Tristan Harris
Google
Distracted? Let’s Demand a New Kind of Design

In today’s attention economy, design is often reduced to a competition for stimulating our brain stem, instead of stimulating our deepest human needs and greater sense of fulfillment. But what if technology could distract us less, and respect our time & attention more? What would that world look like - and how could it be built? What if we could design to make our Darwinian instincts work for us instead of against us? In this talk, Tristan will open a conversation about a new kind of design ethics, that puts meaningful choices and human potential first.

Tristan Harris is a design thinker, philosopher and entrepreneur – most recently focused on Design Ethics. Tristan is rated #16 in Inc Magazine's Top 30 Entrepreneurs Under 30, a former Mayfield Fellow in Stanford’s Technology Venture Program in Entrepreneurship, and graduated with a B.S. in Computer Science from Stanford University. Currently he’s developing a new framework at Google to help product designers facilitate conscious choices. Before this, he was co-founder and CEO of Apture, an instant explanation engine that enabled millions of users to get on-the-fly explanations about any topic without leaving their place on the web. Google acquired Apture in 2011.