I love this city. Victoria, that is.
It’s where I’ve planted roots, am raising my family and it has a budding technology community that seems to fly under the radar on both a national and global scale. While I know that many of my friends throughout Canada think of my city has a great destination to retire in, I’ve come to know of it as a great place to thrive in.
That’s why I’m not surprised that Victoria plays host to one of the more compelling and innovative events I’ve ever come across: the transmission: GLOBAL SUMMIT.
I first discovered this event last year when Behance’s Scott Belsky made an appearance. I was following his tweets and realized he was a stone’s throw from my house when he sent them. While we didn’t get to meet in person while he visited Victoria, I did start to pay attention to the transmission: GLOBAL SUMMITt as a result – and this year the event is turning things up a few notches with Transmission Innovation Camp.
What is transmission: GLOBAL SUMMIT?
Every February in Victoria, BC, 150 experts and leading thinkers descend to discuss the long-term vision of digital creative content and sustainability in the creative industries for this event. Topics of discussion during the summit include interactive media, metadata, digital TV, gaming, music, digital storytelling and screen-based entertainment.
The event features a series of talks from highly regarded experts from all over the globe, with this year’s lineup featuring the likes of:
- Bill Buxton – Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research
- Angel Gambino – Advisor, Sonos & Co-founder, Rosa Parks
- Paul Hoffert – Composer and Professor at York University
- Eric Garland – Founder and CEO Big Champagne
- Don McLean – Dean of Music at University of Toronto
The talks will be hosted by Nora Young (Host & Creator of “Spark”, CBC Radio One – a show I’ve always been fond of) and Michael Enright (Host, CBC Radio One’s The Sunday Edition), so I know they’ll deliver the goods.
Along with the talks are the evening events such as Dinner in the Dark at the utterly amazing Atrium venue and transmitLIVE, which features a collection of artists presenting their work and craft throughout Victoria at a variety of venues. The flagship venue is the Atrium, where the launch of a five-story high, digital media installation by renowned curator, Malcolm Levy, in collaboration with Jeremy Greenspan (of Junior Boys) will take place.
During the summit, there is always something inspiring, innovative and exciting happening. I took in a couple of the evening events last year and it definitely had me relishing the thought of being involved in a much larger capacity come 2012.
The summit itself takes place this year from February 8-10, but it’s the Innovation Camp that gets things going starting today.
Transmission Innovation Camp
Transmission Innovation Camp is essentially a startup commercialization initiative, where four dynamic startups – through a carefully curated process – have been chosen for their capacity to be game changers at a global level. The four startups are as follows (some of which already have active websites that you can check out):
- CafePlaylist: an online service dedicated to improve retail venue performance licensing compliance and to provide related value-added services to venue owners, consumers and industry organizations.
Deebo: a web and mobile application that improves the quality of life for people with diabetes by providing an incentivized, game-like approach to blood glucose and lifestyle management.
MediaCore: a cloud-based online video platform that allows anyone to create, customize, and monetize their own video community.
Songspin.fm: a music discovery website that creates custom radio stations made of the hottest and freshest tracks on the internet.
These entrepreneurs will spend eight days (February 6-14)working in focused business modeling sessions, in conjunction with a group of international mentors and entrepreneurs-in-residences, resulting in a full integration of their offerings into the conference design. The mentors all have varied and well-respected backgrounds, and some of those involved in the camp include:
- Paul Hoffert, CM. (Professor, York University and Chair of Bell Broadcast & New Media Fund)
- Steven Masur, Esq. (Managing Partner, MasurLaw)
- David Neale (President, Neale & Associates)
- Sue McGill (Advisor on Information, Communications and Entertainment, MaRS Discovery District)
Entrepreneurs-In-Residences who will participate include:
- Ana Serrano (Director, CFC Media Lab)
- Michael Tippett (Executive Director, GrowLab)
Why This Event Excites Me
The transmission: GLOBAL SUMMIT brings all of the things that are right in my wheelhouse into one event, and as a guy who is all about being productive I really can;t ask for much more. It is grand in scale and scope, and the team seems to be looking to level up the summit each and every year. Events like this are rare anywhere, let alone in the city where I live. I can dive into technology, discuss workflow and productivity and even get into a bit of the Creative Commons and copyright debate that the team at Dyscultured gets into on a regular basis.
And, ultimately, I’m a creative at heart. All of the stuff at this summit drips with creativity.
The Innovation Camp is just another great add-on to what is a stellar showcase, and I can’t wait to see what this week has to offer everyone who is a part of – or feels the buzz from – transmission: GLOBAL SUMMIT 2012.
