Question of the Week: If Anyone Could Keynote…

Hi ​@danielleatsafe first, nice to see in person!

It’s a great question. I would like to see the Bill Gates or Jeff Bezos. 

I believe that their lectures would be very interesting because of the technology that surrounds us.

It was great to finally meet you in-person too ​@danilo_fme! We’ll see what we can do for the next Peak 😜

Sure. London!

Simon Sinak or Marshall Mcluhan (you said anyone). Both have messages and thoughts that continue to resonate. And have greatly influenced how I interact with the world.

For sure my dream is to see FME Lizard on stage, but my second option would be Alex Ferguson from Scotland, legendary former manager of Manchester United.

Ideal keynote? Let’s see… 

Fictional speakers? I think Doc Emmett Brown from Back to the Future would be pretty amazing!

Since the next FME conference will be in England, how about Sherlock Holmes? Well, it’s elementary!

For real people, how about Tim Berners-Lee? Or Hannah Fry - mathematician and lecturer at the Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis? I think she’d be an awesome keynote.

Thanks!

+1 for Hannah Fry, she would be awesome!

Other suggestions: Randall Munroe from XKCD, who is not only wickedly smart and funny (check out his What If… channel) but also often has mappy content, such as… Map Projections 😃

A few years ago at my annual cartography conference the keynote speaker was Geoffrey Mandel. From the programme: “His first industry job was as an art department assistant on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and since 1995 he has been working as a graphic designer for films and TV shows, including Space: Above & Beyond, JAG, NCIS, Star Trek: Voyager, Spider-Man 2, Serenity, Blades of Glory, Dirt, X-Men: First Class, Gangster Squad, Parks & Recreation, Mad Men, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., The Muppets, Black Mass, La La Land, and the upcoming Downsizing and American Made.

In his spare time, Mandel designs and illustrates props, blueprints and star maps for various science fiction franchises, including the Serenity blueprints, and maps of the Star Trek, Firefly and Battlestar Galactica universes.”

Best partner for FME Lizard would be of course David Attenborough ;)

Also it would be nice to listen Geoffrey Hinton talking about his point of view on the use of AI in geospatial industry

I would like to see (and meet) Jack Reacher (the one from the books, not so much his on-screen incarnations). 📚😀

I would like to see Dale Lutz as the keynote speaker after stepping down from his leadership position at Safe Software. The outsider view of an ex Insider!

​@philippeb I too would like to see FME Lizard on stage.

I would also love to attend an XKCD keynote ​@redgeographics.

John Green is an author, health advocate, and internet personality who is just really wise and down to earth. I’d love to see him give a talk on his life and experiences and how data has shaped the world. A lot of his current work has been raising awareness and money for maternal health in Africa and tuberculosis. 

Ivan Sutherland, a computer graphics pioneer and an inventor of VR/AR!

Thinking of the fictional character angle here, I’d love to see and meet Ted Lasso as keynote speaker...just so much positivity packed into one person!

I think Douglas Adams would have been an excellent Keynote speaker. As a real/fictional combo I’d love to see Harry Shearer as his Spinal Tap character Derek Smalls...

Someone that’s obsessed about collecting and managing data in sports… Maybe like a director of data for an F1 team or hockey team?

Robin Williams because Robin Williams

If Harry could also channel Mr Burns that’d be…. excellent…. 😂

Congratulations ​@philippeb! You won our May prize draw for Question of the Week. We’ll send you a private message with details on receiving your FME swag prize pack!