Brand experiences and Humans in a Post-Truth Era: Devine’s Key Insights from Web Summit 2019
Heralded by Forbes as “The best technology conference on the planet” a visit to Web Summit 2019 by the Devine team was inevitable. Web Summit takes place in Lisbon, Portugal and connects CEO’s, policy makers, startups and freelancers in the biggest tech conference of the world. The simple question at the core of Web Summit is “where to go next”.
With 70.000+ attendees from 160 countries, 1200 talks in 4 days and countless startups pitching their ideas this conference challenged our planning skills. We spent our time meandering from discussions on the future of journalism to talks on AI (Artificial Intelligence) and storytelling through design. In this article we highlight our main takeaways, starting with the opening night in the Altice Arena.
In Tech We Trust?
The highlight of the opening night was without a doubt the video interview with whistleblower Edward Snowden, the man who exposed the system of US mass surveillance. A courageous choice, as his stance on data collection clashes with many of the companies and startups present at Web Summit. Your digital interactions are tracked, voice assistants capture every spoken word, and banking applications keep track of your spending habits to serve you personalised ads. The GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) instituted by the EU aims to give individuals control over their data, but Snowden calls this new regulation only “a good first effort”. He states that the GDPR misplaces the problem:
“The problem isn’t data protection, the problem is data collection,” Snowden said. “Regulation and protection of data presumes that the collection of data in the first place was proper, that it is appropriate, that it doesn’t represent a threat or danger. And because Europe has yet to fine a tech company for bad GDPR behaviour, the current rules are just empty words.”
In the panel-talk ‘Political Journalism in a Post-Truth Era’ four journalists reflect on the surge of fake news and the role of journalism. The issue of trust plays an important role, with constant accusations of bias and inaccuracies hurled at political journalists. Journalist are faced with the challenge that reporting in the style of human conversation and anger are more easily digested compared to informed and balanced journalism.
Can quality reporting be brought in a format as strong as the populist messages? The New York Times does not believe journalism should adapt to this format completely, but isn’t clear on what the right solution should be.
The other panel members gave no further insights either. Clearly journalism has not yet found a way to deal with the new communication style of the digital era. Listening to Margrethe Vestager (European Commission) in the closing notes, she believes the micro-targeting of political ads and news is one of the biggest threats to democracy. The role of the social media platforms whom deliver the news to the people is crucial. They have to review their values and take responsibility.
A Brand New Future?
We have seen the industry shift their focus to brand storytelling. During Web Summit 2019 it is clear that this stays in the spotlight, as expected. Content marketing is big business. People don’t just identify with the product but instead look at the whole supply chain. This means that customers (and investors!) ask themselves what they stand for and if the brand resonates these values. An emotional connection with the brand through an authentic user experience increases engagement and keeps people engaged after their experience.
An important aspect to highlight is how personalisation is playing a bigger role, especially from the viewpoint of diversity. Immersive research can help in these cases, beautifully illustrated by an example of art and design school RISD (Rhode Island School of Design). In one of their first design classes the exercise is completely briefed in Spanish, to illustrate the impact of not being fluent in your environment. Diversity brings a broader point of view from a design-perspective and as such one is able to create a better product.
In the passionate talk ‘Why the future belongs to the imaginative’ Brian Collins (COLLINS) ridicules the current focus on the MVP. Things used to be designed and developed to be INSANELY GREAT and now we get a ‘minimal viable product’. According to him, this only leads to minimal viable thinking and leads to a boring future.
His playful metaphor to illustrate a brand promise is spot-on. A brand promise is a promise performed consistently over time, which can be aligned with story + experience. The oldest brand promise? The pirate flag. Brand promise: you’re f*cked.
OK Human, Better Computer?
Of course, Web Summit is much more than different speakers and panel discussions. It is also the place where startups and scale-ups have the opportunity to introduce themselves, forge partnerships and find potential leads or investors. One of the buzzwords of Web Summit 2019 was AI (Artificial Intelligence). We encountered a lot of startups ranging from fin-tech to health-tech that employ or will employ AI or machine learning in their solutions. At Devine we realise that this technology will revolutionise the future.
This was demonstrated with practical insights from Kristin Lemkau (JPMorgan Chase) on how their company uses machine learning to optimise their marketing efforts. She boldly claims that machine learning will make marketing more human. And she backed it up by data, showing ads and CTA buttons optimised through machine learning that break known design conventions which proved to perform performed up to 40% better than human-proposed solutions. We definitely will keep our eyes open to see how this will impact the future of UX and UI design!
The panel-talk ‘Rebuilding Trust in Tech’ with Ro Khanna (House of Representatives) and Brad Smith (Microsoft Design) and Karen Tso (CNBC) also briefly touched on AI, describing AI as the combustion engine, and data as the fuel that keeps the engine running. It was stated clearly: “AI is arguably the thing that will shape our economy for the next three decades.”
However, we agree with Vestager that the rules by which we will control machine learning should be made in the very near future with all stakeholders together. During her confirmation hearing, Vestager stated that the EU can not be a leader in AI without ethical guidelines. “The artificial intelligence you want must serve humans.”
Will we be back at Web Summit 2020?
Overall, we are glad to have experienced the biggest tech conference on the planet. On one hand the talks and panel discussions sometimes missed depth or a critical perspective. Twenty minutes for a talk doesn’t allow for a deep-dive into technologies or methodology, and the big tech companies will skill-fully manoeuvre their way out of questions that might criticise the way of working of their company.
On the other hand, the total experience is loud, flashy and a great way to gauge the current sentiment and trends of the tech industry. Devine prides itself on its relevance to the professional world, and events like Web Summit confirm our decisions and inform our choices towards the future.
Thanks for reading!
Devine is a three year bachelor course in Digital Design and Development located in Kortrijk, Belgium, powered by KASK & Conservatory, the School of Arts of HOGENT and Howest.