61 HAPPENING Media Honeypot
Words by Neal Romanek SAUNA WITH THE START-UPS This year’s Media Honeypot conference in Helsinki punched well above its weight in terms of industry influence
everal dozen entrepreneurs took their clothes off in the middle of winter. Then they jumped into the sea. Also – blockchain, OTT, AI
is plenty of opportunity for networking and exchange of ideas outside the lecture theatre. Food and drink play at least as important a part in the exchange as the messages delivered from behind a lectern. This year’s Media Honeypot, which took place at Helsinki’s Sofia Future Farm space, a block from the spectacular Senate Square, opened with a pre-event speakers’ dinner and closed with drinks, a meal and an open invitation to a sauna and ice swimming at Löyly, a hugely popular Helsinki sauna. Did we mention there was yoga, too? Yes, at intervals throughout the day, delegates could recharge and get re-centred with some yoga mini-sessions between seminars and pitches. The keynote presentations at Media Honeypot were to the point, fact-filled and free of a lot of the self-serving fluff that shows up in most media tech conferences. The vibe was one of a well-trained, well- educated, well-resourced Nordics-based industry ready to punch well above its weight on the world stage. The glue holding Media Honeypot together is Janina Salo-Glasemann, who kicked off the conference by telling her story of being a child in Berlin when the Wall came down. One day, there were
and data protection. No, this wasn’t some out-of-control private party in a private compound in Big Sur. It was a gathering of some of the top media tech minds from the Nordic countries at the Media Honeypot conference in Helsinki. Media Honeypot was started by Heikki Rotko, who had been CEO of Finnish commercial TV channel MTV. Rotko wanted to create a way for European media tech start-ups to trade ideas and help each other build value. Working with ArcticStartUp, an organisation focusing on entrepreneurship in the Nordic and Baltic countries, the first Media Honeypot was launched in April 2016. The one-day conference features a day of talks and breakout seminars running in parallel with speed-dating and pitch-fests for media start-ups. In common with a number of other popular media tech conferences that have sprung up in the Nordics, Media Honeypot emphasises personal connection between delegates and frowns on the canned sales pitch and marketeer’s presentation. There
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