You’ve probably already heard the hype around blockchain and digital currencies being the “next big thing” and rolled your eyes at the hyperbole. This key technology that is already disrupting some industries, however, and it is poised to change every industry in the near future. It and a few other technologies, like AI and conversational interface will reshape our relationship with service, objects, and organizations. What does this mean for the physical products we design? How will it impact our peers, customers, users, and industry? Please join us in the conversation with some of the leaders in this field as we discuss what the future looks like for us designers with respect to blockchain.
Speakers Include:
Nathan Shedrof – Executive Director a@ Seed Vault LTD. He is a pioneer in Experience Design, Interaction Design and Information Design, is a serial entrepreneur, and researches, speaks and teaches internationally about meaning, strategic innovation, business value, and science fiction interfaces. His many books include: Experience Design 1.1, Making Meaning, Design is the Problem, Design Strategy in Action, Make It So,and the new Blindspot. He holds an MBA in Sustainable Management from Presidio Graduate School and a BS in Industrial Design from Art Center College of Design. He worked with Richard Saul Wurman at The Understanding Business and, later, co-founded Vivid studios, a decade-old pioneering company in interactive media and one of the first Web services firms on the planet. Vivid’s hallmark was helping to establish and validate the field of information architecture, by training an entire generation of designers in the newly emerging Web industry.
Saya Iwasaki – Designing to Empower As a founder, educator and designer with history at Ideo U, Stanford University Graduate School of Education, EdSurge and One Workplace, I come with experience managing an innovative school in Myanmar, scaling business growth in emerging economies and empowering blockchain startups in Silicon Valley. I’m passionate about empowering systems that have the potential to democratize access to success and increase equity. Currently working in usability and education in the blockchain space.
Kristian Simsarian – Design, Innovation and AI Expert, Speaker and Educator Kristian is an award-winning designer, educator and leader. He is an expert in technology, education, and innovation. As an executive leader at the design innovation firm IDEO, he led the creation of the digital design practice which helped fuel the growth of IDEO into the largest design-led innovation consultancy in the world. As a consultant, Kristian has worked with just about every type of organization, from Microsoft to the NIH, to P&G to The Institute for the Future to Greater Good Science Center along with several universities and startups. From this work, he holds several patents and design awards and his work has appeared in NYT, Business Week, Huffington Post, along with several best-selling business books on innovation. Recently he founded a new consultancy, Collective Creativity, dedicated to using technology and design-driven innovation to help amplify the effects of purpose-driven organizations who are working on pressing complex social challenges. He does this through systems-level transformation, regenerative mindset and by increasing the overlap of wisdom and technological innovation. Ultimately, he is committed to augmenting our collective human and social capacities to increase global creativity, justice, and democracy. He lives with his wife and daughter in a finally fixed up Victorian in San Francisco.
Ben Bartlett – Berkeley City Council and Candidate to CA Assembly Ben grew up in Berkeley in a culture of community service. Ben’s mom was an original Black Panther and his dad dedicated his life to organizing people in North Richmond, Berkeley and Oakland. “Five generations ago, my family came to the East Bay in search of freedom and opportunity,” Ben says. “And we found them – through struggle. Today, that struggle continues.” Standing on their shoulders, Ben has built a career as an environmental lawyer uniting industry and government to address climate change, alleviate poverty with green jobs and expand opportunity for everyone. He uses the principles of environmental justice to drive investment into our poorest communities to create health and wealth. Ben is currently a founding principal at Re: Public Good, a city and climate change consulting firm. Today, Ben serves on the Berkeley City Council where he was elected in 2016 to represent the people of South Berkeley. Working with Mayor Jesse Arreguín and his colleagues on the council.
