Paper Airplanes and TechEX23

By Kevin Morooney - Vice President of Trust and Identity and NET+, Internet2

I love music. Everything about it. Listening to it, making it (I’m infinitely better at listening than making – infinitely), listening and making it together, watching people listen to music, watching people create music. I recently listened to an interview with one of the greatest storytellers of all time, Ken Burns.  When he got to talking about the importance of music in storytelling he said, “Music is god.”

The musical artist I’ve seen perform live the most is Ben Folds. You may or may not like his music, regardless, I think you’d find his creativity in performance to be interesting.  He experiments with different methods of making the audience an integral part of the night. One technique he uses is having audience members write song titles on pieces of paper that they then fold into their best paper airplane and try to throw it on stage. The stage ends up being littered with dozens and dozens of paper airplanes. Throughout the concert, he walks around the stage and randomly picks up an airplane, unfolds it, sits at the piano, and plays the song. Audience members are drawn onto the stage with each step of this process. You’re made to feel like you are part of the creation — because you are.

Our approach to the 2023 Internet2 Technology Exchange is similar. You and your peers create the playlist. TechEX and CAMP need your paper airplanes; you are needed to help make the music. At TechEx, you suggest songs, pick the songs, and even play the music itself. And it all begins with the submission of your proposals.

We are actively seeking you — practitioners, current and future identity experts, enterprise IT architects, project managers, developers, and infrastructure providers —to deliver thought-provoking and engaging presentations in the TechEx Identity & Access Management (IAM) Track, better known as CAMP Week.

CAMP Week attracts higher education IAM experts from around the world along with those with deep knowledge of related architecture and operational principles. Submit a proposal yourself or collaborate with peers to deliver presentations, demonstrations, stories, and/or panel discussions. An accepted session typically propels further fast-paced, in-depth discussions at the Unconference later in the week.

General topic areas include (but are not limited to):

• Best and Emerging Practices – What’s Working Right Now such as identity governance, considerations for using vendor IAM solutions, DevOps and automation, managing access to the cloud, evolving IAM infrastructures, and sharing services across regions and states to cut costs.
• The Future – New tools and innovations such as passwordless authentication technologies, emerging implementations of digital wallets and integrated mobile-device support, trust frameworks of the future, adaptive authentication, and adopting a Zero Trust model.
• International Developments – How can we better enable international collaboration? What’s going on in other countries that we use and can help to extend?

The Call for Proposals/Paper Airplanes is open until April 7. Please consider submitting a proposal for a talk, tutorial, or working meeting.