3 things
Was catching up with Susan today and it reminded me to post this presentation I did last November for an ‘asset management think tank’ that Susan produced (with Reed Midem). She asked me to speak to this group of senior executives from (mostly large) financial services firms about how the changes brought on by technology might impact their businesses going forward.
No problem.
Oh, and… I get eight minutes to do it. Easy peasy.
So I got to work. My first attempt came in at about 72 minutes and in any event would clearly not make any sense to anyone but me (and maybe JP, a clear demographic of one!) So that went in the trash and working in the wee hours of the morning in Monaco - with only the magic of my trusty MacBook Pro and Keynote (sound familiar? - Al eat your heart out! …wonder if I can get Jeff Skoll to finance the movie version too? 
) I started again from scratch.
Obviously I needed to:
-
Distill the ideas.
Create a jumping off point [pun intended], not a conclusion.
Capture their attention.
Well this is what I came up with. 3 things. [the magical number 7 minus 2, minus 2 again… just in case!]:
[ok I know it’s hard to read with the Quicktime/YouTube resolution…if you can’t read it, trust me: it’s really good(!)]
With thanks to (in case you can’t read the source attributions on the video) - Dave Morin, Stowe Boyd, Reuters, The Electric Sheep Company, Ray Kurzweil and Lewis Carroll.
…oh and Sol Seppy! Enjoy.
April 25th, 2007 at 10:23 pm
[…] He’s kept his word. Nice to see him up and about again, I really enjoyed working with him. If you have the time, go take a look at his latest post on The Park Paradigm. And if you haven’t seen it yet, follow the link in his sidebar to AmazonBay, if it still works. He’s a really inspirational guy to work with. […]
April 26th, 2007 at 12:47 am
[…] From Park Paradigm, via JP […]
April 26th, 2007 at 11:21 am
Thanks Dave, and again apologies for the poor resolution. I must admit I’m baffled as to why the (uncompressed) Quicktime file is so huge (exceedign YouTube limits), given that it is mainly just text on a black background. Oh well, I don’t want to complain too much - I couldn’t of even done this (sharing) a couple of years ago (pre YouTube, pre iLife)…small step towards the singularity?
April 26th, 2007 at 3:07 pm
Very fun to watch and of course useful to those who watched it too.
I only wish ‘the singularity’ wasn’t such a dumb idea. Not the continuing increase in computer power along the curve of Moore’s Law, but the idea of “machine intelligence.” Although you’d never get Ray or his accolytes to understand it, this is rather like saying that automobiles are more powerful horses: i.e. it’s akin to the ‘horseless carriage’ idea. In other words, rather than being a *revolutionary* and new notion, it’s a quaint way to look at computers. Far from Ray’s intended position, eh?
April 28th, 2007 at 10:22 am
Sean. I’m not sure I use the term singularity in its intended term, I mostly just found it a convenient, succinct term to describe a state of uber-convergence.
I really enjoyed the fact you gave the context about the video. These thoughts are often the important ones that, if not a substitute for the intended message, certainly add meat around the substance of it for those who care to think of such things.
I might be a bit thick, but would you care to give some context around the Walrus and the Carpenter explaining your thoughts around who’s who?
Regards,
Dave - Lifekludger
www.lifekludger.net
dnwallace.com/blog
April 30th, 2007 at 2:23 pm
[…] Dave asks: What is the significance of the Walrus and the Carpenter in my 3 things presentation? Funny thing is he’s the first so far to have asked me the question - I guess the folks at the seminar where I showed it originally just thought it was an extra bit of lunacy thrown in to confuse them. […]
May 17th, 2007 at 11:14 am
[…] I’ve been a fan of Ray’s for the past few years, ever since I was introduced to his papers on the “Law of Accelerating Returns” and then when I first read his book “The Singularity is Near” in late 2005. Indeed his thesis was one of the key pillars upon which I built my “3 Things” presentation. Up until very recently, however well known he was in the world of geeks, TEDsters and academia, insofar as he was known to a wider audience it was generally as the inventor of the ubiquitous and eponymous electronic keyboard, but that is all changing as his ideas (perhaps thanks to the wonderful ability of new networks and publishing tools are enabling the diffusion of good new ideas to the extent they can no longer be ignored by traditional media) - as his speaking fees apparently have jumped from $2000 to $25,000, a forthcoming documentary and a big feature article in Fortune attests…Ray is now officially an icon. Well done. […]
November 12th, 2007 at 1:39 pm
I have been ordered by Malcolm to respond to your post; bit of a stretch for an old dinosaur like me. I think the post is great and (you may believe it or not) reflected many of the thoughts that my sausage machine of a brain was processing at the same time. It was suitably on song for me to plagiarise parts of it and along with input from the aged “confucius of calcutta” present the whole topic in comprehensible English. It may be too late but your old colleagues are actually sitting up and listening. ps. Don’t tell Axel I’ve done this!!!! I shall watch developments with interest.
November 12th, 2007 at 5:46 pm
and another thing on a more relevant note. Do you think that the “monetisation” of Facebook by Microsoft will make Facebook “uncool” and no longer a desirable place to be??
November 12th, 2007 at 10:02 pm
Thanks for the comments Stephen. It’s never too late to plant a seed.
As for MS/FB, obviously it’s pretty exciting financially for existing employees, but the irony is that it will make it much harder to recruit going forward - if the strike on new options is at $15bn, the “start-up” upside is clearly gone…on the other hand “printing” at $15bn I think makes FB guys look very smart (and the Redmond guys less so.) In any event I think MS needs to change.