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September 30, 2004
Morning Warm-Up at MIT
It's 8am right now at MIT's Kresge Auditorium; in 30 minutes or so, the second day of the MIT Technology Review will commence. I'm settling into the auditorium, front and center - mainly for the access to the electricity outlets at the bottom of the stage rather than for the stellar view. Conference attendees are slowly settling into their seats, wiping that last crumb of blueberry scone from their chin and getting a quick skim of their newspaper.
Behind the curtain on a stage, a piano tech slowly works his way up the scale of the keyboard, tuning each key for a performance that will take place at the end of the day.
"I thought I was at a tech conference, not a Ligeti performance," said a British gentleman sitting next to me.
"Isn't John Cage dead?" another Brit behind me said a moment or two later. (I was tempted to make a reference to Bartok's Music For Strings, Percussion & Celesta but I bit my tongue, deciding this little 20th century classical music trivia contest must come to an end before someone got hurt.)
We've got an interesting day ahead of us. First, we‚ll hear from the president of Georgia Tech University, who will discuss the National Council on Competitiveness‚ National Innovation Initiative. Following that, General Motors Chairman and CEO Richard Wagoner will give today's keynote. Personally, I'm most excited about a roundtable discussion entitled "Emerging Technologies that Will Change the World: The Inventor View." Among the experts appearing during that panel are Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple Computer and Wheels of Zeus; Kari Stefansson of Iceland's deCODE Genetics; and J. Craig Ventner of the Center for the Advancement of Genomics. Given my lifelong love affair with Apple (not to mention admiration for Woz's work in the classroom) and keen interest in genetics, I've got high hopes for that session.
Posted by acarvin at September 30, 2004 8:24 AM
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