[iDC] The Social Event Machine

[J Rabie]

Pesonally I attend few conferences, less than I would wish to, but my 
professional itinerary has had difficulty coinciding with that roadmap.

However, I did have an experience resulting from the "collision" 
between political and academic worlds which might be interesting to 
recount. In April 2002, I went up to Paris to a conference called Numer 
at the Pompidou Centre. The speakers came from France, Europe, North 
America. As an event it had a nice "cachet" and good feeling between 
speakers and audience. Topics turned between artistic, scientific, 
commercial themes.

The last day, a Sunday, was presidential election day in France. This 
was not part of discussions at Numer, it could have been on another 
planet. At the end of the day, we discovered that the Socialists had 
been defeated, and that the second round would be between a right wing 
and a fascist candidate.

For me, the result of this "collision" has been far-reaching, it 
inflected the course of my life.

You can read about this here:

http://www.joetopia.org/militantisme/e/enfants-dimmigres.htm

Joe.