What's On

Upcoming

Workshop: Building Our Manifesto For The Future

Following the recent restructure of Digital Union, we’re calling on your input and action to decide on priorities going forward. To do this, Digital Union is committed to producing a new Manifesto that outlines the areas where we should focus our attention and make sure we get things done for the sector and for you, our members. But we need you to get involved. We believe that the success of the whole strategy following the manifesto is one that is crafted and led by you, the members. As such, the task groups that will deliver on the commitments made will be chaired by members, made up of members and agreed actions will be implemented with the support of the Digital Union Team. The result of this will be a fully formed Manifesto that we will all deliver on to help grow the sector. To kick start this process, your Union needs you and we will be facilitating an all-inclusive workshop that will look at discussing and putting in place the best ways to achieve tangible results in the following areas: ### Developing our workforce How do we work with our education partners to produce industry-ready talent? How do we ensure that courses and curriculum are fit for purpose? What schemes can we help design and implement that ensure regional talent is fed directly into regional businesses? ### Supporting the growth of the sector and community How can we support each other better and learn from each other's experiences and past mistakes? What does appropriate sector-specific business support look like and what do we need to ensure barriers to growth are removed? How can we collaborate with partners to make sure the sector voice is as strong as possible? ### Raising the profile of the North East Sector and the businesses within it How to we continue to raise the media profile of the Digital sector both within the region and outside looking in? How do we ensure that other North East based sectors are looking to neighbouring businesses for their digital solutions? How do we ensure that those studying in the region realise that there are amazing career opportunities on their doorstep? ### Financing your business and the sector How do we make sure we know about all the funding and finance opportunities available to us? How can we influence the LEPs and Combined Authorities to invest in the sector and make increased funds available? How can we make sure there are adequate funds available to secure structured growth programmes for businesses? ### Developing the Union The bigger we are, the stronger and more influential we are. How can we grow the Union and how can we collectively make sure this growth happens? What are the tactics we need to adopt to widen the community? What are the key reasons business join and value Digital Union? __Don’t ask what the Union can do for you, ask what you can do for the Union.__
How to help disadvantaged young people access the workplace

Join us in helping disadvantaged young people and find out what they can do, instead of what they can't in an increasingly digital age. ### About this Event Do you feel passionate about the NE? Are you looking for well trained, inspired young people to work for your organisation? Have you ever been frustrated that sometimes school leavers seem unprepared for the world of work? Would you like to hear about ways in which you could inspire and up-skill some of the most disadvantaged young people in the NE to become work ready, motivated and creative employees and reap the benefits of the modern digital economy? We'd like to share easy, quick and effective ways in which you and your business could support those in the region who desperately need to gain meaningful employment in order to build positive lives for themselves. Foundation Futures is a community organisation in Byker who work with some of the most disadvantaged young people in the NE. They are looking for a wide range of businesses to get involved. You may have the ability to support them in big or small ways, from an hour of your time to a longer term investment, from donations of old equipment to hosting fundraising events. For every interaction they will provide a story of who and how your support has helped. They can provide SROI calculations and social impact statements to support your CSR policies. Most of all, you will help a young person find out what they can do, instead of what they can't. ### Agenda - Networking - Welcome from the Institute of Coding - The regional context - Eleanor Haisell, NELEP - The story of widening participation - Xander Brouwer, Institute of Coding - The work of Foundation Futures - Sue Davison, Foundation Futures - The impact - Mark Davison, Managing Director and Mark Name, Apprentice, James Ingleford Scaffolding - Opportunity for Question and answer
Regulating Unreality: From Fake News to Deep Fakes

"Deepfakes" - or the use of AI to convincingly simulate or synthesis content, voice, images or video for malicious purposes (Nesta, 2018) - has become prominent recently, perhaps most obviously as a means to create realistic but fake pornography involving celebrities or particular victims. As such, there has already been some discussion regarding whether these "unreal" products constitute criminal material such as revenge porn (better referred to as nonconsensual sharing of private or sexual images) or images of child sexual abuse ("child pornography") (Chesney and Citron, 2018). Its implications are, however, far greater. Techniques to generate deepfakes are evolving in response to a parallel arms war of detection techniques, and may eventually result in a world where the problems currently being experienced with "fake news" expand to everything we see, hear and experience, not just news we read. Obvious areas where this may impact on the law include the law of evidence: the law of intellectual property, primarily copyright: and fraudulent misrepresentation and anti-consumer scams: but these will only be the start of a deluge when our world of reality becomes inscrutably a constructed and manipulated text. Should the right to know what is real be a new human right? ### Free public lecture We welcome registrations from a diverse audience, including not only university researchers but also representatives from industry, local government, and third sector organisations. ### Programme 1330 - 1400 - Arrival and Registration 1400 - 1500 - Lecture 1500 - 1630 - Refreshments and Networking ### About the Speaker Professor Lilian Edwards is a leading academic at Newcastle Law School, and frequent speaker on issues of Internet law, intellectual property and artificial intelligence. She is on the Advisory Board of the Open Rights Group and the Foundation for Internet Privacy Research and is the Professor of Law, Innovation and Society at Newcastle Law School at Newcastle University.

March

April

May

June

July

August

Our logo is a live picture of Newcastle, right now.
Captured with almost 500 sensors.

Swipe to view data

Featured

Success for early-adopter workspace tenants

Taking Newcastle to the world at BioJapan 2019

#Biosphere #Business #Newcastle City Council

Inspiring Workforce Through Strategic Recruitment and Staff Development

#Business #Future #Jobs #North-East

Q&A: Iksuda Therapeutics: Advancing care for ovarian and lung cancer patients

#Biosphere #Business #Innovation

Transformational cell technology helping to improve lives across the world

#Biosphere #Business #Innovation #Newcastle #Newcastle University