Quite interesting to say it was a spur of the moment viewing. Lots of people talking about digital aspects that seemed alien to maybe half of them. Among the masses of coal though there were a few (a very few) diamonds to be had. Some valid points were made – I only caught the afternoon sessions but I’ll summarise my main observations. And I’m not ageist!

• Piracy – some real problems here from a variety of viewpoints. You buy a product in one media, then have to re-pay to consume it in newer formats, which typically appear once the old formats are out-dated – is this morally right? Are you paying for the hard item itself or the actual content of it, making it free to acquire across all mediums. This can’t really be the case as new mediums cost money to develop. Also, purchasing restrictions may mean that if legitimately bought, problems can arise when trying to consume it in different countries, or in places where you may not have brought it (hence a legitimate illegal download, if there is such a thing). The current market system of how this works is failing because of the free reins in the Internet, but no-one seems to know how to fix it. Suggestions to come.

• The ‘Google’ Generation – If there is such as thing, anyone born after 1993 apparently. Nothing like labelling socially, eh. Well apparently they are unable to research items in libraries as the Internet is stealing all their old-skool researchers. So they’re a sort of problem group. Or maybe the library is so inefficient, time-consuming and complex that a simple search engine will suffice. Libraries really need to up the ante and get moving digitally, in 10 years time they will be a simple drain on the country and dissolve unless their community projects can keep them alive. Evolve or die libraries, I’m afraid that’s the long and short of it.

• The ‘Digital Divide’ – OK, the gap between people who are actively on the Internet and those who ain’t. Kind of like a rich v poor gap. The worry is all these poor people without the magical awesomeness of the net will keep falling further and further behind until the gap is so large that they will be anti-computers if they aren’t already, and be near impossible to coax onto the webby. I don’t really believe that so much. People need to realise the hard fact that a lot of people simply don’t want to go on the Internet and really ain’t interested. Those who are genuinely interested tend to hunt down their local Internet cafe or borrow a friends computer. I think the actual Rich v Poor monetary divide is much more important to be discussing personally.

I’ve also discovered last.fm (rudedudejude and add me for widespread music goodness), twitter, and a few other things. There’s nothing like being a late adopter to wait until all the problems are ironed out.