iFest’08 — The business inspiration fest

8th September 2008

Maria Zapata - video & main ideas

“In the social arena nothing new is encouraged, only what has been tried and tested.. Part of our mission is to inject innovation in this field”

“We had to invent the concept ‘social entrepreneur’. Just five years ago people did not understand how these two words could go together”.

“We are a great partner for business. Social entrepreneurs are helping companies working with them to expands their markets”

“Ashoka’s vision is a world where everybody has the freedom and the confidence to become a change-maker”

“Ashoka measures impact of its social entrepreneurs after five years. 70 % of initiatives have been copied by other organizations”

“If you help social entrepreneurs, change will happen”

“Ashoka believes leadership drives social change and leadership increases its strength when working in a network”

Fernando L. Mompó

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Tags: Speakers · iFest'08

7th September 2008

Clara Boj - video & main ideas

Lalalab.org

Our focus at lalalab is to turn around the public space and how such spaces can be transformed by new technologies.During recent years, it has produced a process of migration from physical public spaces towards digital spaces. Our intention is to rehabilitate physical places through the adoption of new technologies creating hybrid spaces.

Our latest project is the Hybrid Playground. It includes an electronic game that can be played using a PDA while traveling physically to a playground where there are specially designed sensors incorporated in balance beams, slides, swings, etc.

At the time of developing the project Hybrid Playground, we had the principle objective to force children to have to take with others and interact physically.

We thought that a majority of children need an hour to learn how to use a PDA and be able to use it better than anyone before them. To our surprise, it took only 5 minutes for our test team of children to achieve this objective.

Fernando L. Mompó

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1st September 2008

iFest’08 in the media

Peter Watson en La Contra de La Vanguardia
La Vanguardia. 1 de setiembre de 2008

El festival de la innovación
Emprendedores. 1 de agosto de 2008

“El empresario también tiene derecho a despedir si quiere”
La Vanguardia. 29 de julio de 2008

Entrevista a Hervé Lebret, inversor i escriptor: “Mai no hi haurà un Silicon Valley a Europa”

www.3cat24.cat. 22 de julio de 2008

Entrevista amb Loretta Napoleoni, economista: “Vivim atrapats en una economia canalla”
www.3cat24.cat. 22 de julio de 2008

El evento de innovación empresarial Ifest trae a Barcelona los inventos del futuro
Expansión. 11 de julio de 2008

“Podremos zambullirnos en nuestras fotos”
El Periódico. 11 de julio de 2008

El evento de innovación empresarial Ifest trae a Barcelona los inventos del futuro
Expansión. 11 de julio de 2008

Ifest 2008 en el Fórum de Barcelona
Expansión. 7 de julio de 2008

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1st August 2008

Ricardo Baeza-Yates - video & main ideas

Yahoo!

-Search engines are not about searching anymore. They are means to achieve web-mediated goals.

-Computation is merely the basis for rational and behavioral interactions.

-Upper bound on typed content reaches 700 TB. But content consumption is fragmenting: nobody owns more than 10% of the Web page views.

-Access is fragmenting as well. For example, in Facebook, you can control who can see and how much they can see of your profile

-User generated content is growing exponentially.

-Innovation in the lab of Barcelona: people put metadata in their content and this enable to build pages of results with related searches in the form of text, maps, etc.

Anna Solana

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1st August 2008

Jean Claude Rodríguez-Ferrara - video & main ideas

CAF

Our life is base on trust. Many of the things we do require it.

We can better our lives if we improve our trust in those around us. I want to challenge people to be more willing to confide with one other. For this reason, I am dedicated to create networks of trust.

One thing that can create distrust is money. However, it is possible to create networks of trust with money, with respect to a particular methodology.

There are 2000 groups or Auto-Financial Communities in the world, that are earning a return of 16%, which is invested back into the community.

In Barcelona, where there are 20 groups, there has already been established 400 accounts with an average amount loaned of 400 euros and there are only two cases of outstanding accounts. The key lies in the strength of trust that exists within the community. My dream is to have a CAF in every neighbourhood.

In a CAF, the people are both the provider and client at the same time.

Fernando L. Mompó

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1st August 2008

Mercè Boada - video & main ideas

Mercè Boada
Understanding Alzheimer
Fundación ACE

- Half of the people here in this room will suffer from a type of Alzheimer´s when we reach 85 years old. Often when faced with such prospects, we rather think about what types of public transpotation we want to use or what type of glasses we would like to wear than how to deal with the possibility of living with a condition like Alzheimer´s”

- Spain is an aging nation, and this is only becoming more so as time goes on. We should start facing the prospect of how to live when we´re 90, but we have to take into account that we will be a generationsequiped with a whole range of new domestic technologies.

- Alzheimer is not the same as dementia.

- We are still in the limbo of investigation. We already are familiar with the condition, but we cannot rely on a single medicine to cure the sickness, in spite of the great investment made so far.

- “Those afflicted with Alzheimer´s have a great degree of implication and responsibility in managing the sickness. Those younger than 80 years with the capacity should decide the progression and nature of his or her dependency, how to live with the disesase and how to die.”

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1st August 2008

Loretta Napoleoni - video & main ideas

Economist & researcher at the London School of Economics, author of Terror Inc,. Tracing the Money behind Global Terrorism and Rogue Economics: Capitalism’s New Reality.

“The war on terror has not prevented terrorism at all.”

“Money laundering was made in dollars and therefore contributed to the strength of this currency. After The PATRIOT Act, which threatens to freeze the assets of any bank not reporting suspicious transactions in dollars, the Euro has become the favorite currency for money laundering and stronger than dollar.”

“Muslim investors fearing persecution in the United States took their money else.”

“Islamic banking is the fastest growing sector in finance markets”

“Terrorism financing is now much cheaper than it was in the past”

“The US spends $4 billion every month for its war in Iraq and almost $1 billion every month for its war in Afghanistan. Europe spends millions of euros every year on security. Compare that to the mere thousands devoted to terrorist attacks. The terrorists responsible for the 2004 Madrid train bombings received no official training. Three of the four terrorists behind the London Underground attack were unemployed. Their attack had a very low budget.”

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1st August 2008

Dan Gediman - video & main ideas

National Public Radio
www.thisibelieve.org

-Somebody wrote that “the shortest distance between two people is a story”. And stories are what the American National Public Radio airs through the media project This I Believe.

-People write, share and discuss the core values and beliefs than guide their daily lives. The main goal is to “inspire people to live a more spiritual life”.

-This idea has turned into different programs in the world and different books, which have been published in Spanish as well. It’s an international phenomena.

-The idea now is to create This I believe in Spanish, a place for Spanish Essays on what is the most important to people. “We have started a project with Infonomia on this direction. Have a look at and feel free to send your essay.”

-”I’m very interested in how educators can use This I believe and what the essays of the next generation of the world say. My goal is make the students of the world read each other words.”

Anna Solana

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1st August 2008

Marià Corbí - video & main ideas

Philosopher and theologian

“We as a species are characterized by our capacity to distinguish the necessity of reality from our own reality. It is our flexibility, which we must give thanks to how we came to dominate this earth.”

Marià Corbí explains how our double experience of reality and our flexibility are qualities that fuel our capacity for innovaion in science and technology.

The dogmatization of any “how” or manner of action involves the loss of flexibility, and therefore, the loss of the capacity for innovation.

The era of religions has already passed us. However, it is necessary to study thoroughly the absolute experience of our past sense of spirituality and adapt it for today´s ordinary people.

The clarity of the mind and feeling, without depending on standards recorded in our memory for our wishes, expectations, and failures is the attitude we should have to confront any problem.

Only those who are capable of accepting these things will understand what is in front of us and will give the best solution in agreement with scientific knowledge and technology that shall set us free.

Anna Solana

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28th July 2008

Marc Bonavia - video & main ideas

Marc Bonavia
SIT Mobile

-”It’s important to connect with people´s feelings at the right moment.”

-”Nowadays, we are almost forced to find an emotional connection with consumers.”

-”We have an incredible tool to do personalised sales: the mobile phone, which is emotionally perceived by consumers as an extension of themselves.”

-”Mobile marketing allows personal and emotional commercial relations with consumers. We can connect with people.”

-”We have to take into account how the person feels at the moment he/she receives the message.”

-”SIT Mobile is not just a technology company. In reality, we are a big band in which every musician creates and develops a piece of communication. Our music is communication.”

Anna Solana

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Tags: Speakers · iFest'08