A year ago in March Jeff Pulver envisioned an unusual conference to focus on the impact of Twitter on Media, Information, Communications and Entertainment. Since Twitter is built upon short messages of 140 characters or less, Jeff's idea was to bring that concept to life with many short presentations by a wide range of interesting "characters" rather than few longer presentations from a small group of established speakers. Thus was born the 140 Characters Conference (affectionately called "140conf"). It quickly became clear that Jeff's new conference idea was bigger than just a "Twitter Conference" and at its heart, it was really focused on exploring how Twitter, Social Media and the real-time web are impacting all aspects of our busy lives. Hence, the real theme of 140Conf is the now familiar tag-line, "Exploring The State of Now!"
If You Can Make It There, You Can Make It Anywhere!
After it's New York premiere last June, 140Conf events have now been held all over the world, including Los Angeles, London, Tel Aviv, Las Vegas, Austin and Barcelona. Last week was the second New York based 140Conf, and it was bigger and better than ever. One thousand "characters" were in attendance over two days at the famed 92nd Street Y, on the Upper East Side of Manhattan with about 170 of those characters participating on stage as presenters and panelists. Speakers ranged from Miss America, to Ivanka Trump, to impassioned educators, to MC Hammer, to, well, me! The entire conference was streamed live on U-Stream, and is now available for on demand viewing. Jeff and his team put on a great event, brimming with information, insights and inspiration.
Devices And Vices
Since I work in the Mobile Industry, I wanted to use my ten minutes on stage at 140Conf to take a look at the impact of "real-time" on Mobile Devices, and similarly, the impact of Mobile Devices on "real-time" and how both have affected our behavior. And, I wanted to have a little fun while doing so. You can see "Our Devices Are Our Vices: How Mobile Is A Real-Time Blessing & Curse" in the embedded video below. I hope you enjoy it, and please feel free to share your thoughts in the comments.
