Last updated: August 8, 2020
These are random and raw notes that I took during the REMIX Summit in New York City on March 22-23, 2018.
Follow The Speaker
I’ve never seen this at a conference before: after each session, REMIX provided a secondary track (aka audience allowed to leaving the speaking hall to go to another location) for people to connect with the speaker. This was meant to replace audience Q&A.
During my presentation, I made a HARD SELL for people to come to my session. I noticed that most speakers were getting only 0-3 ppl in attendance. So I was really happy to get an egaged, active group!
Participants came from institutions such MoMA, Brooklyn Historical Society, Brooklyn Botanical Garden, Getty Leadership Trust, Cornell, and more. GO TEAM!!
Key Trends with Peter Tullin
Creative entrepreneurs taking existing assets and connecting them to new trends. Example of Secret Cinema, a London-based organization which told attendees “Don’t tell anyone!” Re-creating awesome movies with real-life activations / immersive experiences.
Early Coffee Shops
The drink was a mud-sludge version of coffee, probably from Istanbul.
They’d talk about the big ideas of the time. They’d ask new arrivals, “What news have you, sir?” Eavesdropping started here.
Creative Collisions, Creative Cities
Innovation. People look towards Silicon Valley as the successful model. But areas like East London, New York, and Berlin have more appeal to some. King’s Cross in London: The biggest regeneration project in Europe. Google is constructing their largest building outside of the USA.
Infrastructure to Encourage Creative Collisions
Second Home: Near Brick Lane in London, designed by Selgas Cano.
- Libreria: Owned by Second Home
- Flagship in Lisbon, Portugal
Holzmarkt Berlin: Creator-owned space. Gets around the “Yes you’ve made the area awesome. Now you need to leave because you can’t afford it anymore.”
acmi X: Moving image museum in Australia. They helped to create the world’s first co-working space for the moving image.
State Library of Victoria, Melbourne
Most-visited library in the world. Covers an entire city block. Recent $88M redevelopment. REMIX helping to thing, What is a library for the 21st century and what does that look like?
URBAN-X
How do we make cities more efficient, enjoyable, and fun for all?
Human-centric design. Startups as a great way to de-risk investments.
“People who work in government and people who work in technology are not so different – they want to change the world at scale.”
Green City Force
They recruit New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) residents age 18-24 with a GED or Diploma. They become AmeriCorps members through a partnership.
80% of their grads have jobs or are in education now.
The Audio Revolution
Iggy Pop HATES broccoli. He hates it so much that sometimes he’ll come out on stage with a head of broccoli around his neck to inspire him with passionate rage (because he hates it so much). His contract rider says that he should have a bowl of broccoli florets in his green room so that he can hurl them in the garbage before he walks out on stage.
1,000 new podcasts are created every week. They can be a communication tool for a tribe.
Successful podcasts have:
- Compelling story or idea.
- Character.
- Voice.
Story. Engaging character or host. Voice.
Cuseum and Brendan Ciecko
He had the best, most well-designed slides.
Fusing the Physical and Digital Experience
Presented by Keir Winesmith from SFMOMA. He had the most memorable slogan: GLAMAZON, which he says stands for
G alleries
L ibraries
A rchives
M useums
A quariums
Z oos
O bservatories
N ature Spaces
Can You Hear Me Now? The Age of Assistance
One of the best speakers so far: Adam Gerhart, U.S. CEO of Mindshare. Opening story of his small daughter and Amazon Alexa device.
- Incidental commerce, fight for loyalty
- Incidental loyalty is not necessarily driven by love for a brand or product, but is driven by the fact that you have used it before, so it becomes the default option for a voice assistant to order.
- Whatever the last brand you purchased = the first brand you’ll get offered in a voice-serviced commerce world
- Determine your “autonomous risk”
- Identify the audio requisites of your brand and category
- Establish or enhance your audio “packaging”
- Over-invest to be the first e-comm purchase in your category in a household for CPG
Georgia Frances King, Deputy Ideas Editor at Quartz
What’s an Ideas Editor? Excite and energize people, understand what the world looks like in the future. She works with Op-Eds for Fortune 500 CEOs, Nobel Prize winners, etc.
Quartz as a company: many email newsletters, an app with AR integration, they make lots of charts, Bot Studio + Workshop, etc.
Future thinking is split between: Utopia vs Dystopia. Tristan Harris as the center of ethics etc.
Random Conversations
- Huge influx of Chinese to Australia: students, residents, and tourists. This is a VERY WELCOME influx of cash.
- Sotheby’s is sponsoring something called “The Museum Network” whereupon they advertise and promote special exhibitions around the world. Seems like a well-funded, long-term initiative.
- VR World expanding to 18 cities within the next year.
Day 2: Intrepid Museum
It’s my first time on an aircraft carrier! This is cool.
History of Intrepid:
- Survived 4 kamikaze attacks
- 550,000 sq feet (same as the Chrysler building)
- 50% of the ship is not open to the public
The High Line
- Almost ALL of their operating budget is funded by Friends of the High Line, wow! Approx $12m/yr now. NYC only gives maybe 1% of their annual budget, just for power.
Jake Barton and Local Projects
Engagement First Museum. “We look to create Museums and Public Spaces that engage.”
That’s a fundamentally different design. Not about scholarship, learning, reading, ingesting, etc. But Local Projects says: What can visitors do? What’s the active tense we can put them in for this experience? So they can become an active participant in the experience.
London Mithraeum looks really neat, I want to go here! Thanks Bloomberg.
The End
Editor’s note: Many speakers not listed had valuable input which I wasn’t able to capture in notes. Shoutout to the LinkedIn guy and the President / Director of the Museum of the City of New York.