SPEAKER: MICHAEL L. DERTOUZOS
Director, Laboratory for Computer Science, and Professor of Computer
Science and Electrical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of
Technology
ABSTRACT:
SPEAKER BIO:
What Will Be...for Techies
What major problems should techies tackle in the years ahead? With
information technology already at a tenth of the industrial world economy,
some think that maturity, stability and lack of novelty are inevitable.
Hardly! The ball game has just begun. Are we going to enter a
gigabyte-infested cyberspace where equipped with magic goggles and haptic
suits, and aided by intelligent agents we'll perform acts crafted to
sound exciting in 1998? Maybe. But that's not where the big gains lurk.
What then? During this opinionated and somewhat entertaining
after-dinner talk we'll put in a salad bowl equal parts of forseeable
technological and ancient human needs. We'll resist assigning primacy
to either of two ingredients and we'll mix gently, while watching
carefully for what may pop out.
Michael Dertouzos is Director of the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science,
where he is also a Professor of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering.
He is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering, the Athens
Academy of Arts and Sciences, and is a Fellow of IEEE. Dr. Dertouzos is the
author of seven books including: What Will Be: How the New World of
Information Will Change Our Lives and Made in America: Regaining the
Productive Edge. He is the founder or co-founder of several hi-tech
companies and serves as an advisor to the U.S. and E.U. governments on
Information Infrastructures. His interests focus on tomorrow's Information
Marketplace. Born in Athens, Greece, Dr. Dertouzos received his Ph.D. from
the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.