I had an opportunity recently to attend a conference/expo with my son that markedly demonstrated a change in the dynamics of exchanging information. However, this was not a traditional engineering and/or technology conference, but in retrospect it could have been. This conference was the Rooster Teeth Expo (RTX) in Austin, TX July 2016 with 60,000 in
attendance. Roster Teeth is on-line content developer for game discussions (podcasts), live action shorts, game play (Lets Play Live), animation (RWBY) and recently a full-length film (Laser Tag, full funded by Kickstarter). This event was well managed and had a slue of guardians (reference to the Holo 5 game as volunteers that provide assistance to the RTX participants). The enthusiasm and energy was off the chart. In addition, RTX provided an App as a personal guide to the conference proceedings and event activities.
The participants ranged from the Baby Boomer to Millennial and subsequent discussion provided striking differences and commonality to today’s current engineering conference. The “Bracket Studio: YouTube Gaming & Editing for Beginners” panel had a conversation with a young man from southern Texas who described himself as having a learning disability, but was clearly computer literate and quite versed with computer, animation, modeling, lighting, camera, etc. and engaged not just with games, but with the technology. At the “RT Animation: 3D Modeling” panel, I met a programmer for a brokerage firm in Chicago who had been attending the RTX for the last three years with his son and was intrigued by the Internet content development process. Finally, at the “RT Animation, RWBY Animation” I also sat by a middle school librarian from Missouri who used YouTube and Internet content to engage students in reading and developing their self-learning skills.
This RTX event demonstrates a change in regards to the exchange of ideas and information for the Generation X and Millennials versus a typical engineering (Baby Boomers) conference. For example, J. Lyell. Wilson presented an article called “The S.S. “Leviathan,” Damage, Repairs and Strength Analysis” at the general meeting of The Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers, held in New York, November 1930. I selected this article since it represents the earliest design basis principles for the Nuclear and Commercial Pressure Vessel and Components code criteria. In addition, the published article includes an open dialogue (Traditionalists) from the participants of the general meeting, much like a current blog(s). My own experience of these current conference, articles, journals, etc. is the lack of an open dialogue (Baby Boomers), only reviewed by a few society members, do not present the subsequent discussion(s) on the content and general considered as an expert technical findings.
An example of this change from a open to exclusive dialogue is how the nuclear plants’ original operating license was adopted by the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), established in 1947 (Traditionalists) that is based on an open dialogue versus the current Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) reorganized in 1974 is based on an exclusive dialogue or rule based. The establishment of AEC resulted in the first commercial nuclear reactor within 10 years and by 1980 the number new reactors peaked at 109. The current NRC’s exclusive dialogue or rule based as a method for information exchange on design criteria is the direct result of the USA’s inability to construct the new generation nuclear plant as being unaffordable. Bloomberg Business wrote, “Even as sympathetic an observer as John Rowe [former chair of the U.S.’s largest nuclear utility] warns that the new units at Vogtle will be uneconomical when — or if — they’re completed.” (Article: “The Nuclear Industry Prices Itself Out Of the Market For New Power Plants”)
Let’s consider these differences. An open dialogue is an inclusive method that engages everyone in the audience without concerns of being rejected. This also provides an exchange of concepts/ideals that would be rejected since it conflicts with a normal/standard premise. In this environment, all things are considered, probably based on the perspective view of each individual and subsequently resolved into what is practical. The example of this is J. Lyell Wilson’s paper that is still the current (eighty-six years, with some enhancements) method for determining the allowable number of cycles and/or component life cycles, prior to failure. The example of change from the AEC to NRC as method of communicating technical issues has failed from a process of the exclusive dialogue to a forced directive (NRC Orders) that has resulted in no real solutions and marks the failure of the process.
For me, attending the RTX was enlightening to see the enthusiasm, creativity and resurfacing of an open dialog. I consider that both Albert Einstein and J. Robert Oppenhenimer both understood that concepts and/or technology are simply a ring of ideas that are formulated into a practical solution at the time and achieves the next evolution of development.