Vol. 2: design-management.de

Some good news comes from California about an upcoming event/initiative on the intersection of Business and Design called: Overlap. From simply browsing the list of organizers it seems that again the forefront of business and design thinkers/bloggers is based in the US and California in particular (wish I could be there ;-). Just to name a few session hosts: Clement Mok, Lorraine Justice, Richard Farson, …

Both Steve Portigal as well as Victor Lombardi are promoting this event via their blogs as well as through “The Overlap conference blog”. Rather than re-wrapping information about the event in my own words I’ll cite from the conference website (nicely “overlapping” text and visuals) Victor Lombardi and Jess McMullin have assembled:

“Overlap offers a unique opportunity to join other curious, deep thinking professionals in a spirited discourse on the relationship between business and design and the implications both that may have on our companies and careers. We have reserved only 41 rooms and expect less than 50 participants in order to enable active participation by all.

Overlap is a completely non-profit, volunteer effort. This means that all participants will be able to attend for only the cost of their rooms. The venue is the Asilomar Conference Center in Northern California, setting our journey along the scenic Pacific coast, within easy driving distance of both the San Francisco and San Jose international airports.”

Beside the fact that I think I won’t be able to attend the conference which is taking place from May 26th – 28th it seems the mode for being eligible to attend the event is to contact Victor Lombardi (via his blog) and getting invited.

What I find most laudable is the clear focus on discussion and interaction embedded in a non-profit setting. For me this is a good sign in the light of a posting by Jeff Jarvis from January 2006 titled “Exploding the conference business” where Jeff states:

“Too many conferences suck. They’re too expensive. They are filled with boring panels. They are all about speeches and not about conversation and argument and learning and meeting. They don’t capture the expertise of the crowd. They enrich the organizers at the cost of both the “talent” and the “audience” (a distinction that is usually random, meaningless, and essentially insulting). They are filled with commercial pitches.”

I’m sure Overlap will be quite the opposite and I trust some folks will definitively blog about it! Stay tuned …