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SXSW 2025: Senior Moments

by Jay Cuthrellnewsletter panelpicker vowel sxsw seniormoments ai agenticai esteem ethics empathy aging audience

UPDATE: We’d appreciate your SXSW Vote

First thing — Please be sure to have registered with a SXSW ID (free).  https://id.sxsw.com/sign_in

Second thing — For SXSW 2025, I’m organizing a panel with amazing speakers. PLEASE VOTE FOR THE PANEL! 🤓

Senior Savoir-Faire: The Fiercely Agentic Meet Agentic AI https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/148254

https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/148254

Speakers

Third thing…

If you are looking for the list of similarly themed panels and talks… I’ve got you covered! Check out these ten (10!) awesome panels!

  1. Identity in the AI Era: Protecting the Most Vulnerable https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/153306
  2. Innovating Aging: Health & Medtech Redefining Elder Care https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/151886
  3. Digital Age(ing): How tech can empower our aging population https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/154313
  4. Silver and Savvy: Redefining Aging Care With AI https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/153009
  5. Gaming Without Age Limits: The 50+ Opportunity https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/147259
  6. Aging Reimagined: A Strategic Design Approach https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/152371
  7. Designing AI & Tech for Older Adults https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/153061
  8. It Gets Late Early: Ageism in the Workplace https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/151313
  9. I Used To Be Emo, but now, I’m An Adult…how sad! https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/148425
  10. Senior Savoir-Faire: The Fiercely Agentic Meet Agentic AI https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/148254

This week we take a look at my South by Southwest® (SXSW®) 2025 PanelPicker submission.

Getting Informed

I am submitting a proposal for a panel at SXSW 2025. If you are reading this, I would make the argument that you should submit a panel too.

I am serious. If you haven’t spoken at SXSW before, you should submit a panel.

A PanelPicker 101

If you’ve submitted a talk to a conference before, you probably remember filling out a form. For SXSW, the form might be a bit longer, more detailed, and more particular than you would expect.

Before you start, you have to create a free SXSW ID. Then you can sign in and begin.

Next, you would want to be prepared for the content you’ll need to have at the ready. The reason you need to be ready with the content is the form assumes you already have it and mandatory fields limit your ability to save per page steps of progress.

What do I mean? Below are the high level sections you will need to complete.

  • Organizer: Big companies use PR firms and agencies that might organize submissions on behalf of others but the goal of this part of the form is to get a single point of contact for the panel submission.
  • Title & Attributes: The basic entries here also include picking from seven (7!) panel formats and the level of understanding for the audience you want to attract (Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced) as well as selecting one of the more than two dozen (25!) topics used to organize the thousands of submissions you’ll be competing against.
  • Description & Takeaways: These are the basics. You have character limits because these titles, descriptions, and “why should someone care” text areas will go into online resources that favor mobile devices and physical signage real estate at the conference itself.
  • Resources: Assume you’ve already written a blog post, published an online slide deck, recorded a podcast, or created a YouTube/Vimeo video detailing everything about this submission because you are very organized and have been planning this for a year, right?
  • Speakers: One incredibly detailed page asking for many things that are mandatory and more that are not mandatory.
  • Agreement: Click all the boxes or do not pass go to completion.

Example: The SXSW PanelPicker multi-page form screenshot (PDF)

SXSW PanelPicker submission form

Notably, the speaker section goes beyond the basics. The speaker section is quite intensive and asks for mandatory specific details:

  • Qualifications
  • How does this speaker contribute a diverse perspective?
  • The speaker wants to be considered as a SXSW Mentor.
  • I (Primary Contact) have a personal relationship with this speaker
  • I (Primary Contact) have a means of contacting this person
  • I (Primary Contact) have confirmed this person is available to speak on this session if accepted.

In my case, I submitted nine (9!) form pages of content for the four (4) speakers on the panel which includes a moderator of the panel. The form also requires the following information available for each speaker and you cannot change any of this information after submission i.e. no edits are allowed after submission.

Optional information requested in the form includes:

  • Social URLs (X(formerly Twitter), LinkedIn, TikTok, and Instagram are the available fields but maybe Fediverse options will appear in the coming years, right?)
  • Prior speaking experience (because, is matters if this is or is not your first rodeo, right?)
  • Was this at a previous SXSW conference? If so, when and what was the description of past SXSW or SXSW EDU session? (because, it does matter if you’ve been here before, right?)
  • Book Details (because the speaker has written a book before, right?)
  • What is the nature of this relationship? (because disclosure matters, right?)

Again, SXSW PanelPicker is a very thorough form for even a single speaker submission let alone a panel. Also, the selection process is just as thorough.

The SXSW PanelPicker Selection Process

What I am submitting

At this point, you’re probably wondering what I am submitting. I’ve extracted the form submission basics and used hyperlinks where appropriate that would have been text entries in a form field.

My final submission is pending as the entry process began last month and ends just a week from today which is Jul 21, 2024. Then the community voting begins in early August 2024.

Senior Moments: When the fiercely agentic meet Agentic AI Senior Savoir-faire: The fiercely agentic meet Agentic AI

  • Panel: 4 speakers
  • Topic: Artificial Intelligence
  • Intended audience: Older adults and their families, technologists, designers, policymakers, as well as advocates for the elderly and vulnerable.
Background / Inspiration

First, consider the terms senior moment and senior moments becoming normalized in everyday language. Are there infant moments, childish moments, junior moments, and adult moments too — or is empathy wasted on the young?

~20 years ago, I witnessed the frustration of seniors accessing the web, the needless loss of digital mementos, and receiving emails meant to prey upon their kind nature. These thoughts were captured in my blog post “Internet Access (2005)”.

~10 years ago, I was struck by the growing application of technologies where a distinct lack of empathy in design and gaps in ethics were increasingly common. These thoughts were captured in my blog post “ESTEEM is STEM plus Ethics plus Empathy (2014)” and Have your A.I. call my A.I (2016)".

As we look ahead to 2050, this panel will provoke conversations beyond our hour together.

Session description

Frustration. Anger. Confusion. Anxiety. Fear. Sorrow. Vulnerability. Betrayal. Why? Margaret was locked out of her digital life vault by her well-meaning but misguided AI assistant.

Margaret is not real but serves as a cautionary tale highlighting the potential friction between human autonomy and automated decision-making, particularly in sensitive areas like personal data and digital legacy.

This panel discussion explores the challenges and opportunities that arise when fiercely independent older adults, like Margaret, encounter increasingly agentic AI systems in their daily lives.

Takeaways
  1. How can we design AI systems with empathy that empower seniors to manage their digital lives while respecting their autonomy and desire for control?
  2. What are the ethical implications of agentic AI having access to and control over personal data, especially those who may be less tech-savvy?
  3. What role should policymakers and industry leaders play at the intersection between aging and AI in the context of digital legacy and personal data?

Why a panel?

To be blunt, I’m not new to SXSW and I’ve been attending since 2008. You might recall recently in Miscellaneous May (2024) where I referred to “Five Elements of Diversity” aka V.O.W.E.L..

To be clear, I’ve already been a SXSW panelist speaker twice and I’ve been a SXSW solo speaker once. As such, I reached out to my network asking for panelist suggestions because I want to be a moderator and facilitator — NOT a speaker — for more voices to be heard that are not mine.

Results so far

I was overwhelmed with suggestions and already found several amazing speakers for the panel. Of course, getting someone to say yes to a panel is different than committing to the timespan for SXSW 2025, travel expenses, etc. — even with a complimentary pass to SXSW.

Due to the overwhelming response, there is a list of alternate panelists. What I’m thinking about now is how I want to participate as a better human being.

Next steps

As a better human being, I should be thinking about others. As of this update, I’m contemplating not speaking at all by assigning from the pool of amazing panelists to assume my own “speaker” slot that is currently set as the panel moderator.

Does this mean I am a PR firm now? I don’t know.

What I do know is that I have been asking myself if my presence on stage is required, essential, and meaningful to an audience. We shall see.

So, what will be the next big theme at SXSW 2025?

Until then… Place your bets!

PLEASE VOTE FOR THE PANEL! 🤓

Disclosure

I am linking to my disclosure.

View this page on GitHub.

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