Q.& A. | Bruno Giussani

The message for business people contemplating their place in cyberspace is simple and direct: get linked or get lost.

Vic Sussman and Kenan Pollack

Bruno Giussani isn't from the online gaming industry, but he knows a thing or two about the Internet.

Mr. Giussani, a recognized technology expert, is delivering the keynote address at this year's European i-Gaming Congress and Expo. Well-versed in the ways of the Internet, he is a leading journalist, author, blogger and speaker on the ever-growing and constantly changing landscape of the Internet.

Mr. Giussani will kick off the conference on Sept. 22 at 1:15 p.m., Central European Time, with a macro-level look at the impact of emerging trends on the World Wide Web and which innovations may affect companies' futures.

IGamingNews spoke with Mr. Giussani via e-mail (naturally) about his presentation and what online gambling companies might glean from a broad-brush take on the subject.

Q: Can you tell me a bit about the focus of your address and how it will benefit a gaming audience?

A: I won't be addressing directly the gaming industry; I will talk more about the current online context and developments.

There is a significant transformation of our business and social model underway. It is likely to touch every sector, although at this stage it is deploying its effects mostly in communications, entertainment, media and software -- and the industries that heavily depend on these. Its basic tenet is: the "customers", the "public", the "audience" -- the people we used to call "users" -- are becoming more actively involved, witnessing, sharing, creating, engaging in conversations with each other and with companies and other organizations, coordinating resources and skills.

Examples are numerous.

The phenomenon is best epitomized by the blogs, the free-form online journals that have started to rewrite the rules of media, PR, branding, marketing and public discourse; by the rise of "user-generated content" (information, entertainment, etc); and by the numerous experiments in co-creation and co-design. This shift is fuelled by a media environment that's truly new: in the last dozen years we have gone from scarcity to abundance of media, media formats, media channels, media platforms. Bandwidth is abundant and cheap, tools are abundant and cheap (and often free) and are today in the hands of many. That's what I plan to talk about.

Q: Clearly, today's Internet is heavily user-driven and will only continue to grow in that manner, right?

A: It's actually a mix. The infrastructure is still heavily driven by corporate innovation (think of the iPhone and the space it opened up for building in-the-pocket applications to an extent that was not possible before), but in terms of what people do with it, well, now it's really up to them. Part of it is the fact of having one billion Internet users (i.e. a very high number of Internet-literate people), part of it the fact that the many tools that used to be in the hands of the few are now in the hands of many.

Q: What do you think a gaming audience will take from that idea and how can they apply it?

A: I don't really have specific answers, but I'm expecting some gaming company to create soon ways for users to suggest or design their own games, for example.

Q: On the other side of the coin: Is there anything that you are interested in learning about at EiG?

A: Lots.

Online gaming is an expanding field and I suspect there is a lot of innovation going on that I don't know about. So I'm looking forward to that.

Click here for more information on Mr. Giussani and here for more information on EiG.