SXSW 2016 Recap
I spent my final spring break of college in Austin, Texas taking advantage of the student discount (half-off!) for the annual South by Southwest Conference. With an interactive badge, I had the opportunity to see an impressive lineup of speakers who have changed the internet experience with the founding of companies like Youtube, Twitter, Slack, and Wikipedia. In addition to these headliners, there were smaller panels and meetups. A consistent theme of the conference was looking at the schedule and finding 4+ events that you are interested in, all happening at the same time.
Below, I will recap my notes on some of the events that I attended.
Keynotes/Panels
Courtside with NBA Commissioner Adam Silver
Speakers: Adam Silver, Brian Stelter
-Although there are advantages to having live, perishable programming, there is a large amount of people who cannot watch a game live due to work, region or other circumstances. If you do not provide highlights or web content, you lose these people who are not going to sit down and watch a full two hour game three days day later.
-There is a notion that you want people to snack so they will pay for the meals. This means providing web content that is only part of the package, and ultimately entices the viewer to watch the main programming.
-Shoulder programming is important. The introduction of ‘Inside the NBA’ has been a huge success.
-Media perspective is different than the experience of actually being in the arena. Most people in the world cannot go to an NBA games. This means the NBA must find other ways to indulge fans, and new technologies like virtual reality can really enhance rather than degrade the league.
-Arenas are a modern town hall; a place where the community can go enjoy themselves together (Concerts, sports, graduations, etc).
-Adam Silver cleverly states that he is a “diehard fan of every NBA team”.
-Noted that he is still confused as to why the rise in popularity of basketball hasn’t caused a rise in NBA caliber players.
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HAL to Her: Humanizing Tech Via the Power of Voice
Speakers: David Austin, Jesse Robbins, Lesley Carmichael, Timothy Jordan
-Big issue with current state of virtual assistants is listener fatigue. Cortana, Siri, and other current voices still sound robotic. Your virtual assistant must be trusted, and right now, the voice delivery is not human-like, and there is an underlying trust issue that will have to be changed over time.
-Either succeed or fail gracefully
-Issue 2: Right now, you look down and are removed from reality. The goal is to keep you in the present, since the magic of voice interface is that it’s not really an interface. You interact with it through speech rather than touch (Voice API)
-One of main challenges is echo cancellation
-Bottom line is that there is a different set of social norms related to advancement in voice technology; common irritation with one sided conversation
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Will AI Augment or Destroy Humanity?
Speaker: Dag Kittlaus (VIV), Steven Levy
-Right now, computers solve problems effectively when they are pointed at the problem. This is far more difficult for broader issues.
-Apps are islands. Someone has to tell you about it, and you have to go download it. Kittlaus says that VIV will get rid of this problem.
-He does not believe there is a prescribed path to ubiquity through acquisition, so being acquired like Siri was is not a current consideration.
Example interactions with VIV:
You: “Dry hair”
VIV Response: “Lowers windows”
You: “Eject passenger”
VIV Response: Seat reclines and sunroof opens
You: “Im drunk”
VIV Response: Orders an Uber/Lift (or brings you another drink)
-Response to critics doubting ease of use with voice control: “If it’s easier, people will migrate to it.”
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-Kittlaus is not concerned about the loss of jobs due to AI, saying that most people used to be farmers, and now only 3% of humans are; so people find other things to do.
-2045 is prediction for sentient computer
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Comments Are Terrible: But They Dont Have To Be
Speakers: Erica Palan, Greg Barber, Talia Stroud
-Users are invaluable. They can provide new story ideas and propel journalism, and they of course are the consumers of the published work. Yet the comment section is the bane of most journalists’ existence, and discussion revolved around why comments are so terrible, and ways to fix it.
-Commenters are some of your most loyal followers; conversing with them strengthens bond.
-Writer participation: Think about how interactivity play a part in your storyteller.
Solutions:
-More people engage when there are multiple columns. Consider providing ‘disagree’, ‘agree’, and ‘neutral’ sections.
-Preface comment section with pro/con section.
-Buttons; allow someone to “respect” another person’s comment (Research confirmed efficacy).
-Give selective readers elevated status to moderate comments.
-Provide prompts/questions for readers to respond to in comment section.
-Put tags on commenters profiles that recognize positive contributors.
-Highlight the best, and convey that those are the kind of comments that you are looking for.
Coral Project software allows you to find stats on commenters, and figure out who are the best/worst commenters.
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Accessing the Inaccessible: Evolving Search
Speaker: Biz Stone, Danny Sullivan
-People naturally want to answer questions when they know the answer. The idea with Jelly is a “fire and forget search” to save people time.
-Stone believes the goal of tech should be to amplify traits. Technology should be there when you need it, and save us time.
-”Jelly is not better than google search, its just different”
-Jelly is a search engine with personality. It is a subjective search engine that will provide a specific and helpful answer. People suffer through terrible UI because that’s where the answers are. Though it may not be immediate, he says it will let you live your life without wasting time sifting through poor search results.
-Stone points out that Google’s search engine was invented in a completely different time.
-Stone says you can’t beat human experience; people naturally want to share their knowledge. There is a natural inclination to answer questions we know the answer to.
-”Everyone is talking about AI, but why not work on utilizing intelligence”
-There is always someone out there who knows the answer
Sidenotes:
-Stone believes in treating company culture like a product (give it direction!)
-He loves Amazon echo
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Stewart Butterfield in Conversation with Farhad Manjoo
Speaker: Stewart Butterfield, Farhad Manjoo
-To get sense of value, ask how much you would have to be paid to have it (Slack,etc) taken away from you
-Hoping to stay an independent company
-There will be more functionality with other apps in Slack in 5 years
-Does not plan on making Slack available for external (outside work) use because it will inherit the issues that come with that (spam, phishing,etc)
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-100 million people use snapchat a day
-More photos are shared on Snapchat than Facebook (8 billion video views)
-Companies that are using Snapchat for marketing are reaping the benefits
-Early adopter advantage (big connection to success; more time to get more users)
Advantages of Snapchat:
-Snapchat isn’t a feed, customers are actually choosing to watch/view.
-Authenticity and storytelling are key to marketing, Snapchat is great for both.
-People don’t believe Shaquille O’Neal fits into a Buick or that Matthew McConaughey genuinely likes Lincoln. If people see these figures snapchatting it, seems legitimate because it humanizes people.
-Episodic content; have to be on platform in those 24 hours to see it. As an event based platform, it takes advantage of FOMO (similar to 90’s TV when you couldn’t rewatch shows)
-Fewer social consequences (Example provided: Impossible to accidentally like the wrong girls photo; only views)
-Noted that there is still forms of engagement (screenshot and chat)
-Gives people the power. Snapchat forces companies to listen; brands have to make an effort understand the platform by looking at other stars because it is not possible to put the same content from Facebook onto Snapchat.
-Provides youth with a voice. Those who feel as if they don’t have something worth sharing now have less pressure on their ‘online portfolio’ since the content disappears.
-People feel more comfortable talking to brands. Customers don’t want to talk with companies, they want to talk with other people.
-Snapchat is one to one experience. If you are making really engaging content, people come back, otherwise you can’t force people to.
-Snapchat says “friends”, not “followers”
-You are building a community, not a following
Social Media Star’s request: Separate “save” and “post” button
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Avoiding Startup Shutdown to Raise Capital
Speakers: Adam Gislason, Steve Ogunro
-Intellectual property audits help identify what can be trademarked/patented and what should be (recommends doing this at beginning of start-up)
-Investors won’t do NDA’s because they are getting pitched too often to keep track
-Source code is copyrightable
Protect your idea within the sphere of people you are working with (Cited Snapchat’s founder controversy)
-Develop lawyer relationships as an entrepreneur to protect yourself!
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Food and the Future of Live Video
Speakers: Steve Chen, Vijay Karunamurthy
-Nike uploaded as ‘Joe B’ to become first established big company to get into user content scene on Youtube
-Nom live video-ing is another form of authentic interaction. Right now Nom is intended only for cooking, but they won’t remove videos of other topics.
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Myth vs Fact: Cybersecurity and the Connected Car
Speakers: Catherine McCullough, Senthil Ramakrishnan, Michael Spierto, Hilary Cain
-Best practices are better than regulations given the speed at which it will become outdated.
-Though you really only want car for two hours a day, and the average commute is 6 miles, things are built to peak capacity.
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Wikipedia: Beyond the Encyclopedia
Speakers: Jimmy Wales, Guy Kawasaki
-Switch to SSL has made countries unable to filter what pages people can view. This means the Chinese government cannot censor specific pages, as the government can only see that you are viewing wikipedia, not what page.
-It’s forced them into making a decision to censor all of wikipedia or none of it. At this point, they have decided to censor all of it; Wales will not relent on changing this.
-In reference to the driverless car conversation, Wales talked about 2nd order disruption.
-Driverless cars has secondary effects. “Uber will be rubbing their hands at -an opportunity to cut costs (and jobs)” with the arrival of driverless cars.
- Uber is a second-order disruption caused by a development in the telecommunications industry (the smartphone).
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Surveillance, Sousveillance and Body Cams
Speakers: Omer Tene, Oren Yakobovich
-Big Question: Should the debate be at the point of collection or focus on use of the video?
-’Track me not’ bombards Google with random search queries
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Though I didn’t actually attend the speech, here is Obama’s keynote conversation for good measure.
SXSW Tips
- If you are interested in seeing the headlining speakers, save time by just finding the biggest ballroom (Ballroom D in the Austin Convention Center) and look at the schedule for that. Chances are the headliners will be there and you can just stay in that room.
- If you aren’t going to the event, look at the speeches you would be interested in attending, and monitor Twitter/SXSW websites for posts/recaps for those speeches. People are relentlessly tweeting at these panels/speeches.
- There is a valid argument that to make the most of the event, you should attend the smaller panels that interest you since the keynotes typically get posted on Youtube anyway.
Note: In reference to my previous post on the “Current State of Consumer Culture”, SXSW sponsors did a fantastic job offering brand experiences. For example, McDonald’s offered VR experiences, music, and a ‘build a burger’ for free opportunity.
