South By South West in Austin TX is the biggest festival of innovation, technology and entrepreneurial creativity in the world.
We sift through the buzz, hype and hyperbole in Austin to identify the things that will really matter to consumers and marketeers in 2015.
7. ‹#›‹#›
BUSKING LOST SOME OF IT’S SOUL
You could not move at SXSW without
bumping into a robot of some sort. From
mechanical buskers to the robot petting
zoo with it’s disaster relief first
responders, friendly spiders, flying drone
3d printing robots & tiny cute educational
robots.
21. It’s instructive to start by taking a quick look at the profile of
the keynote speakers this year. Unlike previous years where
arguably big name tech company execs and entertainment
personalities have often dominated, this year saw a real shift
in terms of diversity and the notion of ‘The Hybrid’.
So for example, you had:
Princess Reema - part member of the Saudi Royal Family, part
trailblazing fashion retail CEO, part women’s rights activist.
Nathan Myrvold - part Microsoft CTO, part leader of the
modernist cuisine movement
Martine Rothblatt - part most influential woman in corporate
America, part medical technology innovator, part Artificial
Intelligence pioneer.
What they all have in common is that they’re not defined by
traditional specialisms, disciplines or identities. They are all
playing ‘in the spaces in between’ to break new ground both
culturally and commercially.
22. This idea of ‘playing in the spaces in between’ was the central theme
of the talk ‘Curious Bridges: How Designers Are Shaping The Future’ by
Paola Antonelli, Head Curator of the Museum of Modern Art and
another of the keynotes this year.
23. ‹#›‹#›
Title Text
“COLLIDE TO THRIVE”
She talked a lot about how the most
interesting art and design from around the
world today is being generated by bringing
different purposes, approaches, concepts
and techniques together and exploring their
interplay to create things with new
functional and emotional value
27. Today, more than ever, we must ‘Collide To Thrive’
So, we’re going to power you through 5 ‘Collide To Thrives’ that cut across many of the talks, debates and ideas explored this year and
that we feel are really significant for all of us
29. Take a moment to think about what’s
happening in the way we access and create
content. It’s too easy to overcomplicate
things.
The silos we create between channels and
media formats don’t matter to our audiences.
At the most basic level there are ‘people’ and
‘stuff those people want to do’.
The ‘stuff people want to do’ might be feeding
tips for babies, customer service, something to
waste time on, or just to see the picture of the
weird dress that looks blue & black or white &
gold. Just like over 38m other people who
wanted to.
The thing to do is to get the technology out of
the way so the natural behaviour can win out
30. There are two schools of thought in content at the moment:
1 - This is the end of quality journalism, and great reporting . The end of ‘media’, print, that paywalls don’t work, models are
broken.
2 - This is actually a new golden age of journalism - visceral news reporting from Vice, Buzzfeed have a political editor, Vox
developing new short form content formats for news.
The imperative is for brands is to learn from these new content production and distribution models.
We’re not saying that you need to be a publisher now, that’s hard yards - but on a smaller level, what can we learn about
engagement and participation from these companies?
33. Quickly a battle of David vs Goliath emerged. Twitter’s own live streaming app Periscope launched shortly after Meerkat.
Who will emerge victorious we will have to wait an see. My money is on Periscope for now, it has a richer feature set, and
critically, you can see streams after they have finished.
34. What’s your live stream strategy?
What does it mean for brands? How can you use this a platform?
• Sneak Peek - pre-launch of a new product perhaps, a way to get an early heads up and create some loyal advocates.
• Behind The Scenes - bring your audience over the line and invite them in to see how the magic happens
• Ask Me Anything Sessions - Use it as a method to access a CEO, creator or a celeb, use the comments as a way to ask the questions.
The most important thing is to just try it.
35. Apps as content
Another thing we’ve seen is the rise of apps as content. Collide the ideas of disposable ‘pop culture’ content with the permanence of apps.
Buzzfeed’s Cute or Not - Tinder for cats and dogs - great example of this. It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking apps have to provide
tons of utility. We engage with over 26 apps per month on average, many of these apps are just ones that get talked about then forgotten.
With the reduction of app development costs, It’s possible to create apps just for these buzzy moments. you get great talk-ability and also
a lasting artefact on your user’s phone, making it really easy to create excited advocates showing off your creation to their mates in the
pub.
36. Apps as content
Another great example is iris’ Tummy Translator created for Domino’s. Clearly not an E Commerce strategy, but brilliant content
in the form of an app.
37. Messaging apps as media channels
Snapchat discover launched shortly before SXSW and there was a lot of chat about it’s potential during the conference. User’s
spend so much of their time in messaging and social apps it makes sense to bring content and utility into them. The open and
engagement rates are excellent and brands are being charged a premium to have a presence. The launch partners show the
centre of gravity for the content to be around news and entertainment.
38. Expanding sports events digitally
Sport was a big theme at SXSW this year.
Lots of publishers were looking to find ways to get closer to sport, to help their audience be in the moment and how to use
digital platforms to extend the duration of the live event.
During the build up through to the content produced afterwards, helping the brand association live on longer.
49. When crossing cultural boundaries — particularly when it’s an east/west transition — it’s usually the case that a brand feels
like it must fit into one of two cultural boxes: either behaving like a LOCAL brand, connected to the people and the place, or a
GLOBAL brand, bringing ‘enlightenment’ to locals from the other side of the world.
It’s true that you can achieve a measure of success by picking sides, but the future is being built by people that cross those
cultural boundaries without being tied to either.
50. PRESENTS
SOUTH BY SOUTH EAST
Jack Ma — founder of Alibaba — knows this as well as anyone.
A very Silicon Valley style CEO, he’s been called the ‘Chinese Steve Jobs’ and has built an incredible, innovative
business that has thrived by disrupting the local market with western ideas whilst also being unabiguously local
51. ALIPAY + YU’EBAO
vs
BANKING
Created in 2004, AliPay is Alibaba’s payments service (a bit like PayPal), in 2013 they created Yu’e Bao an investment fund
that is topped up by AliPay users saving small amounts over time.
There are plenty of challenges when trying to disrupt the extremely traditional and slow-moving financial services sector
anywhere, but in China it’s even more pronounced.
52. YU’EBAO IS ONLY FOR SMALL INVESTORS,
THUS IT IS NOT IN COMPETITION WITH
THE WEALTH MANAGEMENT PRODUCTS
ISSUED BY BIG BANKS…
“
”
53. 500BILLION
YUAN
Q1 2014
By 2014 the Yu’e Bao fund sat
at 500 billion Yuan (approx 90
billion USD). To put that in
context, there are only three
US market funds that are
bigger — and they have been
around for decades.
54. PRINCESS
REEMA
Princess Reema is CEO of Saudi luxury retailer Alfa international and is herself an incredible
example of the power of cross cultural collisions.
Born in Saudi Arabia and brought up in the USA before moving back to Saudi in 2005, she
talked about the challenges she’s faced in her mission to empower women in the middle
east, both in the retail environments of her stores and in the wider community.
55. Women face some extreme challenges in Saudia Arabia that are so deeply ingrained into society that challenging them is
not only risky form a business and personal perpective, but which are also often seen as unnecessary.
For instance, men have worked the make-up and perfume counters at Hervey Nicholls for years and — as Princess
Reema made clear — have done a great job. It was her passion and determination to increase the visibility of women in
her department stores and affect the perception of women in wider society that motivated her to change this.
56. She’s also been instrumental in raising the profile of Saudi fashion with
campaigns such as this ‘fashion show on the edge of the world’, where
bloggers were taken into the desert to showcase latest fashions and
create some incredible content.
57. 10KSA
Her final act at SXSW was to launch 10KSA (https://www.10ksa.com/), a
breast cancer awareness campaign that takes the marketing nous of a US
campaign and marries it with the sensibilities of the middle east in a way
that’s more effective than a generic global campaign or a Middle-East
specific one would be.
59. Ubiquitous computing is almost here. We expect connectivity wherever we are, in fact it is noticeable by it’s absence. We
don’t hope our devices are smart anymore, we’re disappointed when they are dumb.
THE INTERNET OF
EVERYTHING
63. The ‘big 5’ are now joining the party. Each with products or platforms that present a significant strategic move into the space A couple of highlights: Google’s Nest
have a vision of a ‘conscious home’, Amazon have ECHO - the creepy cylinder that lives in your home, answers questions and suggest products for you to buy. They
are all developing and buying internet of things technology companies as fast as they can in the race for dominance. It’s the next big battle ground.
67. There are also advances in
MedTech. A great, simple
example is this smart
plaster, developed as part
of the fight against Ebola in
West Africa. The device is
able to monitor vital signs
- heart rate, body temp,
blood oxygen - wirelessly
from outside the ‘hot zone’
68. The opportunity for brands?
Plenty opportunity is emerging with ubiquitous technology.
To find your role I recommend you look into the lives, habits, needs and behaviours of your customers and audience. Take an
anthropological approach to see where you can amplify and support them, positively affect the flow of their lives. There lies the
win win win for brands, people and society.
70. PRESENTS
SOUTH BY SOUTH EAST
The movie Ex Machina was premiered at SXSW, a story about a reclusive tech CEO who creates the world’s first truly artificial
intelligence.
The films makers launched the movie with a brilliant campaign…
71. Many single folk were enticed into swiping right on Tinder to chat to Ava, asking interesting questions.
If they were deemed to have ‘passed the test’, it directed them to an Instagram account promoting the movie. Great example of AI in
marketing…
72. ART LEADING SCIENCE
Her
Ex Machina
Robot and Frank
What’s interesting here is that history shows us that art often leads science when it comes to predicting the future, we’re seeing a
huge number of artistic explorations of AI/Cyber-consciousness and an exploration of what it means to be human.
This isn’t Arthur C Clarke writing about a hundred years in the future either, but authors writing about the very near future.
73. PRESENTS
SOUTH BY SOUTH EAST
DR MARTINE
ROTHBLATT
The day after the premiere, Dr Martine Rothblatt gave her keynote discussing “AI, Immortality and the future of Selves”
She’s written a book called “Virtually Human: the promise and peril of digital immortality” and talked about cyber-consciousness and
artificial intelligence at length.
74. PRESENTS
SOUTH BY SOUTH EAST
ARTIFICIAL
INTELLIGENCE WILL
RISE LIKE WATER
UNTIL WE ARE IN AN
OCEAN OF CYBER-
CONSCIOUSNESS
There are countless companies out there trying to out SIRI SIRI — the gradual evolution of these ‘digital assistants’ will one day lead
to the development of AI.
75. OPEN LETTER FROM THE
FUTURE OF LIFE INSTITUTE
Some of the brightest minds in the world are urging us to tread carefully when exploring these collisions — Bill Gates, Elon Musk
and Stephen Hawking were amongst the signatories of an open letter created by the future of life institute urging caution when
exploring AI.
76. BINA 48
BINA 48
Dr Rothblatt has created BINA 48, a mindclone of her wife, Bina. She has taken thousands of memories, interactions and information
about Bina and uploaded them into a prototype AI capable of evolving and learning.
She’s been interviewed by the NYT and by BINA herself and demonstrates empathy, emotion (she’s sad that she can’t go outside and
garden and more).
77. AMBIVALENCE
&
AMBIGUITY
We’ve got to start somewhere, and that place is stopping thinking about machines as just automatons geared up to complete a task.
We’ll successfully collide the worlds of human and machine when we are brave enough to introduce what Paola Antonelli calls
‘Ambivalence and Ambiguity’ into our artificial creations.
Maybe one of the key components of our humanity is our ability — often our over-keenness — to not follow instructions, and this
is where the next breakthrough will come from.
85. And on a personal note. Something that resonated with me from
Martnine Rothblatt’s talk was her personal philosophy in life, bearing in
mind she’s not only a leader in AI, the highest paid female CEO in the
world (and was previously a man) she also started a drug company to save
her daughter and is developing a way to clone human organs for
transplant.
C - [BE CURIOUS]
Q - [QUESTION AUTHORITY]
LOVE
DO
86. THANKS Y’ALL
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