The Creative Currencies Chiasma 2015

I had great fun tonight giving a talk at #include2, the first kick-off intro event for the upcoming Creative Currencies Chiasma that’s taking place in Edinburgh in Feburary 2015.

Chris Speed  Chair of Design Informatics kicked things off by setting the scene with a few insightful comments about the nature of value in society. I rattled through a Bitcoin 101 for an audience of students, academics, entrepreneurs, the Bitcoin faithful and who knows who else – always impossible to know where to pitch it but hopefully there was enough to engage a few people to start to question some of the potential.

. @DugCampbell taking the lid off #bitcoin and lay the ground for Creative Currencies @DesigninAction @deb_max pic.twitter.com/odFbwMSZnt

— chrisspeed (@chrisspeed) December 1, 2014

After I sat down, it was great to see a representative from the so-called “traditional” financial sector, Dave Barnes from RBS, give a talk in which he ran through the mechanics of Bitcoin. Great to see engagement from the banking sector. The more people that understand and get involved in the debate, the better the debate becomes in my view.

Last but by no means least, it was the turn of Joe Lindley who’d driven up from Lancaster with his fascinating Bitcoin radiator conversion. He’s basically pimped a bitcoin miner by adding a wall radiator which is being powered by the heat generated from the computer. Great idea! He also dropped plenty of nuggets in his talk that I need to go and investigate further, particularly around the whole concept of Design Fiction – in other words, using fictional scenarios in order to envision possible futures for design. I sense a big overlap with the concept that science fiction has the power to predict the future.

A really enjoyable event and what’s more, there’s another one next week, this time in Glasgow. Meantime, I’d encourage everyone out there with an interest in this area to seriously consider applying for the Creative Currencies Chiasma 2015 itself. Hey, you get 2.5 days of solid time to generate ideas in Edinburgh, with hotel and food paid for and a potential prize of £20,000 at the end of the process for the winning team to develop any ideas.

We’re all aware that there’s a talent gap in Bitcoin at the moment. It’s a situation that’s likely to get worse before it improves given the likely growth cycle. Design is absolutely one of the areas that’s crying out for more talent within the industry. So if this sounds like it could be of interest to you, please do apply. Ignoring everything else, it’s be a huge opportunity to get your foot in the door in a sector that’s likely to explode with demand over the coming few years.

Good luck!