Optimal Friction™

Last night I arrived at the splendid Hawthorn Inn overlooking Camden Harbor here in Maine. After a 6 hour drive through the beautiful New England countryside, I finally arrived in this bucolic and quintessestial coastal town. I slept like a baby and woke early. Blogging at 5:30 am, the inn is quiet and peaceful. It's a reunion in many ways, being greeted last night by old friends, meeting new ones, and taking in the hospitality of Maryanne Shanahan who is the inkeeper at this lovely bed and breakfast.

This year, POPTech 2006's theme is, "Dangerous Ideas." The conference website describes it as follows:

What is a “dangerous” idea? It’s one that upends conventions, challenges assumptions and breaks taboos, reordering our sense of the world and our place within it. It’s an idea, as Victor Hugo said, whose time has come.

Pop!Tech 2006, our 10th anniversary gathering, will again bring 500 extraordinary people together with more than 30 speakers, performers, iconoclasts and visionaries to think about the social impact of new technologies and the future of ideas. Here’s just some of what we’ll be discussing:

* The nature of risk in the connected age
* Bright green possibilities
* Globalization’s great surprises
* The role of faith and fundamentalism
* Pandemics and their prevention
* New approaches to education
* The creative imperative
* New frontiers of exploration
* What technology wants from us
* Our constructed selves
* Conflict, resolution and the possibility of peace

Check out the roster of speakers, which includes New York Times columnist and Pulitzer Prize-winner Thomas Friedman, game design god Will Wright, ambient music pioneer Brian Eno, global health visionary (and newly minted MacArthur Fellow) Victoria Hale, legendary geneticist Richard Dawkins, renowned environmentalist Lester Brown, Tibetan education pioneer Losang Ragbey, chef and gastronomic invetor Homaro Cantu, and dozens more - and that doesn't even touch on the many incredible performers and unannounced special guests.

Like every Pop!Tech, the 2006 event will feature a rich mix of presentations, performances and one-of-a-kind surprises. Be prepared to be wowed.

All of these seem to be incredible topics that you don't hear discussed at just any conference quite like the way subjects are presented here. I always imagined that two of my passions, technology and the nature of conflict, were an unusual combination. It's really exciting to see that both of these subjects are on the headlines here. It's my 7th year at POPTech and it feels really good to be back at one of my "intellectual homes." Stay tuned.