A Musician’s guide to Inventing

I gave a talk at the wonderfully diverse and always thought-provoking Thinking Digital 2015 conference.

But instead of a conventional keynote speech, Herb Kim the organiser kindly said that I could present whatever I liked. The result: “A Musician’s Guide to Inventing”.

I worried before going on stage that this was a completely crazy idea – and a bit far off anything else in the conference. I couldn’t sleep – I was up late tweaking the presentation. I knew the room was full of interesting and influential people who knew about technology trends, and when I give any presentation I’m obsessed with the idea of giving the audience something that they could use – something that would be valuable to them. How could I give something new to feed their amazing brains? Perhaps I could share something more personal that they might not know about… but maybe that’s not going to be interesting enough? Oh, how I fretted…

So, completely unsure if this would work and with the inherent sense of adventure that gets me into all kinds of amazing situations – I did this:

And I’m so glad I did it. I was so relieved! It went better than I could have imagined! What a pleasure to have 3 floors of such an energetic and friendly audience laughing, clapping and bonding! It’s weird, the one thing I wasn’t worried about was the music performance – even though that bit is really complicated!

Of course, with hindsight I was very happy that I decided to go with my audacious idea – it was only then I realised that by doing what I did I was taking the advice of my own presentation! So I guess this is a post dedicated to those thinking about doing something amazing and ambitious and wonderful who perhaps need that extra push to go ahead and start. Go on! And let me know in the comments what you’re gonna do.