Pekka Himanen to talk about the power of creativity and social networking

09/09/2010

Himanen will be talking about issues such as the culture of creativity, the traits common to leading innovators in the field and his personal philosophy on the elements that make social networking such a powerful tool. The conference will be part of the inauguration of the second edition of UAB's master's degree in Web: Communication, Marketing and Business. The event is open to the general public but places are limited.

Himanen has given conferences at the most prestigious universities across the globe. He has been counsellor to the Finnish government and consultant to international firms and is member of several decision-making forums. His books on information society have been translated into more than twenty languages. He is currently professor at the Aalto University School of Art and Design, Helsinki, and principal scientist at the Helsinki Institute of Information Technology. He was visiting professor at Oxford University from 2005 to 2006.

His best known work, entitled The Hacker Ethic and the Spirit of the Information Age, analyses the attitude and values shared by the first hackers. Himanen uses the term hacker in its original sense, making reference to the community of programmers and researchers who contributed to the creation of the internet and the World Wide Web. His analysis of hacker ethics reveals a new attitude towards work which encourages creativity, innovation and progress in today's information era. Under these new work ethics the exchange of knowledge, passion, enthusiasm, freedom and social values substitute traditional capitalist ideology.

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