SXSW Interactive Adds Featured Speakers

Having trouble keeping up with the unrelenting addition of speakers and bands and films to the SXSW lineup? Well, things aren’t getting any easier as the Interactive portion of the Fest dropped a few more names this morning.

Clockwise from top left: Odell Beckham Jr., Dr. Hiroshi Ishiguro, Biz Stone, Dr. Regina Dugan, Maria Konnikova

Perhaps of most interest to Austinites is the SXsports premiere of Richard Linklater’s Everybody Wants Some with the director, star (Tyler Hoechlin), and Linklater’s college baseball teammate Rick Keeler all in attendance.

Other SXsports participants announced include Madden cover boy, king of the one-handed catch, and sometime collector of personal fouls, Odell Beckham Jr. of the New York Giants. Beckham will join CEO of Uninterrupted Maverick Carter on the Direct From the Source: Athletes Unfiltered panel. Uninterrupted is a content platform that gives athletes direct access to fans and allows them to express themselves without a middle man. Founded by LeBron James, the site was launched in December of 2015. Chief content officer of Bleacher Report, Rory Brown, will also sit on that panel.

Other Interactive additions include:

Director of the Harvard Kennedy School's Women and Public Policy Porgram, Iris Bohnet, will discuss ways to achieve gender equality and redesign the workplace.

Rodney Brooks looks into the future of artificial intelligence. He’s the founder of Rethink Robotics, so we assume, if anyone, he can fight Skynet.

Dr. Regina Dugan comes from the forward thinking folks at Google as its vice president of engineering, advanced technology and projects. She’ll talk innovation through passion.

Sometimes a person’s job description is hard to parse. John Hagel’s gig is such a job. The SXSW press release says “Hagel helps executives to anticipate big shifts and to turn mounting performance pressure into opportunities for value creation.” So, there you go.

Wondering if androids and humans can co-exist? Award-winning roboticist Dr. Hiroshi Ishiguro will address that very issue. Fingers crossed for coexistence.

The New Yorker writer Maria Konnikova looks into the power of the written word for good and evil.

PayPal co-founder Max Levchin offers his insight into revolutionizing consumer finance.

The co-founder of Twitter and Medium, Biz Stone, will tackle the evolution of teaching the Web and the benefit of combining humanity and technology.

Chris Urmson of Google’s self-driving car project will attempt to assuage our collective fear of automobiles gone wild.

Best-selling author Gary Vaynerchuck gives “uncensored answers” to audience questions.

Strap in, folks, SXSW is only two months away.