Diversity of thought and tech conferences

code.joejag.com

4 points·joejag··4 comments

For me, the most useful tech talks are the result of a lot work by the speaker (or the speaker's team). My favorite example is Charlie Miller's talk on battery firmware hacking at DEFCON 19[1]. In 45 minutes, he detailed months of time spent trying to get a laptop to explode remotely. He gave examples firmware disassembly, research (he'd never done hardware stuff before), and social engineering. Not only did the talk contain information about battery security, but it gave a glimpse of the thought processes and tools he used.

Compare that to conferences about politics and philosophy. There's no equivalent talk. They use debate formats because what else could they do? They don't have much useful information to present.

1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dlSBQ5b6Pdw#t=0m35s

I agree, there's no doubt that a well executed classroom like talk is both inspiring and informative.

What I'm arguing is that the community we are part of also has issues that aren't clear cut, that we could debate to generate interest and inspire the community.

There is no shortage of great political speeches.

How would this work any better than the never-ending flame wars that are continually being waged in countless online forums?

I like it. Look forward to seeing it in action.

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