Lift10 press release (english)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
LIFT 10 - CONNECTED PEOPLE
5 - 7 MAY 2010 / GENEVA INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE CENTER

For the fifth consecutive year, Lift Conference draws to Geneva the people who inspire, drive or explore new trends in technology. For three energizing days, Lift Conference looks at the radical thinking behind innovation, the way it affects the use of technology and how it can help us transform change into opportunity.

Started in 2006, Lift Conference is now a not-to-be missed international event that has spawned separate editions in South Korea and in France, as well as a world-wide community that continues to share and contribute to Lift all year-long. Smaller Lift@home events are also organized in San Francisco, Moscow, Brussels, Seoul, Toronto, London, Zurich and Tokyo.

This year's edition of Lift 10 takes place at the Geneva International Conference Center from 5 to 7 May 2010 and is expected to gather 1,000 participants, a three-fold increase from Lift 06.

On the theme "Connected People", Lift 10 will identify the reasons technology is used in different ways by different people and the influential factors, whether cultural or generational, that contribute to this diversity.

Laurent Haug, founder and president, says that "Lift is one of the few conferences that truly looks beyond the obvious, bringing new ideas to the global debate on how technology reshapes society."

"Some insanely interesting ideas (come) out of the LIFT conference" writes BusinessWeek.

"The great difference of Lift with other conferences is that two-thirds of the content is crowdsourced." explains Laurent Haug. "Our challenge is to leverage the intelligence, energy and creativity of the people who compose our community."

To answer the questions: "Who are we really when we are on-line and how do we behave?", "How are social webs used by younger or older generations?", "Do on-line communities reflect human gatherings in 'real life'?", "What is the impact on politics, media or businesses?", "Is privacy being redefined?" Lift has invited a roster of key-note speakers.

"Lift likes to invite emerging doers and thinkers, those who are doing great things without necessarily being noticed for it" Haug says.

The six speaker sessions on the theme of "Connected People" coordinated by Lift's Editorial Manager, Nicolas Nova, will cover the topics of generations, communities, privacy, politics, the future of media and the stories of the people "who have done great things and who tell us how they did it."

The renowned biomedical gerontologist, Aubrey de Grey, will have an opportunity to compare notes on generational uses of technology with younger players, including a third-culture university student from Argentina.

On-line communities, "one of the buzz words of 2009/2010, but one that is often misunderstood" according to Laurent Haug, will be analyzed by Alice Taylor, a UK educational commissioner at Channel Four TV, as well as Jean Burgess, an Australian media researcher who has published a study on the user-led content of You Tube.

Privacy, "One of the big social questions on the table because of technology" as described by Haug, will be reviewed by sociologists and futurologists.

Rahaf Harfoush, the New Media Strategist who helped bring Obama to the White House will be followed by the Eurodeputy Amelia Andersdotter from the notorious Swedish Pirate Party, to present the web's political potential in terms of mobilizing voters.

As for the open-ended question of where media is going, Laurent Haug believes that "interesting models" are emerging, where creative content can be used simultaneously by web, TV and paper sources, producing "economies of scale", but more importantly, "a way for content to reach people."

Catherine Lottier, the foresight specialist for France's most innovative TV channel will join forces with Virginia Mouseler, the managing director of WIT - World Information Tracking - the leading agency specialized in research and information on TV programs worldwide, as well as Mercedes Bunz, the UK Guardian's New Media Strategist to analyze the evolution of the situation.

Yeon Ho, the founder of OhmyNews, the first media of "citizen reporters", will be one of the story-tellers.

Unusually for a tech conference, women this year will be a major presence on the main stage.

In addition to the 20 key-note speakers, Lift comprises 30 workshops by and for participants on "pragmatic issues" such as building on-line products, managing reputations or e-booking, to give but a few examples.

Furthermore, "Open Stages" allow people from the audience to share their enthusiasm for new ventures.

Alp ICT and Lift have partnered to bring 15 startups to the conference. Two operations are organized: a startup corner will be built outside of the conference rooms, a place where young companies will see the products and services of these young companies from Western Switzerland. Then a venture night (a repeat of the Lift08 event) will see eight young companies share the stage with legendary Venture Capitalist Neil Rimer of Index Ventures.

And finally, the famed "Lift Experience" organized this year with the Geneva University of Art and Design (HEAD), promises novel projects at the frontier of technology and art running in parallel and presented in the hall of the conference center.

"Artists are people who regularly use technology before businesses," says Laurent Haug "so it is interesting to see what they do and what they think. They really challenge us."
The majority of people who attend Lift Conference are not from IT (only a fifth), but CEO's, investors, managers, entrepreneurs, designers, artists, journalists, bloggers, researchers, professors or students who welcome innovation and are open to cross-pollination.

A participant explained: "I felt more intelligent after than before! It gave me clues on why new technologies are revolutionising economics, society, interactions. Lift taught me how to use them in my professional approach."

Significantly, an average 85 percent of participants intend to return to the next Lift Conference and more than 90 percent would recommend it to a friend.

And in terms of social networking, nothing beats the Lift legendary fondue on the first night, officially recognized as the biggest in Switzerland.

"In a world where innovation happens everywhere, it's our responsibility to create diversity, because you never know who's going to have an interesting idea next time" indicates Haug.

The complete program is available at: www.liftconference.com/lift10/program

To attend the conference, register on: www.liftconference.com/lift10/register

To download Lift logos visit: http://liftconference.com/fr/press#5

For more information visit the conference's website on: www.liftconference.com

Press contacts:
Laurent Haug
Founder & President
laurent@liftconference.com
+41786966480

Sarah Suter
Media Accreditations
sarah@liftconference.com
+41794505554

Lift Conference is made possible thanks to the following partners: