Back on the U.S. east coast with the advantage of distance and time to reflect on KMWorld 2008 meetings this week, I have to say Stephen Arnold’s “Google Gadgets, Gears, and Glue” was a conference highlight. 

Arnold’s presentation began with Google’s creative technology and its impact on this industry. It progressed to his forecasts, based on analysis of Google patents, for the technology leader’s future impact on other industries including retail, banking and healthcare. His perspectives are drawn from his ebook: “The Calculating Predator”

Beyond the attention getting nuggets in Arnold’s presentation, from images of the smart Google refrigerator, to a Google ATM machine and remote health sensing devices, the take away message for me came from Arnold’s recounting a conversation with his dear 87 year-old mother (prior to her sadly passing away last year.)  The subject was the Dubai hotel that looks like a sail.  Arnold’s Mom was not prepared to accept a hotel could look like a sail.   

Designed to resemble a billowing sail, the hotel soars to a height of 321 metres, dominating the Dubai coastline.

Arnold used this example to alert us all, with a sense of urgency, to the changing mindsets and fresh frames needed to be competitive with calculating companies like Google. Traditional viewpoints and business as usual are not enough.

If you attended workshops today and had lunch (a great pasta with veggies — hmmmm), I hope you tried not only the chocolate covered strawberries but the truffles — I’m flying as I’m sure all the afternoon workshop attendees are too!  Tomorrow there’s a luncheon (with speaker Vijay Koduri) sponsored by Google. Eric Mack, KMWorld workshop leader and blogger, did a post about Vijay in September and I’m sure he’ll do another one tomorrow.  By the way there are also box lunches on Wednesday (sponsored by Onesta) and Thursday in the exhibit hall, so enjoy morning breakfast by Information Today as well as they lunches and coffee breaks sponsored by Autonomy.