NFTs fell a bit into the background noise at this year’s SXSW. The grandiosity of the metaverse was walked back a bit. The banking debacle loomed large. But, in between the music and film, the SXSW crowd's mixed feelings of jubilance and terror about the emergence of generative AI were palpable. Amy Webb, CEO of the Future Today Institute, gave a top-notch trends report, the bulk of which focused on large-scale learning models that are changing the world, or at least killing the Internet as we know it, one prompt at a time. 

Our panel “The End of Events, The Birth of Engagements” experimented with what could happen inside a traditional panel session if you focused on making connections and memories while making our point. 

We flipped the idea of being on stage around by having our panelists greet each attendee personally, asking them what brought them into the room. And we kept an empty chair on stage for those who knew way more about a subject than we did to come up and share. Our attendees were greeted by the wonderful Philip Nelson, musician and broadcaster, who welcomed the audience with his dulcet tunes. You can watch a handheld rough version of the presentations, but in a nutshell, here are a few takeaways:

Sherry Huss, Head of Community at Freeman, noted that there's a new generation of conference attendees looking for greater connection to their colleagues and industry, more hands-on learning experiences and a clear value proposition that aligns with work/life priorities. Sherry had a twinge of remorse that in our rush to return to in-person meetings, we haven’t changed things all that much. 

Michael Casey, Chief Content Editor at Coindesk, took a moment away from tracking the inner workings of decentralized finance and crypto to paint a picture of his upcoming event. Consensus is where the token economy and gamification is baked into every facet of the event. You’ll be earning Desk, the conference’s social token, as you interact with exhibits, speakers, merch, and other attendees.

Sophie Ahmed, the GM at Hubilo Onsite, showed us that an “event” is an event and the words like hybrid and digital will disappear into the background. Given the new tools we have to provide 365 communities, demand generation, data and analytics, and more. We’re looking at new revenue streams and a more robust and inclusive community.

Robin Raskin, yup, that’s me, brought it home showing how today’s conference and meeting planners can use Generative AI tools to help them cut the yeoman’s job to size. 

And Jim Louderback, well, he’s always in the picture and he’ll be your emcee at our March Virtual Events Group meetup. 

Washington’s got its panties twisted in a knot, demanding that TikTok become an American-owned entity or be banished from the kingdom. There’s plenty of reason to distrust TikTok, but in my Techonomy column this week I argue that the company’s secret mission is to rot our brains, not steal our identities.

Look, I love girls in midriffs singing in their bathrooms, crazy dude skateboard tricks, and little babies dancing, as much as the next guy, but now that TikTok is a major source of news for teenagers, things get a bit disconcerting. (I’m guessing Colbert and Kimmel are too long-form?) TikTok may in fact be a cultural weapon of mass destruction.

Still, if you’re intent on being on TikTok you’ll want to know about CapCut, its coolest secret weapon. Capcut, a quick video-editing tool, was created by ByteDance (TikTok’s parent company) and it offers an easy way to churn out TikTok or other social videos that don’t suck. Its fusion of right-sized templates, stock images and video, and easy import and editing tools is worth playing with.