The short and long-term implications of the COVID-19 on media and technology will be the subject of an upcoming symposium hosted by Northwestern Qatar’s Digital Advancements and Media Applications Lab (DAMA Lab).
The conference – Media Innovation Symposium: Responses to the Pandemic – will feature a series of panels with media experts who will address topics that include the digitization of sport, journalism in the digital age, and creative writing during the pandemic.
“This past year, the world had to move quickly to respond to restrictions imposed by the pandemic,” explained Eric Espig, manager of the DAMA Lab. “Through this symposium, we are bringing together media and technology leaders who will unpack the reality of the changes in the media and communication world and shed light on what we can expect to see in the near future.”
A panel on COVID-19, sport, and media will be moderated by Craig LaMay, a Northwestern professor who is also an expert in sports media, will address the slowdown in the growth of global sport, the difference between U.S. and European models of sport, the rise of hybrid sport, digitization of sport, and the demand for online streaming of sports by media giants Amazon and Facebook, among other topics. Joining LaMay on the panel will be Mike Rowbottom of InsideTheGames, and Gerard Akindes, from the Josoor Institute.
“Through this symposium, we are bringing together media and technology leaders who will unpack the reality of the changes in the media and communication world and shed light on what we can expect to see in the near future.”
To address the challenges and opportunities for business owners in the socially-distant, digital age, Northwestern Qatar Professor Venus S. Jin will moderate a second panel with Heba Q. Almasri, director of the startup accelerator Qatar SportsTech; and Ramy Abdulzaher, co-founder and COO of Bonocle, Inc. The panel will provide a local perspective on how startups had to reinvent their business models to survive the restrictions imposed by the pandemic by turning towards e-solutions and finding innovative ways to meet the market’s needs.
For creative writers, the pandemic has been a different experience due to the flexibility of their profession. Authors Hala Alyan and Khaled Khalifa will join a panel moderated by Northwestern Qatar Professor Aaron LaDuke to discuss the opportunities and challenges writers face from a creative perspective and how they were affected from a business and publishing standpoint.
The conference, which will include two additional panels – moderated by Professor Marcela Pizzaro and Professor George Anghelcev – is the first symposium organized by the DAMA Lab –
a community of designers, journalists, researchers, students, and educators that work on experiments in storytelling and research.
The symposium will take place virtually on January 28, 2021, starting at 11:30 a.m. (GMT +3). Registration is open to the public and free of charge. For more information and to register: click here.
