PARADISO

Which Internet for which future?

Website editor — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 13:18:11 +0000

The Research*EU Results Magazine of the European Commission has highlighted, in its release of October 2011, the outputs of the PARADISO FP7 project that Sigma Orionis and the Club of Rome have developed over the period 2008-2011. The article, entitled “Which Internet for which future” (available here as a pdf file) underlines in particular the recommendations prepared by the PARADISO high-level expert panel and the conference organized through PARADISO at the European Commission in Brussels on Sept. 7-9, 2011 on the theme “Internet and societies: new innovation paths”.

Join the PARADISO online community!

Website editor — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 07:00:52 +0000

All individuals and organizations from Europe and other regions of the world, interested in the activities developed through the PARADISO initiative to better understand the interactions between Internet and societal developments, are invited to join the PARADISO LinkedIn group. This community already counts over 470 members from all regions of the world, engaged in lively discussions and constitutes one of the possibilities offered by the PARADISO open initiative to be fully informed, and contribute to planned and future PARADISO activities. For further information, please contact us.

PARADISO recommendations to the European Commission

Website editor — Sat, 10 Sep 2011 13:27:06 +0000

On September 8, 2011, during the last session of the 2nd edition of the PARADISO international conference organized at the European Commission in Brussels, members of the PARADISO high-level expert panel have presented their draft final recommendations regarding research topics to be addressed in future EU-funded programmes (see the “Reference document” section of this web site to access detailed information on these recommendations). At the end of the session (picture), Roberto Saracco and Ziga Turk, co-Chairs of this panel, together with Roger Torrenti, PARADISO project coordinator, officially communicated these recommendations to Zoran Stancic, Deputy Director General of European Commission’s DG Information Society and Media. During his wrap-up, Zoran Stancic congratulated the panel and all PARADISO stakeholders for the quality of their work and stated that these recommendations will be duly taken into account by the European Commission and that several of them indeed reinforced recent directions chosen for EU-funded programmes and projects. For further information, please contact us.

1st Dialogue on Platforms for collective awareness and action

Website editor — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 13:22:29 +0000

The 1st Dialogue on “Platforms for collective awareness and action”, part of the “Internet and societies: new innovation paths” event organized with the support of PARADISO, has been successfully held today at the European Commission in Brussels. This one-day workshop, chaired by Robert Madelin, Director General of European Commission’s DG Information Society and Media, focused on platforms likely to support environmentally aware, grassroots processes and practices to share knowledge, to achieve changes in lifestyle, production and consumption patterns, and to set up more participatory democratic processes. The overall aim was to contribute identifying related multidisciplinary research priorities for the last Call of FP7 and for FP8. After a great number of contributions and lively interaction with the audience, Robert Madelin concluded that the size and complexity of the challenges should not be an excuse for inaction, his last tweet being “great people+2 days of wall-to-wall european/world excellence-#reasonsto believe”. Detailed information on this workshop is available through the European Commission’s portal devoted to this topic.

2nd edition of the PARADISO conference

Website editor — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 13:15:25 +0000

The second edition of the PARADISO international conference, part of the “Internet and societies: new innovation paths” event organized with the support of PARADISO, has been successfully held yesterday and today at the European Commission in Brussels. The conference was officially opened by Ms Neelie Kroes, Vice-President of the European Commission and European Digital Agenda Commissioner (picture). Today, following the opening session, keynote speakers from Europe and the rest of the world have shared their visions of the future of our societies and of the Internet. The last session has been the occasion, for the PARADISO high-level expert panel, to introduce in detail its set of recommendations to the European Commission regarding research topics to be addressed in future EU-funded programmes. For full details, please visit the Events section of this web site.

Drawing contest Award Ceremony

Website editor — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 13:45:35 +0000

On September 7, 2011, during the welcome session of the 2nd edition of the PARADISO international conference organized at the European Commission in Brussels, the award ceremony of the children’s drawing contest organized by PARADISO took place (see the “Drawing contest” section of this web site for full details on this contest). The ceremony was held in the presence of children having participated in the contest (and of their parents and teachers) and was chaired by Jacques Babot, Scientific Officer at DG Information Society and Media and PARADISO Project Officer. The satisfaction of the organizers concerning the success of the contest – classes from 16 countries from all around the world have sent a total of 79 drawings – was underlined. After having warmly thanked all children and teachers having participated in the contest for the quality of their work, Jacques Babot announced that it had been found impossible to award only some submitted drawings, which means to exclude others. Therefore it had been decided that all entries would be awarded and that all participating classes would receive a printed catalogue of all submitted drawings as a modest expression of the most sincere gratitude of the European Commission and of the PARADISO project. To conclude the ceremony, Jacques Babot gave the floor to children having participated in the contest to tell the audience (over 200 conference attendees!) what they expected from the Internet in their future. A young girl, after some seconds of reflexion, genuinely but clearly answered: “I would like the Internet to do my homework”. A big applause followed…

Support the PARADISO Foundation

Website editor — Sun, 21 Aug 2011 13:17:42 +0000

The PARADISO Foundation has been created in September 2010, as a not-for-profit “private Foundation” under the Belgian law, by the same stakeholders who have been developing the PARADISO initiative, with the objective to extend PARADISO activities. It focuses on ICT-based solutions enabling a transition towards a more sustainable future. It targets citizens and the civil society, from Europe and other parts of the world, and aims at fully informing them, at supporting their initiatives, and at networking them. The PARADISO Foundation needs the financial support of organizations and individuals to fully achieve its goals. Contact us for details.

A conference on very good track

Website editor — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 06:44:14 +0000

The high-level conference organized by PARADISO from Sept. 7 to 9 at the European Commission in Brussels on the theme “Internet and societies: new innovation paths” is on very good track.The agenda for the 3 days has been finalized and features over 40 key officials and experts, including Ms Neelie Kroes, VP of the European Commission and European Digital Agenda Commissioner, and Mr Robert Madelin, Director General of European Commission’s DG Information Society and Media.

Moreover, the number of registered attendees has already reached a high level (over 450). In this context, if you plan to attend and have not yet registered, we can only recommend you do to it as soon as possible, since we may have to close the registration process before the event. Details of the agenda, of the attendees to date, and of the registration procedure are available through a specific section of this web site.

Success of the children’s drawing contest

Website editor — Sun, 10 Jul 2011 06:52:12 +0000

PARADISO explores how the full benefits and potential of the Internet can be enjoyed by tomorrow’s societies, in order to contribute to a better world. It is important that today’s children, who will be the main users of the Internet of the future, should be able to make their voices heard.

They have been able to do exactly that through the drawing contest that PARADISO has launched in April 2011 inviting young people to draw or paint how they see the Internet affecting their lives in the future. The contest was open to primary/elementary schools in Europe and other regions of the world. Teachers were invited to play a leading role in the contest, facilitating collaborative working so that one entry per class could be sent. The contest has been a success: classes from 16 countries from all around the world have sent a total of 79 drawings. These figures were a very good surprise for the contest organizers.

But beyond figures, they have been truly surprised by the creativity, not only from an artistic or emotional viewpoint, but also and more surprisingly from an application and technological viewpoint. There are in these drawings some ideas that will probably be considered with interest by research laboratories specialized in the Internet domain! All submitted drawings are presented in a specific section of this web site. Selected drawings will be displayed in the form of posters and of a slide show, during the conference organized by PARADISO at the European Commission in Brussels from September 7 to 9, 2011 on the theme “Internet and societies: new innovation paths”.

Platforms for collective awareness and action

Website editor — Mon, 04 Jul 2011 14:50:47 +0000

We are happy to announce that the final agenda of the conference supported by PARADISO, to be held from Sept. 7 to 9 at the European Commission in Brussels, on the theme “Internet and societies: new innovation paths”, includes two different sub-events. The first one, the “2^nd edition of the PARADISO international conference” will take place from Sept. 7 to 8, while the “1^st dialogue on Platforms for collective awareness and action” will take place on Sept. 9. The focus of this second event, chaired by Mr Robert Madelin, Director General of European Commission’s DG Information Society and Media, is quite in line with PARADISO recommendations. The vision is that ICT can empower citizens to become the main actors of change towards sustainability, thanks to bottom-up platforms. This event should contribute identifying related multidisciplinary research priorities for the last Call of FP7 and for FP8. Please visit the Events section of this web site for full details. If you have not yet registered for the event, please do it as soon as possible since the room total capacity may be reached prior to the event date.