PopTech Videos: PopCasts

From composing electronic music to scoring experimental videos to making larger-scale public installations that create immersive soundscapes, sound artist Stephen Vitiello invites his audience to reinterpret sound. He took us on a sonic tour of his work including recordings from a 1999 residency at the World Trade Center and his sound installation at New York City’s High Line, “A Bell for Every Minute.”

The one-man band, Jazari, consists of machines that play a variety of hand percussion instruments, all under the control Patrick Flanagan, who wields a custom-built controller and a Wii remote to create improvised jam sessions. After performing, Flanagan walked the crowd through the technical process of how his system works.

Psychology professor Kevin Dunbar studies how scientists approach the unexpected and learn from mistakes. Over the course of a year, Dunbar’s team studied the habits of four molecular biology labs. They found that those labs most successful at turning mistakes into new theories tended to be more diverse and willing to take risks.

Nathan Eagle is harnessing mobile phone data in emerging markets. He’s launched txteagle, a program that enables the under-employed to earn money or phone credits by performing tasks on their cell phones. Through partnerships with over 220 mobile phone operators, txteagle is active in nearly 100 countries.

Reggie Watts is an entertainer who combines stream-of-consciousness improvisational comedy with music to create a wholly original experience. A PopTech veteran, Watts knows this audience well and he handled them like a pro, getting big laughs with a smart blend of sarcasm and self-deprecation during his performance.

Accompanied only by his piano, Grammy award-winning recording artist and philanthropist John Legend performs the soulful “Wake Up” and “Shine” from his album, Wake Up!, including a song that appears on the soundtrack to the documentary Waiting for Superman.

OK Go’s eccentricities and music videos are undeniably captivating. But there’s no denying that they are incredible musicians too. OK Go took to the PopTech stage with acoustic performances of “White Knuckles,” “Return,” (performed with bells) “This Too Shall Pass” and “Here It Goes Again.”

April Smith and the Great Picture Show serve up an exuberant blend of vintage-inspired music that drips with emotion and grace. The group recently released their first CD, a fan-financed project called Songs for a Sinking Ship.

Vijay Anand wants to eliminate corruption. That’s why he co-founded the 5th Pillar, an organization dedicated to providing citizens with the tools to fight corruption. He’s also launched one of India’s most successful anti-corruption campaigns with the Zero Rupee Note, a bill that looks like currency but allows citizens to refuse bribery without fear.

Eli Pariser explores how ideas move in the networked economy. As the board president of MoveOn.org, he pioneered many practices of online organizing. Now, Pariser is focused on the social and political impact of the personalized web, examining the role that filters – both cognitive and software-based – have in shaping what information spreads, which he refers to as the Filter Bubble .

Donald Ingber explains how taking an undergraduate sculpture course while learning how to culture cells led to an unexpected breakthrough in understanding cellular construction. He believes an open mind for serendipity correlates to innovations in a diverse range of fields — from the “lung-on-a-chip” to “DNA origami.”

David de Rothschild is on a mission. Alarmed by the devastating impact of plastic pollution in the ocean, the eco-adventurer built the Plastiki, a boat made from 12,000 plastic bottles. In it, he and his crew of nautical nomads sail halfway around the world to alert the public about this ecological crisis and the need to reuse discarded plastics.

Director of MIT’s SENSEable City Lab Carlo Ratti wondered if there was a way to create a small, inexpensive, scalable, self-organizing system to help remove the oil after the Gulf oil spill. He discusses the inception of Seaswarm, a fleet of low-cost oil-absorbing robots in his PopTech 2010 talk.

Tulane ecology professor Michael Blum has been at the front lines of the Gulf coast oil spill response and clean-up efforts. In his PopTech talk, he analyzed the operational, organizational and technological failures that led to the accident as well as the community’s resiliency in its rebuilding efforts.

Tom Darden is the Executive Director of the Make It Right Foundation, an organization founded by actor Brad Pitt to build 150 green, high design homes in New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward, a neighborhood devastated by Hurricane Katrina. Darden said he wants to take what has been a local conversation about green construction to the national level.