Brussels, London And Berkeley: Some Upcoming Events

from the bouncing-around dept

Here's a quick rundown on some upcoming events I'm involved in, leading off with a very exciting keynote brainstorming workshop at the INNOVATE / ACTIVATE conference in Berkeley on April 21st. As some of you know, we've run a bunch of brainstorming workshops either at our own events or as part of other events (as we're doing here). In this case, we'll be doing a brainstorming workshop around the question of "What does a proactive intellectual property agenda mean?" This is a question that has received a lot of attention over the past few months, since the SOPA fight. Lots of people who were involved in that battle came out of it wanting to do something positive to move the debates about IP towards fixing the problems associated with it, rather than just reacting defensively to efforts to expand a broken system. So we're going to brainstorm some ideas. The session will kick off with three (very) brief talks to get people thinking out of the box -- one by Nicole Ozer from the ACLU, one by Mike McGeary from Engine Advocacy, and one by me. From there, everyone will go into breakout groups with a specific brainstorming task for an hour, and then we'll regroup and discuss what the different groups came up with. These events are always thought-provoking and a lot of fun. I'd suggest coming to check it out, but I've been told that the event is already sold out.

Separately, this coming week, I'll be in Belgium on Wednesday, April 11th, taking part in a stakeholder hearing about ACTA at the European Parliament (which looks like it will be streamed live online). Two days later, I'll be in London, where I'll be hosting a discussion with Coadec talking about our recent Sky is Rising report (and I'm sure I'll also be discussing other policy/tech/business model issues as well). If you're unfamiliar with Coadec, it's a wonderful, UK-based organization, focused on helping the innovation community get involved and engaged in policy issues in the UK. That one is free and open to the public, so please come and join us. It should be a lot of fun.
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Filed Under: berkeley, brainstorming, brussels, events, london


Reader Comments

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  1. identicon
    rubberpants, 5 Apr 2012 @ 9:22pm

    Godspeed.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    Rottweiler, 5 Apr 2012 @ 9:32pm

    Good luck Mike, we are looking forward to see your participation in the ACTA hearing.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 6 Apr 2012 @ 5:33am

    Wow... a guy from California is a stakeholder in Belgium.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. icon
    Hephaestus (profile), 6 Apr 2012 @ 7:06am

    "What does a proactive intellectual property agenda mean?"

    Try the following ...

    We have the technology to keep tabs on every thing any politicians does and votes on. Put it all in one central location and allow people to choose what issues they would like to be kept abreast of.

    We have the technology to find and contact everyone in any politicians home turf. Track what the politicians are doing and notify everyone in their district.

    We have the technology to keep the politicians afraid for their jobs. Even a 5% voting block can ruin a political career.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 6 Apr 2012 @ 8:05am

    "We have the technology to keep the politicians afraid for their jobs. Even a 5% voting block can ruin a political career."

    The ultimate statement of the minority dictating to the majority. Classy!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  6. icon
    Gwiz (profile), 6 Apr 2012 @ 8:29am

    Re:

    Wow... a guy from California is a stakeholder in Belgium.

    You really don't understand this internet thingy, do you?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  7. icon
    Gwiz (profile), 6 Apr 2012 @ 8:41am

    Re:

    The ultimate statement of the minority dictating to the majority. Classy!

    Wow. That's what you got from Heph's comment?

    The things he spoke of are about transparency and accountability from our elected representatives and the possible repercussions of not being as such.

    That sounds like a majority (IE: constituents) dictating to minority (IE: elected officials) to me. And it is the way it is supposed to work.

    link to this | view in thread ]


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