I will be hosted by the YES Conference 2017 in Tallinn, Estonia, for a keynote presentation on 12 September 2017.
Will the digital revolution give us information democracies or information empires?
The answer lies in a political choice, a choice between open or closed. Either making information open and freely accessible to all, or, closing it off and having it owned and controlled by the few. This choice matters everywhere from inequality to freedom. It matters whether you are concerned about a robot taking your job, or the power of Google and Facebook to shape how we think and vote. It matters whether you care about the cost of medicines or access to scientific research. These issues now reach into the lives of every single person on this planet – whether they know it or not.
But dystopia is probable not inevitable. If we take action we can make an open world. A world that is freer, fairer, healthier and wealthier. A world where we get to harness the magic of digital technology, its limitless copying, for good. Where technology helps us flourish as never before. But we need to act, to act together, and to act now.
Update
Full video of the talk given in Tallinn.