It’s almost time to move into the MCA and camp out for all of Vivid Ideas… well, that’s where I’ll be from May 25 – June 8, and there’s lots of reasons to join me.

Ok, so I love the whole program, but I’ll limit myself to 10 highlights here. If you want to see more, here’s a one-page program overview to download and print.

DaBaoGe (screening)
Discover the stars of China’s emerging indie music scene at this exclusive screening. DaBaoGe is a bilingual music project producing documentary-style music videos in unusual locations throughout China as a means to creating a living archive of this new wave of youth culture. Free on registration here.
Monday June 4, 9pm – 10pm

Shane Smith (VICE, NYC – interview/screening)
I’ll be interviewing the co-founder and CEO of VICE Media about creating (and funding) high-quality, original content; online, in print and through innovative projects. Shane also shares his experiences creating the unforgettable Vice Guide To Travel series. Tickets $15, book here.
Tuesday June 5, 9pm – 10pm

Engaging Asia (panel)
There are 322 million people aged between 16 and 30 in China. Asia-savvy experts from the worlds of advertising, not-for-profits, visual arts, performance and digital media discuss strategies for taking projects and products to China, and bust the myths that may be holding Australian creatives back.

Speakers include Andy Miller (DaBaoGe, Greenpeace Asia), Kerry Comerford (Really Useful Company), Andrea Myles (Australia China Youth Foundation) and Yang Lei (Curator and Exhibitions Director, China Millennium Monument Museum of Digital Arts). Moderated by Christian Edwards (Senior Correspondent, Xinhua). Tickets $25, book here.
Monday June 4, 7.30-9.00pm

Cory Doctorow (boingbong.net, London – keynote/conversation)
I’m very excited about this one. Cory is a big thinker, an author and creative commons crusader, who has so much to say about creators’ rights in a connected world – and why sharing and copying matters to makers. Cory will also join anthropologist and Intel fellow Genevieve Bell, for a conversation exploring the future of culture, behaviour and technology. Tickets $25, book here.
Friday June 1, 6.30-8.00pm

Youtube Superstar (panel)
As part of the exciting 25 years of rage exhibition at Carriageworks, MusicNSW are presenting some of Australia’s most exciting music video directors SPOD and KROZM, along with rage programmer Madeline Palmer, to talk about the art of crafting unforgettable music videos. Free on registration here.
Thursday June 7, 6pm – 8pm – Carriageworks

Jake Nickell (Threadless, Chicago – keynote/panel)
Jake Nickell is a hero to all self-starters. He takes us through his philosophy – Make Something Everyday – and joins three of Sydney’s most successful, motivated creative business-owners – Jeremy Somers (We Are Handsome), Dana Tomic Hughes (yellowtrace) and Jai Al-Attas (ZAPPP) – to share advice on bringing focus to your passion projects and taking action on new ideas. Tickets $25, book here.
Thursday June 7, 7-8.30pm

Awesome Soup (fundraiser/live pitching session)
We’re working with the Awesome Foundation to fund Sydney’s next big idea: vote for the most awesome idea pitched on the night – or pitch your own to compete for $5000 in cash! Tickets $30 (includes soup!), book here.
Saturday June 2, 7.30-9.30pm

Creativity For Good (networking, presentations)
A networking session brings together creative thinkers, social entrepreneurs and community builders, to increase the impact of the creative sector in society. Register your interest for an invitation. 
Wednesday May 30, 5-7pm 

Driving Australian Design: What a national design policy could do for designers (networking, presentations)
is a cross-disciplinary conversation and networking event for designers to consider the impact of design policy on industry, government and society. Register your interest for an invitation.
Wednesday June 6, 5-7pm 

Henry Holland & Jessica Fletcher (House of Holland, London – interview/conversation)
I’m really looking forward to sitting down with Henry and Jessica to talk about their creative (and business) journey, from pop culture mags to London Fashion Week, and and how to use celebrity, media, film and collaborations in building a fashion brand. Tickets $25, book here.
Wednesday June 6, 7-8pm 

I’m excited, can you tell?

We launched our Vivid Ideas program yesterday, in Sydney and Melbourne, and I’m VERY excited to be able to let the cat out of the bag and reveal some of our brilliant headline guests. There’s lots more to come over the next couple of weeks, stay tuned! Check out the website and follow us @vivid_ideas. 

Here’s some bits of my speech, which explains what we’re on about and what’s in store.

For 18 days at Vivid Sydney, global leaders and creative practitioners come together to shape our creative future, through the Vivid Ideas program.

We’ll be joined by international stars and CEOs from Etsy, Threadless and VICE, UK design star Henry Holland, author and futurist Cory Doctorow, and, from Melbourne, Young Australian of the Year Marita Cheng.

This year’s Vivid Ideas program will definitively position Australia as a creative powerhouse at the gateway to the Asia Pacific.

We’re building on three years of industry events and the public facing Vivid Creative Sydney program, to provide an expanded forum for the creative industries to exchange ideas.

This is our most exciting Ideas program yet. We’re covering industries from gaming, to fashion and film, design and publishing, architecture, photography, and more.

The industries that will dominate our future are being invented today. The creative economy will be driven by ideas and imagination.

Our focus is on applied innovation – we ask – how do creative thinkers take those light-bulb moments, and convert them into products, services and experiences that can be shared?

Vivid Ideas invites practitioners from around the world to join us in Sydney, to network, collaborate and do business, at events from the MCA to the State Library to Carriageworks.

This year, the heart of the Vivid Ideas program is the Vivid Ideas Exchange, a venue we’re creating on the new sixth floor of the Museum of Contemporary Art.

The Vivid Ideas Exchange will host over 100 events across 18 action-packed days and nights; including:

• An industry curated program
• A signature program of cross-disciplinary events open to the public,
• And a dedicated visual arts professional development stream, co-presented with the MCA.

These events at the Ideas Exchange will;

• connect Australia’s creative industries with world leaders, in a series of keynote talks and panels in the Forum

• facilitate one-on-one networking in the Lounge

• deliver a series of targeted industry conferences including FailCon (a conference about the power of failure) and Web Directions: State of Play (a symposium on the future of browser-based gaming)

• We’ll also give creative talent access to hands-on master classes and workshops – including the hugely successful Portfolio Masterclasses, presented by The Loop.

The Vivid Ideas Exchange is the place to launch new initiatives, present showcases of innovative work, and meet your heroes and peers during Vivid Sydney.

Here are just some of the highlights of our program:

Jake Nickell is the founder of Threadless.

• The poster child for crowdsourcing and the age of the prosumer, Jake launched a t-shirt design competition 12 years ago, with $1000 in savings.
• Today his company, Threadless, boasts a community of 1.8 million designers and design-lovers who post, vote on, and buy unique t-shirt designs every day.
• Jake travels to the Vivid Ideas Exchange from Chicago, to deliver the Threadless story and to explain how to manage your own self-initiated projects towards success.
• Jake’s philosophy is Making Something Everyday – we can’t wait to hear his ideas on how to turn passion projects into businesses.

Threadless / Make Great Together from Threadless.com on Vimeo.

Cory Doctorow is the founder of boingboing.net

• Cory is a sci-fi author and hero of the open source and creative commons movements
• He’s also the founder of Boing Boing – ranked by Technorati.com as the most popular tech blog in the world.
• Cory is travelling to Vivid Sydney from London to deliver a keynote on the next frontier for creators and consumers – asking us to question who we give our rights to, and how creators can best take advantage of a connected world.

Henry Holland is a fashion designer and the founder of the House of Holland.

• One of the UK hottest new talents. Henry Holland has charted an unconventional path from pop culture magazines to London Fashion Week.
• Henry and House of Holland general manager Jessica Fletcher will join us at the Vivid Ideas Exchange to discuss building a brand and an international presence in the worlds of design and fashion.

Chad Dickerson is the CEO of Etsy.

• ETSY has built a vibrant marketplace of over 14 million members in 150 countries.
• Some of you might recall that we hosted Matt Stinchcomb, Etsy Marketing Director, at Vivid Creative Sydney last year. Etsy loved the experience so much that they’ve decided to hold their very first Southern Hemipshere event at Vivid Sydney.
• The ETSY Success microbusiness conference is a full-day event on Saturday June 2, and a must for any niche creator.
• As part of our public program, Chad will share the ideals behind Etsy’s mission – empowering small-scale producers to change how – and what – we buy and sell.
• Chad will also join a panel of local entrepreneurs to discuss how business is being re-aligned to match the social and cultural values of a new generation of creators.

Marita Cheng is the 2012 Young Australian of the Year.

• Marita is the founder of Robogals Global, a network designed to get more women involved in engineering and technology.
• Robogals has worked with over 3,000 young women across 82 schools in Australia, and now has chapters at 20 universities in Australia, the UK, and the USA.
• Marita will deliver a keynote at our Bridging the Digital Divide session, and will participate in a panel discussion about building the skills we need to thrive in the creative economy.

Shane Smith is the Founder and CEO of VICE 

• VICE is one of the most innovative media brands of the past decade
• They produce magazines, books, films and web TV, they have a record label and also run the incredible Creators’ Project, which has incubated great projects like Karen O’s Stop The Virgens, which Ignatius mentioned earlier.
• VICE now has publications on every continent, and broadcasts their unique take on pop culture, art and politics to a global youth audience.
• Shane will take us through the next evolution of the VICE story – which places a huge emphasis on creating original, high-quality online content.
• He’ll also share his experiences creating the unforgettable Vice Guide To… documentary series, which has taken him from film studios in North Korea to underground art performances in Russia.

That’s just a taste of the program – we have so much more to announce over the next few weeks.

We’ve got panel discussions on engaging with markets in Asia, explorations of immersive media, and discussions about the mega-trends changing the way we create, collaborate and communicate. There will be showcases of outstanding games from Australian developers, music videos, and more.

We’re launching a Think Tank on the creative industries, an opportunity for creatives to collaborate on and influence policy and industry development.

There are still opportunities for us to incorporate more creative talent from across Australia: please do come have a chat afterwards or get in touch if you have a story to share.

Alongside our Vivid Ideas Exchange program, a series of external industry conferences and business events will be held around Sydney.

Highlights include:

• Song Summit, bringing together international songwriters and the Australian music industry across three days, culminating in the APRA Awards on May 28

• SPARC Design, giving Australia’s lighting industry a forum to discuss the latest in lighting design and technology

• Mumbrella 360, uniting the marketing and advertising industries at a two-day summit on media

• X Media Lab, a cross-platform, digital media event, designed to help people get their ideas to market.

• And our Vivid Sydney partnership with the Sydney Film Festival, which will amplify both events and extend our programs to new audiences.

We’re also VERY excited to announce a huge exhibition to be held at Carriageworks celebrating 25 years of rage on ABC TV.

rage is the longest running music television program in the world.  Since that first broadcast in 1987, rage has delivered all-night video mix tapes into our lounge rooms and our lives.

The exhibition will also will feature special events like our Youtube Superstar music video masterclass, featuring outstanding Australian directors including Kris Moyes and SPOD.

The Vivid Ideas program is as rich and diverse as the creative industries themselves, and we can’t wait to share it with you all in May/June.

I’ve been working on this book, with publisher and futurist Ross Dawson, for the last six months, and I’m really excited about being able to release it to the world… soon. An intense (and short!) development period for the 2012 Vivid Ideas program has consumed my life for the past six weeks, but I’ll be getting stuck into the book again VERY soon.

Please do drop me a line if you have ideas or projects you’d like to share. The book is a practical, colourful guide to developing strategies for governments, creative industries organisations and business, to help stimulate an inclusive, sustainable, creative economy. With a little luck, Strategies for Creative Economies will be released in May 2012.

I’m participating in a panel discussion for SAMAG (Sydney Arts Management Advisory Group) alongside the directors of Sydney Film Festival and Underbelly.

Meet the Festivals March 2012
Monday 26 March, 2012, 6.00-8.00pm
Australia Council for the Arts: 372 Elizabeth Street, Surry Hills

On 26 March SAMAG will host Meet the Festivals, a seminar bringing together new and current Festival Artistic Directors, Nashen Moodley (Sydney Film Festival), Jess Scully (Vivid Ideas) and Imogen Semmler (Underbelly Arts Festival), moderated by Patrick McIntyre, Sydney Theatre Company GM and former Sydney Film Festival CEO.

The gathering of diverse artistic directors will discuss approaches to festival curation and management, views about the feel and character of Sydney and our local festival audiences, and key national and global festival themes and trends across art forms. Glimpse into the professional minds of festival directors, their priorities, concerns and visions, as they work towards large-scale and dynamic community events.

Registration: info@samag.org or (02) 8250 5722. FREE to 2012 SAMAG members – $10 for non-members / $5 for students. Pay at the door – cash or cheque only.

I had a fantastic time on Monday hosting this discussion – my favourite part were the answers to the final question – how can Sydney become a better place for street art?

The artists (and even some of the audience) had great ideas to contribute. The point was made that $100 million dollars is spent every year cleaning off graffiti – imagine what could be done to cultivate a different kind of street art culture, if just a fraction of that was spent on legal walls and spaces to develop talent?

Thanks again to amBUSH, SHFA and the artists.

Project 5 is a brilliant initiative from the geniuses at amBUSH. This is the fourth year for this heavyweight street art love-in for ICE – Information and Cultural Exchange – one of Sydney’s most important creative and social organisations. I’m hosting the artist talks on Monday March 12, at 47 George Street, The Rocks.

Big thanks to Bill & John for inviting me to participate, and Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority for supporting such fantastic projects.

From the program:

New to the Project Five events is the Artist Talks. Hosted by Jess Scully, founding creative director of Creative Sydney, the artist talks is an opportunity to get up close and personal with the Project Five Volume Four artists VEXTA, LUKE CORNISH, JAMES REKA and REGAN TAMANUI. The discussion will also explore subjects such as the state of street art in Australia right now, the artists own body of work and personal experiences working in Australia and overseas and will present the new artworks created at the Live Art Events to be auctioned at the Auction Event for Charity on Thursday 22 March.

You gotta check it out.

I’ll be speaking at Hassell Studio for International Women’s Day, Thurs March 8, on the topic of women building communities. I’d appreciate any tips or ideas on this: I’ve been so focused on finishing the program for the Vivid Ideas Exchange, I haven’t had a chance to get stuck into it yet. A few ideas floating around though; either around the idea of local tech networks (there’s loads of great local female-friendly ones in Sydney at the moment) or on another topic, exploring women and social capital. I’ll probably end up with something in-between.

It’s free and you can RSVP to lcunneen@hassellstudio.com.

Hassell actually do amazing work – check out this video explaining their “learning-led design” for the University of Adelaide Learning Hub – beautiful stuff.

Here’s what I would be doing this week (if I had time to have more fun right now). Thanks to Sarah Thomas for the story.

I’m working on Vivid Sydney for the fourth time, and this year, in a new and really exciting role. I’m the Festival Director of Vivid Ideas (which I’ll be able to talk about in more detail soon), an action-packed 18 day industry & public program dedicated to creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship.

We’ve just opened a call for expressions of interest – if you have an event you’d like to share with our audience or an idea for discussion, check out the EOI form on the Vivid Sydney website or get in touch by February 28. It’s a short call-out period, get in touch if you have a kernel of an idea and we can talk it through.

Check out the podcast here.