Highlights from Day 1 of Web Summit 2022

What an amazing first day of Web Summit 2022! Here are some of the most interesting talks from across the day, covering AI, gen Z news, and sportswashing.

Web Summit 2022 features talks spanning 26 content tracks and 17 stages, meaning every topic relevant to the tech world today is bound to be touched on.

Alexa’s next AI trick? “Anticipating your needs and automating a response”

Alexa is perhaps the most well-known example of AI technology in the world today. The virtual assistant’s soft voice is familiar to many, but Amazon’s Rohit Prasad thinks it can do so much more: “Alexa is not just an AI assistant – it’s a trusted advisor and a companion.”

The Amazon senior VP and head scientist for Alexa noted that, during the recent years of the Covid-19 pandemic, more people turned to Alexa than ever before: “We had total interactions with Alexa grow by 30 percent in 12 months.”

Rohit now believes the technology is ready to take the next step in its evolution.

With coming iterations of Alexa, Rohit said, the digital assistant will become better able to recognise behaviour patterns and offer guidance supporting those actions.

Alexa will also be trained to understand what situations are good for its user in context. Rohit gave the example of Alexa being able to check if your thermostat is too high and suggest that you turn down the heat to save money, especially if you have the temperature set to the same level all the time.

Is sportswashing about more than human rights violations?

The controversial issue of sportswashing was tackled on SportsTrade by the Athletic UK investigations writer Joey D’Urso and chief football writer for The Independent, Miguel Delaney, who talked chiefly about Saudi Arabia’s purchase of British football club Newcastle United and Qatar’s winning bid for World Cup 2022.

Miguel wasted no time offering a definition of sportswashing: “People think it’s about simple public relations. ‘Saudi Arabia buys Newcastle because they want good press.’ It’s much more sophisticated than that.”

“Having spoken to many human rights bodies, it’s about [Saudi Arabia] trying to integrate themselves into the structure of the west in a post-oil world. It’s about making them good guys to do business with,” explained the sports correspondent.

Addressing World Cup 2022, which takes place in Qatar in late November, Miguel went on to say “it’s not as powerful as owning a football club, which is a much more insidious and successful way to sportswash”.

“If you write about this in purely sporting terms, are you complicit in sportswashing? If you write about it in a benign way?” Rob asked.

Joey, however, noted that negative headlines around the world had a somewhat positive impact on human rights in Qatar: “It has led to change. Labour laws in Qatar have changed as a result.”

Closing thoughts on sportswashing were clear: “These states should not be allowed to own football clubs,” said Miguel. “In the very near future, the Premier League is going to be fought out between two Middle Eastern-owned clubs.”

How can news organisations reach gen Z audiences?

Finding and catering to gen Z audiences was a hot topic on this year’s Fourth Estate stage, with Vice global head of news, programming and development Subrata De, the Shade Room political reporter Judith Nwandu and journalist Ann Curry giving their two cents.

Subrata explained Vice’s decision to create a presence on streaming platform Twitch, and explored why it’s a legitimate choice for a news organisation to be on sites such as OnlyFans.

“I don’t believe that there is one set of people who want news, or that people age into news. I think it’s up to us to find out where people are,” said Subrata.

There is still scepticism about social media platforms – such as TikTok, which is largely composed of a gen Z user base – being viewed as news sources, said Ann.

However, Ann also defended younger news consumers: “A lot of my friends were barely getting their news out of Rolling Stone magazine. Gen Z is probably better – despite the hand wringing – than my generation was.”

Gen Z, said Ann, is “getting its news from each other. They feel they can trust each other. They don’t trust my generation and they don’t trust mainstream media”.

Ann ended her point on a cautious note about over-reliance on the popular social media platform: “TikTok does have influence from the Chinese communist party, let’s be honest about that. There’s a worry that data collected from the user can be weaponised against them in the future.”

(From left) Vice global head of news, programming and development Subrata De, the Shade Room political reporter Judith Nwandu, journalist Ann Curry and Axios media reporter Sara Fischer on Fourth Estate stage during Day 1 of Web Summit 2022. Image: Eóin Noonan/Web Summit (CC BY 2.0)

What does the metaverse have to do with Meta?

It’s safe to say that Herman Narula knows the metaverse. The co-founder and CEO of VR and video game development company Improbable has literally written a book on it.

And Herman had a few things to say about Facebook’s foray into the space…

“To say Facebook is building the metaverse really confuses the notion of what the metaverse is,” explained Herman. “For one, they’re building a completely closed platform that has none of the economics and opportunities of the metaverse, and which is essentially just a video game.”

“For me, the metaverse is about a network of connected realities with a free-flowing value exchange between them. Facebook’s strategy precludes that from happening.

“The other issue is that they’re focusing on experiences that are not that compelling to audiences,” Herman explained.

“There are so many amazing things you can do in virtual worlds,” said Herman. “Why would you want to be in a Zoom meeting in a virtual world with all the things you could do, like fight a dragon, be part of an army, or have an amazing adventure?”

Herman finished by saying that he thought Meta’s VR hardware is “incredibly expensive, wholly unrelated to what customers want, and not yet compelling enough for use”.

Second Life founder Philip Rosedale agreed wholeheartedly: “Facebook has chosen right now to go after experiences that are almost always coupled to the VR headset. So something like having a meeting, you’re putting the VR headset on. And there are just basic science problems that I’ve banged my head against for more than 20 years now that are tied into having a good meeting with a VR headset on, that I think cannot be solved even by US$10 billion a year in investment.”

Philip thinks a metaverse mediated only by VR headsets is not just unappealing from a comfort point of view, but a safety one too: “Your willingness to wear a VR helmet on your face is proportional to your level of comfort being blindfolded in a room with strangers.”

VC’s insanity state

There was some soul-searching on the Venture stage on Day 1, as VCs and investors provided a post-mortem on the seemingly dead boom years of the tech industry.

“I think most VCs in the world have been guilty of a little bit of unsoberness in the last couple of years,” said Sabina Wizander, partner at Creandum. “I left the market in 2016. And then I came back to peak markets at the beginning of 2021, and I was in shock about what I came back to. Rounds were €20 million deals that were done in 48 hours. You barely had time to look under the hood.”

“We were a bit fucked for a period. We were in this insanity state where we’re just shooting money out,” said Andreas Munk Holm, founder at the European VC.

However, the VCs were in agreement that a new period of sobriety has taken hold, with a return to strong business fundamentals and unit economics.

There’s still lots more to come at Web Summit 2022. Catch further highlights by following #WebSummit across Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn.

Main image of Amazon’s senior VP and head scientist for Alexa, Rohit Prasad, on Centre Stage: Ben McShane/Web Summit (CC BY 2.0)