sessions, I can somewhat predict three key theme possibilities: The previously independent Music, Film and Interactive festivals will continue to converge around common-ground -- as an example, with Transmedia or cross-communication projects becoming more mainstream activities this year.   The term “User-Generated Content” will likely disappear as a description applied to all low-budget content creators -- it’s inappropriate for the multitude of talented writers, musicians and videographers that produce quality digital media.   Bloggers that contribute to Content Factories (aka content farms), and the companies that host their material, will be targeted as...

Consumer confidence in handling digital technology has developed rapidly as products such as the MP3 player, PVR, laptop PC and PDA have become progressively mainstream. This enhanced public adeptness has led to increased awareness and demand to be able to do more with their content. By delivering fully portable or mobile services and content, companies looking to succeed in the ' digital lifestyle ' will be tapping into consumer trends towards having things anytime, anyplace, anywhere, anyhow for anybody. The digital lifestyle means that the opportunities in the connected home now extend beyond the boundaries of a house. It provides the chance to convert the latest technologies, services and applications into valued and compelling experiences for the consumer. This forum has been created with an emphasis on discussion, debate and interaction to enable participants to compare ideas and strategies, as well as identify potential partnerships. The event will examine how to c...