Featured Speakers
Mike Masnick
CEO, Floor64
Founder, Techdirt
(Conference Emcee and Moderator)
Chris Anderson
Editor in chief, WIRED
Author, The Long Tail and Free: The Future of a Radical Price
(Keynote Speaker)
Where You Can Find Us
Produced By
Understanding and Making the Most of Free! Putting Our Money Where Our Mouth Is
As the digital economy drives down the marginal costs of technology and a generation of young consumers grow accustomed to giveaways, it's no longer a question of 'How can you compete with free?' but a matter of 'How can you afford not to compete with free?'
At the same time, the current economic crisis is making the need to turn free into cash more critical than ever, and some argue that free is doing more harm than good to content creators who rely on 'traditional' business models to pay the bills. The recession has proven that it takes no prisoners, and some companies won't survive unless they can figure out how to monetize free – and quickly.
The Free! Summit addresses these challenges, and the opportunities, in an open and critical way by bringing together leading thinkers and innovators who are embracing the value of free...as well as those who are not. Investors, entrepreneurs, content developers, marketing professionals, analysts and other stakeholders who are at the forefront of the digital revolution.
Whether you're investing in free, trying to sell free, competing with free or just trying to understand what free is all about, you'll benefit from the insights and connections you will find at The Free! Summit. These days, companies and industries of all types are exploring new business models and searching for better ways to anticipate and meet customer needs.
Our mission is to create a forum for focused conversation about these, and other, important questions:
--When ad dollars dry up, how else can you profit when you're giving it away?
--How is free changing consumer expectations, and vice versa?
--How can free be part of a sustainable business model?
--When the price is zero, what else do customers value?
--Is free a threat, or a boon, to intellectual property?
--How do you compete with free...and when does it stifle competition?
--Are there other ways free pays off? What about the societal benefits?
--What are the hidden costs associated with all this free stuff?
--Where is free headed?
Produced by SageScape LLC, a privately held startup that specializes in developing executive conferences and online communities for the tech industry, this unique executive conference is devoted entirely to debating the merits – and drawbacks – of free's role in the digital economy.
We're not just talking the talk, though. We're walking the walk by making The Free! Summit free of charge to participants. How can we afford to do that? Through the support of individual and corporate sponsors who believe in our mission enough to volunteer their services and to underwrite the costs of Free! so you can be there gratis.
For starters, we're very fortunate and grateful to have Floor64 CEO and Techdirt founder Mike Masnick on board as the conference emcee. If you're familiar with his writing at Techdirt, you know that Mike has been outspoken on all things related to free, and he's guaranteed to keep the debate lively.
We're also honored that author and WIRED editor in chief Chris Anderson, who is (literally) writing the book on free, will deliver the opening keynote address. His award-winning New York Times bestseller, The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business is Selling Less of More, continues to be a must-read for the business world and his next book, Free: The Future of a Radical Price will be released on July 7th.
Attend One Conference, Try the Other for Free
In addition to waiving the registration fees, we're testing the free waters in another way: by co-locating The Free! Summit with SageScape's 3rd annual Tech Policy Summit, taking place May 11-13 at the San Mateo Marriott.
Our flagship conference, Tech Policy Summit is the only gathering of its kind on the West coast that brings together prominent leaders from the private and public sectors to examine critical policy issues impacting technology innovation and adoption.
This year's theme is Accelerating Innovation and Economic Growth and we'll be focusing on the innovation agendas and policies of the Obama administration and Congress with over 60 speakers, including Congressman Mike Honda (D-CA), the founder of craigslist, the SVP of research at HP, the CEO of LinkedIn, the executive director of the Sunlight Foundation and the chief privacy officer of Facebook.
Because we believe that policy is everybody's business, we have decided to allow everyone who registers for Free! to attend the opening evening of Tech Policy Summit at no charge. The conference will kick-off right after the conclusion of Free! with a roundtable on fostering open innovation in the global economy and a special one-on-one interview hosted by BusinessWeek technology columnist Steve Wildstrom, and an interview with Facebook's chief privacy officer Chris Kelly. After that, you're invited to join us for a cocktail reception where you can meet with participants from both conferences.
UPDATE: As of May 6th, seats are no longer available. We will record audio of the general session though, and will post podcasts of those sessions online following the conference.