Kushtrim Xhakli » Speaking & Travel

LIFT Conference 2009

Kushtrim Xhakli — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 12:37:37 +0000

Where has the future gone? This is what Lift09 explored during three sunny days on February 2009 in Geneva. Many things have changed in the past decades, even if we don’t ride flying cars nor have smart fridges ordering our carrots. Ask yourself this: are you sure you want your neighbor – the one who tends to make a long stop at the pub after work – to drive a vehicle with wings? We’re not sure either.

We all have different futures, and in William Gibson’s famous words, “future is not evenly distributed”. It is up to us to built it, and we certainly had with us some of the people who have a shot at influencing it with brilliant ideas. See the Lift09 talks and for more check the blogs, Flickr and Twitter.

During days of conference Sandbox (http://www.sandbox-network.com), a global network for extraordinary young talents together with LIFT Conference organised a dinner with the same topic bringing together extraordinary young achievers under age of 30 to network, exchange ideas and talk about some questions related to this years’ conference topic, “Where did the future go?”.

LIFT Conference is the highest reccomended conference in Europe, this year was amazing to see Vint Cerf, Google Evangelist talking about Interplanetary Internet (see video below)

Best Practice Award 2008

Kushtrim Xhakli — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 01:25:26 +0000

During ECDL Foundation CEO Summit in Vienna which was held during 23-25 October 2008, a special award was granted to trajnimi.com national portal, which has adopted ECDL as a standard for ICT education and as a means to increase employability in Kosovo.
Award was given from Jim Friars, Chairman of ECDL Foundation to Kushtrim Xhakli representative of the portal which was launched in 2007 and had a major success on advancing the IT skills based education in Kosovo.

Speaking at ECDL Foundation CEO Summit Vienna, 23-25 October 2008

Business Startup Center Kosova: E-Business Course Week 2 ideas

Kushtrim Xhakli — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 21:39:02 +0000

Week 2 of e-business course held from 19-23 May 2008 produced various discussions, tactics and ideas for doing e-business in Kosovo. Also during the second week, Kosovo students had the unique opportunity to hear two days guest lecture from Prof. Jonathan Briggs, E-Commerce professor in Kingston University, London. Mr. Briggs engaged the students with activities using the online tools which helps e-businesses: Google AdWords, Shopify and many advertising models in internet. Students were given a task to analyse The Market Quarter success story to help them coming with interesting ideas during the week.

Ideas generated by students:
Classified ads:
Advertisements placed by people and businesses to let people know about renting, selling property and available jobs.
Tentenet
Online store selling traditional custom items, clothing, and decorations.
Kosovarja Company
Online service which helps foreign tourists while they spend time in Kosova, monetization through membership clubs and affiliation with partners whom services will be promoted online.
Restore Hair
Online shopping selling shampoos with immediate effects in hair development
PC-Kos
Web magazine for IT providing news about IT market and selling pre-paid mobile scratch cards online.

Business Startup Center Kosova: E-Business Course Week 1 ideas

Kushtrim Xhakli — Mon, 19 May 2008 01:06:00 +0000

From the e-business course that I am lecturing, last week students came with four e-business ideas:

Growing People Kosova
Website which provides information on pregnancy, baby, birth, child care, kindergartens and includes the part where you can exchange ideas, discuss articles & reviews, ask questions, and contact directly to the doctor also having an opportunity to book him from online calendar.

Lojrat.net
Educational games in albanian language designed to teach kids about a certain subject, expand concepts, reinforce development, quizzes, traffic knowledge assisting them in learning a skill as they play.

I-study
Open directory for high schools graduates in Kosovo seeking to register in Universities, website providing consultancy, tests, stimulative exams and tour guides of existing Universities in Kosovo. The website will also be used as a communication channel between universities and students network.

Autoplus KS
Find auto parts online, order auto parts online, get them delivered, rent a car service, rent a limousine online and pay faster. Compare cars, compare prices, list autos all using one single website about auto enthusiasts.

I wish students good luck on developing these ideas.
This upcoming week I expect some new e-business ideas for Week 2 class.

CERN’s Large Hadron Collider

Kushtrim Xhakli — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 21:54:07 +0000

I had the unique opportunity this year to visit CERN’s Large Hadron Collider a day after LIFT Conference 2008, an experience which helped me to understand better CERN and its innovation. I was in a group together with Bruce Sterling, Ben Segal, Robert Scoble (who did the video below), Aral Balkan and others. Below is a video which helps you understand what is happening underneath CERN research and scientific labs. Thanks to Robert Scoble for recording and putting it live in FastCompany.tv.

LIFT08 pulse

Kushtrim Xhakli — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 17:46:36 +0000

Social, Presence, Conversation and Network

Kushtrim Xhakli — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 00:08:41 +0000

I’m going to LIFT Conference 2008 with set of tools to create, share and present. I will create network possibly by increasing my Linkedin connections, I will share conversation and a presence during LIFT08 with Twitter, and will get much social with Facebook (physical contacts only).

Here is the trend graph of recent months popularity of these social networks:

Meanwhile I will have a possibly to present my open stage proposition: How innovative projects can transform education and ICT opportunities. (Your vote and support is highly appreciated at this stage).

And the most important part is to meet with network of people i created last year, compliments to LIFT team for making the event this year much more valuable to be part of it.

LIFT Conference 2008

Kushtrim Xhakli — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 22:30:48 +0000

LIFT Conference is about to start soon, this time richer with program attached with preliminary network using social media softwares. As last year main discussion during the breaks was Twitter, this year it Facebook will dominate the field. The recent report provided by Glen O’Neil on Network Mapping shows the increase of network among participants, this time I expect an increase of 30% of contacts in Facebook, Linkedin and Twitter.

LIFT07 – A conference about technology in our society

Kushtrim Xhakli — Mon, 12 Feb 2007 21:45:27 +0000

I came back from LIFT Conference 2007, Geneva 7-9 February 2007. I had an opportunity to meet new people, new idea, new challenges and new technologies. Wasn’t it what is LIFT about? Yes.

I will post some more lift notes in following days, also i have to copy paste stories from Berlin and Copenhagen this year.

Ipko Institute, a success story, and its role in education management

Kushtrim Xhakli — Sat, 08 Jul 2006 14:34:02 +0000

Some weeks ago Olof Palme International Center in cooperation with IPKO Institute organized for Western Balkan partners the Project Management Training in Skopje (15 – 17 June 2006) where I gave a presentation about:
Ipko Institute, a success story, and its role in education management
Download the presentation

Following this event was Regional Network Meeting (18-20 June 2006) as continuation of the entire OPIC event.
IPKO Institute helped on organising this event this year, for more information here