What we going to do today or right now is give a chance for everyone who mighted regretted
not being in one of the other breakout sessions or wanted to be in two places at the same time
in three or six, that to hear what went on in each of the breakout sessions with a short
reporting and summarization from the session leaders about what occurred in the session.
The topic questions for these sessions were agreed with each of the session leaders to be
discussed in a format that did not have necessarily a single answer to the question
but rather were conversation starters. And if I was in one them and based on that one and
if the past is any guide for previous years these discussions could have gone on for hours
and hours and they range over quite a wide area topics within each topic question. But now we
get a treat because we get to hear a wide range of topics from all the session leaders.9
Why don't we start with Lisa (inaudible), this topic discussion of shifting power.
How do we determine content value in the user edited media age? Ok
Before I start I was going to say in response to the first presentation this morning we were talking about
the lack of a buzz word for the 2000's I think part of the problem with that is that because we're so
focused on technology and not the impact of technology which I think is really the fundamental thing
that's occuring today. So moving us into some realme of contents, I basically started from a few basic
assumptions. The fundamental shift in the balance of power has already occurred from so-called
producers to so-called consumers all driven largely by the emergence of communications
technologies. But what we believe is that these technologies really enable something that already
occurred. You had the old world of media where you have closed power, enterainment sent one way,
the consumer has the choice turn on turn off. Their are simply no tools for people to be able to
do what they intuitively want to be able to do which is to engage with their content. So really
bringing it down is this notion that if you resonate with something any decisions, entertainment
decision is ultimately an emotional one. If you resonates with something your automatic desires
to want to enguage with it are anticipated. In fact I would extend that to say that most discussions
are ultimately emotional in nature, even if there technology ones, profit one, the desire to profit is
essentially emotional decision, and emotional desire. So in terms of content value really what
we're seeing at play is a fundamentally illogical break between what people automatically
in a truly desire to do and a world that is based on close systems that try to regulate that
desire. And so in terms of how you determine the content value really where markets are
fragmenting people are increasingly exercising their own control over their media, over
their decisions. Choosing empowerment instead of pablon that the only way that you can
reach those people is to create content in any form that's authenticate. That's based on trust.
If you develop a sense of trust with an audience your goal if you create mediocre contents again in
any form your old. In fact I expect that within the next few years we'll see the wiping out of
a large number of mediocre media grounds there's simply no place for them in this world anymore.
So content value is trust based. Commerce all commerce in fact is trust based I think.
And increasingly as we've move to more and more Digital Communications it's really,
it's really the sun around every thing that we do in the virtual world and the physical world
will increasingly turn. Time is shrinking, our notions of space and time have changed. the difference
if you look at media the difference between a bunch of college kids sitting around in 1979 and making
mixed Led Zeppelin tapes or a Camaro parked outside. The only thing thing that different about that
today is our notion of space and our notion of time. And that's driven by again what
emerging communciations technologies have enabled. So, I will end on that note.
Next let's hear from Mr. Webb, his topic was private ethics and public policy. Can we reconcile faith
social responsible and science. Thanks James. I feel like a little bit like that two-minute dating
service thing you probally heard of, I actually never tried it but you know you supposed to switch dating
partners everytwo minutes and then at the end of that deicde whoose your mate for life type of thing.
Well needless to say, it's amazing how accurate those first impressions are so let's just see how good
the first impressions are with respect to this topic. The topic as James said: private ethics and
and public policy. Can we reconcile faith, social responsible and science? I would like to say first of
all we had a really great group, we had really stimulating discussion on this. You can perhaps well
imagine, I mean the issue of ethics and public policy is something that has been kind of just below
the surface in everything that has gone on in the morning here. We've focused on the kind of the
nuts and bolts issues of technology and where we're going, a little bit like what Lisa was saying.
Let's start talking about content now we, we can't just focus on the nuts and bolts, same thing.
Let's look at the broader issues here, the amazing impact that technolgoy has on our
lives positively and negatively. The examples are legion, I mean we can talk
about the nuclear bomb way back when and that was all about scientists
using Technology for the public supposedly. But what a genie was lead out of a bottle there
So there's an early example of the ethical implications of technology.
Anyway long story short was that we struggled with this idea of
reconciling public policy and private ethics. And ultimately seem to come to some sort of a
conclusion that basically goverment cannot do it all, nor should we expect goverment to
to do it all. This was not an issue where we can expect laws for example to encompass
the way in which things are done. Societies are a little bit more complex than that.
The way societies order themselves is a little bit more complex than that. It involves families
and cultures and religion and tradition and the challenge I would suggest and I would
think reflects where we where coming from as a group. Was in
acknowledging that if we're going to, if we're going to live to see the year 2500 or
three thousand not we individually but we as a race, then we need to come up with a
better way of reconciling these various things. And that doesn't mean handing over the
responsibility to government. In fact you can hear some discussions this morning about how
well if goverment gets involved it can actually discourage innovation in a very non
positive way. So, the sorts of things that we were talking about where things like the development
of ISSO social responsibility standards. Probally, most people in the room were familiar with ISSO
ISSO nine thousand and one quality management system standards or ISSO fourteen
thousand one of verbal management system standards. These are standards that are management
system standards that are very sort of procedurally and so. ISSO as an organization
is an international organization but it's a non governmental organization. It's a bringing
together of business people, governments, intergovernmental people, non-government
organizations, labour, consumers and so on. And now ISSO has launched on a
a new standard, a social responsibile standard. The potential, the promise of the ISSO
social responsbile shown standard is a way perhaps of distilling the best
of religion, ethics, culture, tradition and coming up with a kind of a
clean and agreed upon multi understanding of what we need in order
to survive as organizations, as individuals, as societies in the twenty first century. A little bit like
the gentleman from I was going to say from Mars, the gentlemen speaking on the topic
of Mars this morning mentioned how with respect to the Apollo project
there was a clear objective. Because it was a clear objective it was easier for NASA to reach
that objective. Similarly, if there are if there is a standard that is agreed to internationally that
is a non-governmental yet it involves governments as well as other parts of society
and distills the key things that underly our individual sense of our responsibility
our organizational sense. Then the feeling of the group was that this would be an excellent
piece towards having a more sustainable future. And when we talk about what is,
what should we call this decade, I would propose that we need to come up with some sort of
concept that involves the notion of sustainability. Because surely if we just talk about technology
without linking it to sustainability arguably we are going to be missing a very big boat indeed.
I would just like to give you a final. This is a quote from Walmart, to show you the times are changing.
I'm sure Dylan would not like me mixing Wal-Mart and Dylan into the same sentence but let me
do it anyway. This was the CEO of Walmart said this last week. He said the factories in China
are going to end up having to be held up to the same standards as the factories in
in the U.S. There will be day of reckoning for retailers. If somebody wakes up and finds out
that children are down the river from my factory would you save three cents a foot on the cost of
garden hose and their developing cancers at a significant rate so the American public can
save three cents a foot. These things won't be tolerated and they shouldn't be tolerated. There
are people in this room that hear what I've just said and they will say wow. Walmart is
losing its way, Walmart is not going to talk about customers. They're talking about sustainability
and the factories they buy from. I'm going to tell you, said CEO Lee Scott, get ready for a real long
struggle in your life if you can't understand that you can do well by doing good. Final point if Walmart
can change, surely we as individuals and so on, as organizations can change as well.
That's a very big change for Wal-Mart to be speaking that way, but the group
suggested that we issue a challenge to WTM, that is to incorporate
some notion of sustainability in it's platform of values that it stands for. So,
this is not just seen as a group of people getting together to gaudgets and nuts and bolts.
As long as the Governor General has mentioned. Just a few quick comments. One thing we did
this year, was thanks to the Shell Foundation which is one of our sponsors. We were able to subsidize
participation of twenty delegates operating in the Citadel development around the world.
We also just as a matter of course, the organization has categories that it treats.
coequally in the membership. Such as environment, such as social enterprenuership,
such as educ