The good news is last week Cross Media conference finally landed in Toronto, the bad news is it took organizers and fellow Canadians, JumpWire (New Yorker Gavin McGarry excluded ) a few years and several international pit stops to come back home! But I’m not going to go into the state of Canadian tech center here; it was worth the wait for Cross Media T.O.
Jumpwire’s president and the evening’s moderator Gavin kept the evening well paced in pert style, presenting a total of 13 speakers including case studies from Steve Pratt – Director CBC Radio 3, CBC Radio 3 & Siobhan O’Flynn – PhD, Transmedia Consultant, Narrative Now. A debate on the future of Advertising from Colleen DeCourcy – Former Chief Digital Officer for TBWA Worldwide & Richard Bernstein – S.V.P. Managing Director, Arc Worldwide, A Leo Burnett Company . A panel discussion featuring Sabrina Geremia – Head of Agency Relations, Google Canada , Chris Van Noy – Chief Strategist, Akamai , Lisa Charters – SVP Director Digital, Random House of Canada Limited , Michael Schmalz – President, Digital Extremes Ltd. & Pete Watson – Senior Business Development Manager: Consumer Partners, Research In Motion Limited (RIM) / BlackBerry . And a showcase of 3 young cross media startups Douglas Edwards – CEO, ES3, Adrian Carter – Director, Producer and Creative Director, Shark Teeth Films & Jacob Blackstock – CEO, Creative Director and Lead Designer, Bitstrips. Several presenters started their digital companies at MaRs Center, where the conference was held.
There’s a lot of talk these days about what it means to be a cross-media brand or product, and too little in the way of action. Is it having a Face Book page for your business? No. Is it having the most downloadable app? Not really. But imagine pushing the boundaries between where traditional media ends and digital media begins.
What is cross media?
Read the rest of this entry »
