by DAN CALLOWAY
Published 9 December 2009 @ 22:50 UCT

BRUSSELS, BELGIUM & AMSTERDAM, THE NETHERLANDS – I have just returned from the LIFT@Brussels and Tinker.IT conference that was held on 4 December 2009 at IMAL, Center for Digital Arts and Culture, 30 Quai des Charbonnages/Koolmijnenkaai 30 1080 Bruxelles/Brussel 1080, and which was hosted by Rob van Kranenburg, founder of the IOTC (Internet of Things Council), author of “The Internet of Things,” and developer of the DIFR network in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.  For more information on the purpose and mission of the IOTC, please visit the official IOTC Website.

Source: Wikipedia

There were over 100 in attendance, including members of Nokia, Inc., Phillips, Inc., the IOTC staff (which included myself) and the European Union.  All in attendance were greeted by its founder and made to feel very welcomed.

The conference began at 0930 with a kickoff presentation by Rob van Kranenburg & Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino, followed by several speakers who were presenting various topics on different aspects of the IOTC and its vendor relationships.  Among the presentations that followed were: (1) LIFT@Home by Nicolas Nova; (2) Internet of the Future and the Internet of Things, by Gerald Santucci, Head of the “Networked Enterprise and RFID” unit in the EU; (3) The future of storytelling through scenarios, by Gill Wildman; (4) The Internet of Goods, presented by Hein Gorter de Vries, GS1 in Europe; (5) Pachube and Connected Environments, by Husman Haque;  (6) RFID Guardian, by Dr. Melanie Reibeck; (7) Mime, by Lorna Goulden; (8) NoiseTube, by Metthias Stevens; (9)  Privacy Couch with Jaap Henk Hoepman; (10) Legal Issues, presented by Nicola Fabiano; (11) What I learned from the Violet Experience, by Rafi Haladjian; (12) Playfully hacking the environment, by Karim Amrani; (13) Breaking Patterns with Marcus Kirsch; (14) Awareness Technology with Alan Munro; (15) A distributed physical network of humans through the city unveiling invisible and always mobile connections with Natacha Roussel; (16) Social implications of the IOT, by Jim Kosem; and (17) Town Toolkit, by Christian Nold.

Following lunch, the group broke out into one of seven separate workshops that were integral to the conference.  My particular role at the conference was to co-moderate Workshop 2: Creating the MBA for the IOT in Education. During this three-hour workshop, I pitched a presentation that I had prepared on my proposal as to how the IOTC should proceed with its development of the MBA, utilizing an approach based on learning and instructional design theories.  The presentation was well-received by everyone in the group, by Council, and the EU.

Following the workshops, moderators were given approximately 15 minutes each to present the results of their respective workshops to Council and the EU representatives who were present.  My particular workshop, which was co-moderated by Liesbeth Huybrechts, a PhD student at the Catholic University in Leuven currently teaching and conducting research at the Digital Arts and Media Academy in Genk, Belgium received a resounding round of applause.  It was felt that the workshop was successful and achieved its intended goals.

The conference officially ended at 2200.  But, there is a lot of work that will follow the conference as this is just the beginning.