Learn from Experts and Scholars at LSI’s GETS Conference

Larry Downes is co-author of Big Bang Disruption:  Strategy in the Age of Devastating Innovation (Portfolio 2014). His previous book, The Laws of Disruption:  Harnessing the New Forces that Govern Business and Life in the Digital Age explored the accident-prone intersection of law and innovation.  Downes is the author of the New York Times and Business Week bestseller, Unleashing the Killer App: Digital Strategies for Market Dominance, which was named by The Wall Street Journal as one of the five most important books ever published on business and technology.  He writes regularly for Forbes, Harvard Business Review, The Washington Post and CNET.  He serves as Project Director at the Georgetown Center for Business and Public Policy and a Senior Fellow with Accenture Research.

Professor Citron is an internationally recognized information privacy expert. Her book Hate Crimes in Cyberspace (Harvard University Press 2014) explored the phenomenon of cyber stalking and how law and companies can and should tackle online abuse consistent with our commitment to free speech. The editors of Cosmopolitan included her book in “20 Best Moments for Women in 2014.” Professor Citron has published more than 20 law review articles. Her opinion pieces have appeared in media outlets, such as The New York Times, The Atlantic, Slate, Time, CNN, The Guardian, New Scientist, ars technica, and New York Daily News. In 2015, the United Kingdom’s Prospect Magazine named Professor Citron one of the “Top 50 World Thinkers;” the Daily Record named her one of the “Top 50 Most Influential Marylanders.” Professor Citron is an Affiliate Scholar at the Stanford Center on Internet and Society, Affiliate Fellow at the Yale Information Society Project, and Senior Fellow at the Future of Privacy, a privacy think tank. She is a technology contributor for Forbes.

Erica Kochi is the co-founder of UNICEF Innovation. Her team partners with the private sector to benefit children around the world. She focuses on technology growth areas – from artificial intelligence, and sensors and IoT devices, to mobility, skilling, and financial technologies that can deliver tangible results for children. The Office of Innovation has had recognized success in innovative design of international development solutions. Erica was named to the TIME 100 “World’s Most Influential People” List in 2013. Other examples of this work include RapidPRO – a messaging system that has reported 7 million births in Nigeria, provided antenatal care to pregnant women across Rwanda, and provide a direct feedback loop for 3 million young people across 18 countries to engage with their government and change policy in real time. Erica also serves as the Co-Chair of the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Human Rights. The Council works to promote practical industry-wide solutions to human rights challenges of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. The current focus is on the imperatives and pathways for companies to best realize the positive potential of machine learning while building trust and preventing real and present risks to human rights.

Beth Simone Noveck directs the Governance Lab (GovLab) and its MacArthur Research Network on Opening Governance. She is a Professor in Technology, Culture, and Society at New York University’s Tandon School of Engineering. Her current research focuses on “people-led innovation,” namely the ability of communities and institutions to work together to solve problems more effectively and legitimately. She directs programs to promote effective public engagement in lawmaking (CrowdLaw), to help public institutions expert-source and implement innovative solutions to hard problems (Smarter Crowdsourcing) and to train civic leaders and civil servants in how to collaborate with their own communities (Civic Challenges). At NYU, Beth teaches the graduate-level Clinic on Governance Innovation: Technology for Social Change and Governing Cities. She also coaches “public entrepreneurs” online through the GovLab Academy, working with passionate individuals to take their public interest projects from idea to implementation and become agents of change. Beth served in the White House as the first United States Deputy Chief Technology Officer and director of the White House Open Government Initiative from 2009 to 2011. UK Prime Minister David Cameron appointed her senior advisor for Open Government.