TBD Conference : 'Materia' - Wrap Report

TBD’s fifth out was titled ‘Materia’ and went out live globally Feb 23, 2023. Entirely virtual thanks to Groovy Gecko (and inflation!), ‘Materia’ focused on ‘what matters…?’ and was inspired by ‘Citizens: Why the Key to Fixing Everything is All of Us‘ by Jonathan Alexander and Ariane Conrad.

Most ‘Materia’ talks were solo or firesides which is a core difference when doing TBD physical events to virtual TBD, panels are just harder to connect with although Sedition provided attendees with ‘Digital rest stops’ from emerging artists including 'Joëlle, Sougwen Chung, Universal Everything and Liao Yibai. along the way to help them encode the sections to memory. Topics for ‘Materia’ ranged from

WHAT PEOPLE LIKED

Variety. Almost every respondent mentioned the variety the speakers offered and the topics they were focused on. Oh, and the merch, the limited-edition TBD MOO Notebooks with SproutWorld pencil have flown off the shelves.

IMPROVEMENTS
Interactivity. Tech let us down for the lunchtime networking, but the WhatsApp group picked up the slack.

The limited-edition item created for ‘Materia’ is the ‘TBD Deskpad’ in association with Envopap. Buy your pad over at the TBD Merch Store in Q2.

Overall, the satisfaction score for ‘Materia’ was 9.1/10. The platform experience remained high too - 9.2/10. We had an international audience with over 84 countries joining throughout the day. 53% of attendees were first-timer TBDers . Thanks to everyone who joined on the day, bought tickets, and the speakers and partners.

Check out all the talks on Newcon, TBD’s on-demand platform.

TBD ‘Materia’ speaker cohort included:

  • Tom Standage (Deputy Editor, The Economist)

  • Jenny Haggard (Creative Lead (NA), Spotify)

  • Will Scougal (Global Director, Creative Strategy, Snap)

  • Deann Evans (Director of EMEA Expansion, Shopify)

  • Pip Dunjay (Head of Strategy, TikTok)

  • Ruth Wassermann (VP of Design, MOO)

  • Julia Hobsbawm OBE (Author/Speaker, ‘The Nowhere Office’)

  • Hannes Schoenegger (CEO, QWSTION)

  • Bruce Daisley (Author, ‘Fortitude’)

  • Ian Forrester (Founder/CEO, Daivid)

  • Emilie Colker (Partner, IDEO)

  • Alex Rühl (Head of Metaverse, PWC)

  • Tammy Einav (CEO, Adam and Eve DDB)

  • Francesca Specter (Author/Host, ‘Alonement’)

  • Miss Yankey (Founder, Poetry Prescribed)

  • Tess Kermode (Head of International Expansion, Olio)

  • Dr. David Erritzoe (Clinical Director / Psychedelic Research, Imperial College London)

  • Matthew Cockerill (Designer, Matthew Cockerill)

  • Siân Sutherland (Chief Changemaker, A Plastic Planet)

  • Matt Klein (Foresight Lead, Reddit)

  • Lauren Ingram (Founder, Women of Web3)

  • Gareth Tennant(Ex-Marine, CEO of Decision Advantage )

  • Ella Whelan (Journalist/Author, ‘Letters for Liberty)

  • Tessa Clarke (Investigative Journalist)

  • James Ball (Investigative Journalist)

  • Mike Reed (CEO, Reed Words)

First-time attendees described TBD ‘Materia’ as:

  • Insightful A 1-day conference that offers a series of provocations.

  • A think tank for modern times.

  • A truly eclectic conference.

  • Inspired, free-thinking and

  • Different, fresh, interesting, contemporarya kaleidoscope of fascinating speakers. , each changing you to look at your world through a new lens.

  • A broad cross section of future-insights which will inspire you to make change.

  • Steps you outside of your normal day.

  • Very different - something you need to experience.

  • Genuinely thought provoking. And fun!

  • A packed day of action-oriented talks.

  • A refreshing experience that takes a view of what's to come and how to plan for it better.

  • Some conferences feel like abuse…What I love about TBD is it’s not patronising at all, it assumes the viewer has intelligence. [OUR FAVOURITE]

Paul Armstrong