Geek island paradise

Greek island paradise

It is a beautiful Greek resort. The sky is blue and palm trees wave in the wind. The temperature is hot, moderated only by the breezes blowing from Evia across the sea, which laps on the other side of the lawn.

But the sea is empty, as are the pools.

This is Stream 2007.

And for the three hundred digerati present, living at Web 2.0 speed means sleeping when they die, and probably waiting until then to fix their suntan too.

The conversations at Stream are bracing.

Some people are working on cutting edge social networking. Others have collected $100 million in venture capital and are working out where to place their bets. Others are on the front lines of digital media production.

Everyone is in a business that is undergoing rapid fundamental change.

The newspaper owner who is redefining his product into a mobile and online proposition is there. The TV company executive charged with rewriting its advertising models is there. The people from Google and from Microsoft are there, squaring up for digital Armageddon over advertising exchanges.

Stream is a microcosm of the impact of digital change across the world’s media industry.

But for all talk of digital wars and wrenching change in media that we read about in the press, the most interesting thing about Stream is the sense of co-operation.

The digital world is moving so fast that even people working in the same area see others less as competitors and more as potential collaborators.

The pie is already so large, and is growing so rapidly, that fighting over slices of it seems somehow illogical.