MCB Tech.19 is the future-focused conference for C-Level executives from all businesses. Join other industry leaders whose strategies are driven by technology and impacted by accelerating and rapid changes. Be future ready – get your early bird ticket now!
A political scandal
In 2018, the headlines were dominated by one of the biggest political scandals in modern history, one that spread to all corners of the world and into the very core of the White House. At the center of the scandal was the analytics company Cambridge Analytica. The company had exploited data from millions of Facebook profiles and used these for the purposes of political propaganda. Facebook's stock price plummeted in parallel with a rising awareness among people, accompanied by demands for stricter data protection regulations for personal information. Ultimately, the scandal brought the Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, to testify before the US Congress.
Data rights are the new civil rights
One of those who demanded to know what personal data Cambridge Analytica held was David Carroll, an associate professor of media design at Parsons School of Design at The New School in New York and former director of the MFA Design and Technology program. In a case before the London High Court, he is claiming the right to his personal data and information from the highly controversial data mining company.
"It has been both an interesting and challenging journey", says David Carroll.
"I never expected that a formal data request would end up producing evidence relevant to the biggest data scandal to date (and also potentially the crime of the century.) Even stranger, it turns out, the data protection laws of the UK (and the EU) are applicable to the US election of 2016. Now we are figuring out if a rogue data company can simply go out of business when they get caught doing data crimes. This quest is not over yet but we’ve already discovered exactly why the US urgently needs to adopt the data protection principals of its allies across the Atlantic. Our democracy depends on it.”
You will have the whole story. David Carroll will be at mcb tech .19, June 13, talking about his Dark Data Quest: “What I've learned chasing my Cambridge Analytica voter profile across the Atlantic and why data rights are the new civil rights”. You don’t wanna miss this!
Products your customers love
We are also extremely proud to announce Marty Cagan, founder of the Silicon Valley Product Group (SVPG) and widely recognized as the primary thought leader for technology product management, as a keynote speaker at mcb tech .19.
Before founding SVPG to pursue his interests in helping others create successful products through his writing, speaking, coaching and advising, Marty was most recently senior vice-president of product and design for eBay, where he was responsible for defining products and services for the company’s global e-commerce trading site.
In his bestselling book "INSPIRED: How To Create Tech Products Customers Love," he breaks down why some products fail and others don’t, examining the required skills in a good product team.
"I’ve had the extremely good fortune to be able to work with many of the very best technology product teams in the world. People creating the products you use and love every day. Teams that are literally changing the world," says Cagan.
"What I’ve learned is that there is a profound difference between how the very best product companies create technology products, and the rest. And I don’t mean minor differences. Everything from how the leaders behave, to the level of empowerment of teams, to how the organization thinks about funding, staffing and producing products, down to how product, design and engineering collaborate to discover effective solutions for their customers."
Care for your customers
Marty has specifically looked at today’s most successful tech companies—Amazon, Apple, Google, Adobe, Netflix, Tesla and so on. In his talk, ORDINARY PEOPLE, EXTRAORDINARY RESULTS, Marty will discuss how these companies create an environment where ordinary people can produce extraordinary results. And he will contrast this environment with how most organizations try to utilize technology.
We now also find ourselves in a situation where everything goes much faster than just a few years ago, and many companies are being disrupted. What new demands are made of those who are to create and develop great products?
Marty explains that it is no longer sufficient to lean on an established brand, there is little choice today but to truly care for your customers and ensure you are providing them with strong solutions they can depend on. If you don't, there is very likely a new company that will come along that will.
Marty is looking forward to taking the stage at the mcb tech .19 conference.
"I look forward to coming to Bergen to meet with industry leaders, and am excited to learn about the media and finance clusters of Media City Bergen," says Cagan.
mcb tech .19 and Future Week
Stay tuned as we will be launching a stellar lineup of speakers in the weeks to come. mcb tech .19 is a one day, future conference for leaders in all industries, facing similar challenges in a rapid and accelerating market.
At the same time this conference is part of something much bigger. The mcb tech.19 conference is the cornerstone of the new MCB Future Week, which will consist of a series of research seminars, workshops, events, presentations, talks, and more during the days of June 11-14, 2019 – all taking place inside the Media City Bergen building, and all focused on topics that challenge our common future as it is driven and shaped by technology.
Future Week will hold events for designers, coders, journalists, developers, leaders, students and researchers within science, tech, humanities, art, design, media, finance and more. It will also include an “Open House” day on Friday the 14th where myriad tech talks/workshops/geek-level sessions take place.