Google is one of the forces shaping the world. [Something of an understatement.] Putting human faces to Google, in the simplest way, is to name founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page (and CEO Eric Schmidt). This October at the Google Zeitgeist Conference, the two founders were interviewed by heavyweight journalist James Fallows. The YouTube video of the interview is below. 30 minutes of interesting conversation featuring two major shapers of the current discourse.
Following the video is a blog posting from the NY Times giving a short description of the conference and recounting an anomalous conference presentation.
The Luddite in the Googleplex
At its two-day Zeitgeist conference, which ended Thursday, Google assembled business and political leaders, a crowd that spends much of its day staring at small screens and being broadcast over big ones.
Speakers included former President Bill Clinton (via teleconference), former Vice President Al Gore (in person), and Britain’s likely contender for the prime minister post, David Cameron, the Conservative Party leader, who has his own channel on YouTube. There were media barons, like Richard Parsons of Time Warner, captains of industry, like Fred Smith of FedEx, as well as entrepreneurs, philanthropists and social activists.
But one speaker forswears the digital world. Yvon Chouinard, the founder of the outdoor clothing maker Patagonia, said he doesn’t own a cellphone and has never used a keyboard.
To read the rest of this NY Times blog post, click here.
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