Tech and Politics Meet at Innovations in Silicon Beach Event

With technological innovation accelerating at an astonishing pace, it can be hard to tell the opportunities apart from the dangers. Humanity is poised to make some big strides in the years ahead. But headlines about things like the Equifax hack and Elon Musk’s warnings of an AI apocalypse stir the public’s anxieties about tech.

Our lawmakers are often as troubled and confused by the tech world as the rest of the public — and just as curious about how innovation works, where it is headed, and how it can help us all. Yesterday, Dogtown Media had the opportunity to share a mobile app developer’s perspective on some of the biggest issues in tech with government officials at Innovations in Silicon Beach.

Facilitated by our colleagues at ACT | The App Association, a D.C.-based public policy group that lobbies for app developers’ best interests, this summit gave us a chance to share our informed views on tech with lawmakers who have the power to encourage innovation — or stifle it. Along with our friends at Cross Campus and Tastemade, we hosted 27 political leaders from across 7 congressional districts, as well as representatives from 5 federal committees.

Among the topics discussed were AI and the future of humanity, cybersecurity breaches like the Equifax hack, and the ways in which design and behavioral psychology influences the way we consume technology. The government officials were enthusiastic, receptive, and full of questions. We’d like to think they walked away with a better understanding of where tech is heading — and how we can get there together.

“The technological innovation we’re witnessing is poised to send shockwaves through every facet of society,” says Dogtown co-founder and CEO Marc Fischer. “Our nation’s political and business leaders have a limited timeline to come together and overcome the challenges ahead of us.” We hope summits like Innovations in Silicon Beach continue to unite the best and brightest of tech together with our political leaders.

Afterwards, the officials headed off to SpaceX for their next meeting (wouldn’t it be great to be a fly on the wall for that!). We’ll have more details on what was discussed in our meeting next week.