Last year at the Cloud Foundry Summit we had several science fiction writers talk. I was super excited to hear from Cory Doctorow and Andy Weir. Cory described a plausible future where your legs might walk themselves back to the store if you didn’t make your monthly payment. Andy told a story I loved – he described his Martian writing process in terms of open source. (And by the way, did you know his readers requested that he make his book available on Amazon and Amazon wouldn’t let him give it away for free? We’re talking about The Martian!)
This year we decided to continue the theme of science fiction becoming reality and we have an amazing line up of fascinating speakers.
Janna Levin ponders mind bending science, like in this article whether she speculates if the universe is round. She’s a best selling science writer because she’s a great scientist and story teller. I got to talk to her about her Summit talk and came away as fascinated by black holes as I had been by the universe is round concept. She’s going to talk to us about her research into black holes and the sounds they make – some of the ideas from her book Black Hole Blues and Other Songs from Outer Space.
Ramez Naam is a science fiction writer. I love meeting authors whose books I have enjoyed. Ramez wrote Nexus, An NPR Best Book of the Year – Winner of the Prometheus Award – Winner of the Endeavour Award. He based the “science fiction” in his books on real science being done today. Does this mean that mind to mind communication is coming soon? I hope so!
Martin Ford is the author of the Rise of the Robots. He talks about technology and machines are changing the economy and how we need to pay attention to that in order to shape the future we want or we are going to end up with inequality and economic insecurity. In a world where Cloud Foundry contributors and users are shaping the future, it’s really thought provoking to think about how our technology is shaping our society.
I’m looking forward to some fascinating, thought provoking talks. Come join us at the Cloud Foundry Summit.
