In 2009, the European year of creativity and innovation, Milan is hosting Nik Nailah Binti Abdullah – a “techno-visionary” researcher from the National Institute of Informatics (Tokyo) – to present the new landscapes of “Cross-domain collaboration on the web”. Nik Nailah Binti Abdullah analyses conversations between people (and “machines”) who collaborate on the web, with the aim of creating new instruments that will allow for users’ needs to be anticipated.

 

The event, organized by Didael together with the Province of Milan and European Parliament (Milan Office) will be opened by Arianna Censi, Managing Director of Gender Policies for the Province of Milan, and by Gianna Martinengo, President of Didael and Chairperson of the Women&Technologies Conference. Speakers will include Filippo Penati, President of the Province of Milan, and Maria Grazia Cavenaghi-Smith, Manager of the European Parliament’s Representative Office in Milan.

It will be coordinated by Francesca Cerati, Vice Chief of Service of “Nova24”, Il Sole 24 Ore.

 

The discussion will be in Italian and English, with simultaneous translation.

 

Free entry with pre-registration at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Who is a “techno-visionary”? She is a woman who is able to generate innovation and “invent the future” by creating technologies. And what is meant by innovation is not simply the construction of new instruments, but rather the ability to interpret problems and identify new objectives in a different way.

Women and technologies: a combination still marked by too many clichés. It has been difficult to overcome the stereotypical image of a woman scratching her head in front of a computer screen, or of her being intimidated by “high” technology. And it’s even more difficult to overcome the “ancillary” view of the technology reserved for women, limited to home automation or a strictly instrumental use of the same.The reality is very different: there exists a world of women who do not limit themselves to “using”, bur rather create, invent and mould technology according to their needs and interests, giving life to an unexpectedly large technological universe with undoubtedly innovative potential. Talented women and researchers who operate within Universities, Businesses and Public Administrations and, further still, “techno-visionaries” who are able to overcome limits and nurture extraordinary, genius intuitions.

Nik Nailah Abdullah is one of these women: it is no coincidence that she was one of the 3 finalists chosen for the “Le Tecnovisionarie®” Award. The latter was created by Didael for the Women&Technologies: research and innovation Conference(Milan, 8^th September 2008), which was dedicated to overturning stereotypes by introducing and creating links between female “creators of technology”. The award panel singled out Nik Nailah Binti Abdullah “for her creativity in identifying paths not yet taken in informatics research and for her tenacity in pursuing results with extraordinary practical potential”.

 

One of the most interesting areas in the wider field of innovation through technologies is that of Interaction and dialogue in the Web Communities of the Future: web 2.0 technologies currently allow people to both produce and consume information. Further, new structures that are becoming increasingly focused on services require the ability to create dialogue between people and technologies and to integrate, into the world of ICT, the typical elements of people’s social lives, such as interaction, dialogue, reputation and so forth. These challenges are unveiling unforeseen landscapes, and Nik Nailah Binti Abdullah will give us her personal contribution, her experience and “vision” of these, on 19^th January 2009.

 

The 2008 edition of the Women&Technologies conference took place on 8^th September 2008 at Milan’s Convention Centre. It was conceived by Gianna Martinengo (President of Didael and Chairperson of the conference) and organized by Didael and the European Parliament (Milan Office) with the High Patronage of the President of the Republic. The conference hosted the first edition of the “Le Tecnovisionarie®” award, supported in 2008 by BlackBerry®.

To learn more about the conference, the award and the new edition scheduled for 2009: www.womentech.info.