EP10: Act In Synch 2024, Athens Special - Insights into the Music, Technology, & Community Summit.

Join us in Athens, Greece, where the Act in Synch Summit is fostering cross-industry collaborations and sparking discussions about climate change, sustainability, cultural impacts, and urban transformation. The summit's vibrant setting at the Impact Hub provides an ideal backdrop for exploring how music intersects and acts with advertising, urban development, tech, and global challenges. We highlight insights from influential speakers & delegates who emphasize the importance of community and collaboration in overcoming industry obstacles and forging a positive future in a post-pandemic, AI-driven world.

Artists finding their way through new technologies, freelancers navigating the complexities of the work-life balance, marketing gurus aiming to make brands more aware of the importance of human creativity upon human consumers, tech entrepreneurs pondering on how copyrights and AI might be managed from a legal perspective -  this episode sheds light on the importance of setting personal boundaries, redefining success, harnessing and utilising technologies to enhance human invention, and why community building is so essential for a healthy future. Through engaging discussions, we uncover how societal structures can evolve to support innovation and risk-taking, encouraging a healthier approach to personal and professional growth.

Act In Synch is a Europe In Synch initiative and brings together leaders from across industries to confront climate change. Its mission is to inspire action by addressing the relationship with the planet and the choices made.

https://www.actinsynch.com

Guests on this podcast:
Nis Bogvod (Act In Synch/Europe In Synch)
Renato Horvath (Act In Synch/Europe In Synch)
Hans-Peter Roth (Muserk)
Martin Nedved (AIMS API)
Elena Charbila (Kid Moxie)
Claus Knuth (Bates VMLY&R Agency)
Sophie Lamprou (Impact Hub)
Tianna Amore (Black4Nature)
Vickie Amiralis (In Place Of War/Earth Sonic)
Daryl Bamonte (Archangelo Music)
Alex Maiolo (Action Group)

This 2024 edition of the Act In Synch Summit took place at the Impact Hub in Athens, Greece on 30-31 October, 2024

Europe In Synch is created, managed, promoted, and driven by several European organizations and companies and is a truly cross-border collaboration.
The goals are to bring together professionals from the music sector with decision-makers from film & advertising to provide a real-life, hands-on, learning experience, and to promote European music in the complex field of synchronization, through communication, knowledge-building and networking via focused mentoring and peer training sessions.

Follow Europe In Synch:

• Home: https://europeinsynch.net
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EuropeinSynch
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/europeinsynch
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/europeinsynch
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/europeinsynch

Intro/Outro music is an instrumental edit of "Gimme" by Daffodils.
They're on Soundcloud.

Europe In Synch is co-funded by the European Commission.

This podcast is a SuperSwell production.

Transcript

Speaker 3 0:23

Welcome to a very special edition of the Europe in Sync podcast. We are in Athens, greece, reporting from the Act in Sync Summit. Act in Sync is a now annual event organized by the Europe in Sync partners and we're going to be grabbing some of the attendees and speakers of this year's event and asking them to tell us a little bit about their act in sync experience. We're at the fantastic impact hub here in the center of athens. We're with nice and ren, the organizing party of the whole shebang, the whole act in sync summit. This is the second annual event, isn't it? After berlin last year, so could you just remind us what Act in Sync is and why Athens this year?

Speaker 4 1:06

Act in Sync is the yearly event of the European Sync and what we want to achieve is create networks.

Speaker 4 1:13

That doesn't normally take place in conferences like this.

Speaker 4 1:18

We like to invite the industries that are related to music and have a talk about how are we together looking at the future and the now and how to be better in collaborating, also with the focus on climate, health issues, anxiety, well-being, as we started out with last year, and why athens I was invited to to speak at athens music week and as we are constantly having it in our minds where to go and how to develop this project. Coming to Greece was like the feeling of this is a very visible and tangible city that shows where we are with climate change, with financial issues, with infrastructure that works, with a public attitude that is so positive still and full of hope. So we kind of thought that maybe it's good to come here, and when I was here, I kind of venue scouted and came to this impact hub and the people here. It was just amazing. And now you've seen it. You've seen the people here. It is high-level tech, it is high level thinking and visions and a totally inspiring place to be. So when we came here to impact hub.

Speaker 5 2:32

There was no questions that athens was was the place something that I would add is that some thinking and music licensing is in a very exciting position because we get to work with a lot of different people and companies and contents and topics. So we felt like music is in a position to glue all these topics and industries and people together and perhaps we are in a position to bring different creative industries together with people who are interesting in their fields and we know that they have a really good and interesting perspective on the things in the world.

Speaker 3 3:04

So it's exciting when you have really great characters and then you just throw them together and then what comes out of it you have two days full of panels, talks, lunches, presentations, performances and a remarkable list of speakers from all over the place all the different fields that you've mentioned as well. How difficult is it to sell the concept of what you're doing? How do you go about persuading these people to take two or three days off and come and join in the whole thing?

Speaker 5 3:33

I think an interesting aspect is that just because it's kick-started by people from the music industry, it's not a music event per se. It can be labeled as many things. There are really inspiring conversations from brand strategists, let's say, or people who are dealing with sustainability in different kind of angles. So there are a lot of different and very inspiring conversations and I think people are just refreshed and happy to take part in something like this.

Speaker 4 3:58

It is, at the moment, very personal. Personally, I have been speaking with everyone. I had several Zoom meetings with everyone to hear their perspective, but also to see if they were willing to involve in our projects. And they are very eager to participate, but not only participate, also to help. Because I think maybe the way we communicate our mission is different. We have something, an energy and a perspective that is unique. Maybe we hope so.

Speaker 3 4:28

Today is all about act in sync. You have a day full of panels. Tomorrow, on the second day, you're organising your event in cooperation or collaboration with the Hearth Summit. How did that come about and how is that going to work?

Speaker 4 4:42

It was actually a coincidence because when we arrived here the first time to see the venue, we simply just wanted to book two days in the venue and the the team here was very inspired about us and they reached out to us saying we hear you're doing this in the mid of october, we're doing something in the end of october, should we partner up? And we had a great conversation and it took a lot of meetings to find the balance. But they are hosting a well-being economy conference with political people, environment people you know the CEO of the electricity company from Athens, and so it's like the real outside world that we are all a part of. So coming out of our music bubble and taking part of the surroundings and the culture, that is like the whole purpose. So it was a win-win situation when they asked us to join forces.

Speaker 5 5:34

But why it's important for them is because they also understand how culture is really the glue between people. And if they are talking about urban development, let's say, then not taking culture and music into consideration is an inhuman way to plan anything. So they understand that culture is the fourth element in planning our lives. You know, whether it's the economy and living environment, Culture has to be in it and music represents that.

Speaker 4 5:59

And today is our own day. We have the whole day with our own speakers and panels, and tomorrow we are co-curating the whole day. So we will take part of their discussions and they will take part of our own discussions. So blending that is a perfect fit.

The Future of AI in Music - Hans-Peter Roth & Martin Nedved

Speaker 3 6:12

Well, you have to go and give your opening speech now. And Ren, you've got a bunch of speakers to go and get together. So, thanks for that. Let's meet again tomorrow and we can just reflect on how it's.

Speaker 3 6:22

Thank you thank you, it's gone yeah, we're at the act in sync summit here in wonderful athens, greece, part of the europe in sync project, and I've just literally brought two of the speakers off of the stage, brought them downstairs to the meeting room. Here we have Hans-Peter Ross from a company called Muzerk and we have Martin Nedved who runs a company called Ames API. You look like you had a lot of fun upstairs on stage there. Yeah.

Speaker 6 6:59

It's kind of like a sandbox of whatever you want to do, because this topic that we're talking about is so broad and affects the industry in so many different ways. So there's, of course, the whole creative part of things, but then there's a back office part of things and then there's the whole legal aspect and moral rights and all those kind of things. So, yeah, I mean you could probably go on for way longer than anybody wants to hear.

Speaker 3 7:17

Well, we're talking about AI and copyright, just to make that clear. Martin, at some point we were talking upstairs about the tech companies, how they're operating, and you pointed out that the EU seems to be doing a good job of keeping tabs on these tech companies and trying to keep them in line when they're wanting to circumvent the laws. But, hans-peter, you seem to maybe think it's more of a losing battle than that.

Speaker 6 7:43

It's a losing battle if you want to be ahead of the curve. The beautiful part of lawmaking is that you can create pretty much what you want. Most countries will not have retroactive penal effects, but that doesn't shy away from the fact that you can fix stuff subsequently right. So we have it in environmental agency, where the polluter pays. That was not something that existed back in the 60s, so that has been invented along the line in order to fix something that was not originally fixed, and I think we can see the same thing here with AI. The challenge is that it moves so fast that you can have that risk of feeding behind because things develop so quickly, so instant gratification is probably not going to be what we see. When it comes to remuneration for the use of whatever copyrightable content you will see in these AI models whether it's music or whether it's written word, or whether it's even photographs or paintings or other art forms of expressions there is a lack in time before we can get it right.

Speaker 7 8:44

I think there's like interesting discussion going on in Europe right now, because Europe has always been stronger, let's say, at defending the creative industries. It's pretty much the home of copyright, right and so, on one hand, the EU has been trying to do, let's say, the right thing, but there's a huge amount of pressure from the tech industries and then also from some countries that want to be seen as tech-friendly. So you have countries and I'm not going to name that they are trying to wave the banner of we are going to be the Silicon Valley of Europe and, of course, ai is the next big thing. So they are trying to be friendly towards AI companies and right now, the one thing that they can really promise them is we're going to be lenient on copyright. So that's the really big problem that we are going to be facing. Generally, it's moving in the right direction in EU, but there are huge amount of pressure.

Speaker 7 9:35

The amount of lobbying that's happening in Brussels, the amount of lobbying that is happening in the individual countries, is just unprecedented, because these companies have invested billions, and they are investing billions pretty much every day, and not mainly about music, don't get ourselves wrong, like music is only part of that, but they have invested billions and now they are threatened that potentially that was completely in vain, or also that maybe they will build something but then maybe they will never be really hugely profitable because you're never going to get the profitability that the investors want from them, because the really big VC funds who are funding those ventures?

Speaker 7 10:15

They are not looking for nicely profitable companies. They are trying to help build companies that are going to make exceedingly large, hugely profitable companies. So, yeah, I think the discussion about the legislation is really important and I slightly understand some of the countries because they do fear that we are going to get left out as Europe from the discussion. You can already see that Apple and others are not releasing some of their latest AI models in Europe. Who knows what the right balance is? But of course, for us, we can't ever be okay with a position that whatever is on the internet that's usable without license.

Speaker 3 10:52

But you gave the feeling that, certainly in the US, because a lot of the tech companies originate from the US. So US legislation is almost counteracting what the EU is trying to do, or keeping the door kind of ajar just for companies that want to circumvent the laws.

Speaker 7 11:09

I wouldn't say so. I wouldn't go as far. I don't know what the legislation right now is in the US. I know that they had a lot of proposals and maybe they passed some legislation in some states about the name, image and likeness, so what we would consider moral rights or personal rights here in Europe, but it's more about people creating voice models that can pretend to be Elvis Presley. I don't know that there is that much legislation in the US yet for generating music that is in the style of someone. I don't think that there has been legislation about that and generally, the US is much more based on the precedent system. Right, it's more based on the precedent system. Right, it's more based on the courts deciding is this within the law or is it not, While in the EU it's less about that.

Speaker 3 11:52

Yeah, I mean Hannes Schurz, the moderator. He summed it all up quite intelligently by saying it was a bit of a brain fuck. Is that pretty accurate?

Speaker 6 12:01

Yeah, I mean the copyright industry is not very coordinated at large. I would say. I mean, if you look at the EU and if you could go to Brussels and ask how many people here are lobbyists on behalf of technology companies and then ask how many people here are lobbyists on behalf of the creative industry, I don't think I would be lying if I was going to say there's a huge difference and there's many, many more from the tech companies. So that's another dynamic that I don't think people are really aware of is the stories are being told by people with certain interests and we're up against, as a creative industry, a history, a legacy of being cumbersome and complex and intransparent, and that's just a dynamic that we have to be better at addressing, I think.

Speaker 7 12:50

I think that one of the things to future-proof your sync business we are at a sync conference, after all it's like make your music available to be used, of course are the terms that you want, but please make it easier for people who want to legitimately use your music and want to pay for it. Make it easier for them, make it searchable, make it easy to find the licensing information, etc. We see very often that users will want to use, let's say, what you would call artistic music and then they find out the licensee is such a nightmare that they turn to ai or royalty free or whatever.

Speaker 3 13:28

We are literally trying to scare them away from using our music yeah, part of your discussion as well was about how difficult it's proving to be to hold the tech companies that are training ai accountable on what they're training AI with, and Hans-Peter made an interesting point that I think was based around the ship of Theseus paradox where how long is it before a piece of music, an original piece of music, is reworded so many times that that original piece no longer exists, in the way that the ship of Theseus wants each plank of wood to be replaced? Is it the?

Speaker 7 14:04

same ship. So in the age of AI the Theseus ship would be called synthetic data.

Speaker 6 14:09

Yeah, and I think that that's one of the unknown aspects of this thing.

Speaker 6 14:13

So you can have, let's say, 10 songs. That has inspired I'm making a quotation mark in the air here that has inspired the song, but there could be a thousand songs that had been used to fence in what it is this AI is doing. So I'm just asking the creative industry what's the value of that? I mean me working in technology and my company using machine learning and human in loop machine learning, all these things that mean nothing. By now we understand that when we treat data. By now we understand that when we treat data, there can be as much or even more value in a no to a hypothesis generated by our algorithm as there can be in a yes. So will the creative industry accept that rationale? And how do we in the end then factor that in? And then comes the next thing is how many times do we have to reiterate the outcome? Is it clear after the first try? Is it like a dilution by 50%? Is it dilution by 25%? And each iteration is going to be a convergence towards zero?

Speaker 6 15:18

I was at another panel at Musicbiz in Nashville and this guy came up to me and and he said I've hired 75 composers and I've asked them to write songs in the likelihood of different artists throughout the world. And then he says and once they've then recorded this music, I put it into my AI and now it's royalty-free. Because you redo something as a human, it's inspiration. When AI does it, it's copying. It's very difficult things to reconcile. It's a very good question that I do not have the answer for at all.

Speaker 3 15:58

Yeah, very philosophical as well, isn't it? But another point that came up was is this the end of creativity? You shook your head, martin. You tend to disagree. It's not, absolutely. I don't see this as the end of creativity. You shook your head, martin, you tend to disagree. It's not.

Speaker 7 16:06

Absolutely. I don't see this as the end of. I think we all agreed, actually, that they've been done. We see this as a huge problem, but it's an obstacle that needs to be solved. But if anything, I think it can lead to even bigger creativity. Like right now, the pool of people who can be creating music is a decently sized block, but of course it can grow so much larger and you have to be really elitist or snobbish to think that that's a bad thing, because you could say the same thing about every previous democratization process that that's a bad thing, only the real musicians should be recording. You could go back and then say only the wealthy people should vote right, and where do you stop in that? So I think this is the same process. I don't have a problem with the ai generation. I have the problem with how and whether it's licensed. As long as the laws that we have or that we should have for this follows, then I'm actually very excited by that do you think we talk because if we're panicking or we're scared of ai?

Speaker 3 17:04

is it just just that we need to go a generation and have a different group of people coming through with less attachment to how things have always worked, and for new technology to develop further and explain itself more and for people to calm down and use these things more wisely and properly and get more and more evidence of how they can be very helpful rather than disruptive?

Speaker 7 17:25

I think that we are beyond the panic mode. I would say. I think that the panic was last year, or maybe it was the beginning of this year, when the two companies the ones that shouldn't be named, I guess when they came out, I think there was like a real panic mode because a lot of people were thinking OK, it happened for text, it happened for images, but music is different. I remember having those conversations with people you know two years ago and they were saying music is different, Like it's going to take decades before music is created in the same way like the text and image. And I don't want to say that I was the only one who saw that. No, that it's going to come much, much sooner. I really didn't know and I don't think that anyone can really say that they do know.

Speaker 7 18:04

With AI, the fact is, with machine learning, you might be very close to breaching that point, but you don't even know it. But I know that most people, and composers as well, they were all like oh no, music is so different, like there are emotions involved and you have to know the music theory, etc. And then they were so taken by surprise when those models came out and there was a real sense of panic. I think I remember my father is a composer and he sits on the board of a PRO and he told me like it's over, it's over.

Speaker 7 18:34

I'm hearing from other publishers that they are thinking of closing down their businesses because, like, what's the point of having a publishing business anymore in the world of AI generation? And then, of course, it calmed down, and I think that we are now in the world of AI generation. And then, of course, it calmed down and I think that we are now in the phase where everyone is actually trying to figure out what it's good for, what it's bad for, and by that I'm not saying that there's no danger in it. No, now we might actually find a real danger if it's in there. But I think we are beyond the panic mode now.

Speaker 3 19:00

You agree with that, Hans-Peter.

Speaker 6 19:02

Yes, because the panic moment was with a picture of the world literally ending. And then you wake up the next day and it's still around and you kind of go, ok, maybe it's time only to 99% panic, and then as you go along, you know that panic decreases for every time you wake up and you're still alive, and I think that's probably where we are right now. So I think that it's absolutely true that relevant music has a human component. People don't listen to something that sounds like Drake. They listen to Drake because they're a fan of Drake or whatever that may be. People lean into music because there's a story that they connect to as human beings coming from a group of other human beings. So, from that point of view, music and creation is in a good place because you can get it out to way more people than you could before.

Speaker 6 19:53

The biggest risk I see is the lean-back experience and what that can do. We can start with music being generated ephemerically in shopping centers. You don't even need to store the music. The algorithm can now generate music that just disappears as soon as it's out of the speakers. It will never be recreated again.

Speaker 6 20:12

Or worse, if now a streaming service that offers a radio-type algorithmic curation of tracks based on Madonna's Like a Virgin, and then the first 10 tracks may be something along those lines, but then as you get further down maybe the next track is going to be a trained piece of music, and so forth and so on. So there's a dilution there that can be detrimental to the revenue streams now currently generated by the music business. But I just want to remind also that everybody thought that when the music industry had rec I just want to remind also that everybody thought that when the music industry had recouped twice all the investments that they've made in music because of CDs, reselling what they've already issued on vinyl, you know, and everybody was happy and the mechanical royalties were in abundance in the 90s Then we had a kind of a cliff with iTunes and all that stuff happening in the zeros and up through the tens, and now the industry is making more money than they were before.

Speaker 7 21:07

I would argue with that. I think if you adjust it for inflation, then we are still not back, at least in Europe. I think I've seen a stat somewhere that in the US they're making almost as much as they were in the heydays.

Collaboration, Inspiration, & Identity - Elena Charbila/Kid Moxie

Speaker 6 21:20

In Europe I think we are still a little bit below that, but if you told people that 10 years ago, they would have told them that you were delusional. The online business ruined the music industry, right and hey, here we are 2024, act in sync in Athens, and there still seems to be a business around us somehow. So I'm optimistic.

Speaker 3 21:39

Well, that's a good way to end what we're discussing, but thank you for talking to us now and thank you for making this subject so fascinating and interesting. Despite all the work you're having to do while you're here, I hope you're enjoying it. Okay, thank you both of you. I'll let you go to your next panels. Thank you for having us.

Speaker 7 21:55

Thank you, it was fun.

Speaker 3 22:04

Joining us now from the music panel we have Elena Chabila, a composer, producer and recording artist. Thank you so much, elena. Do you often get the opportunity to talk about yourself and your work and your music like that?

Speaker 8 22:18

I mean, I really enjoy panels because they feel so much more organic. There's a synergy of people talking together that it can just take you into so many other places and outside of yourself.

Speaker 3 22:29

And you're amongst peers.

Speaker 8 22:30

And people I admire. You know, like Daryl Bamonte, he's somebody that I've known through my manager, actually for a few years now, and he's been affiliated with some of the bands that have been the most influential in my life and music.

Speaker 3 22:43

I found a few things on your panel really interesting. You started by talking about your background. You played in bands and you found your way as a composer a bit more solitary in your approach and very much open and enjoying collaboration. But you found it difficult to do that full time in a band setting.

Speaker 8 23:02

Yeah, it was a very early lesson that I'm glad I had, instead of struggling to feel like the recipe of a band was working for me, like I figured pretty fast that that was not going to be the way. Having said that, collaborations and collaborators have brought the most meaningful experiences, creatively and personally, so I really value collaboration. I just couldn't stick with the same set of collaborators, I guess.

Speaker 3 23:27

You think that makes you less creative in the long run.

Speaker 8 23:30

Yeah, because I'm also very introverted in many ways and I find that creating is a very solitary thing sometimes. So I want to have the allowance to be that.

Speaker 3 23:41

Yeah, you explained very well how you work on your composition. For example, I was struck by the fact that you seem to be that. Yeah, you explain very well how you work on your composition. For example, I was struck by the fact that you seem to be quite minimalist. Is that the right word to use?

Speaker 8 23:49

I like maximal sound, but in a minimal sort of setup.

Speaker 3 23:53

You don't surround yourself with stuff.

Speaker 8 23:56

I know it's cool to say that I do, but I don't, I don't look cool when I make music at all. I really don't look cool. All the hard synths and all that that looks cool and it's so beautiful, you know, but I just, it's just not how I've been operating.

Speaker 3 24:10

One thing I really loved when you talked about being nostalgic for things that you didn't necessarily live through. You can look back on the 80s as something you can idealize and you can cherry pick the things that you believe were the things that worked and incorporate it into your outlook and your work now, exactly.

Speaker 8 24:27

I think it's the unattainable of an experience you've never lived for me brings out the best kind of nostalgia, because you can really paint it however you want. There's no reference, there's no memory, so all you see is a collection and you make your own collage out of the things you've heard and seen and you're like, oh, it must have been this and it could have sounded like this, and I would have felt like this and people would have treated me like this and I would have had that kind of romance. You know all that kind of stuff you know, and I do romanticize those things.

Speaker 3 24:56

Yeah, but that's important as an artist in the creative process. You must have that poetic, romantic outlook on it, surely, to create your best work.

Speaker 8 25:06

Yeah, and in a way I feel like every art is poetry, without sounding like an idealist, but I think that it's a collage of feelings, words sometimes that make sense to you, and it's an outlet for what you're currently wanting to express, how you want to be seen.

Speaker 3 25:31

So I feel like it is your own poetry. Yeah, you also picked out a few of your musical inspirations from back in that period as well. You talk about Vangelis. You talk about Blade Runner yeah, you talk about Joy Division as well as the Cure and Depeche Mode, of course. Does it still feel like an endless? Well, you can go back to for inspiration, looking back at that period of time where you're constantly finding new areas of inspiration from different eras.

Speaker 8 25:50

I do. But nothing hits like that and I don't know if it is because it's sort of the first love, although Joy Division I feel like I appreciated way later in my path in music. But there's certain things in the story of those like. The story of Joy Division is as potent as their sound. I don't know how much more effective it can get without the story of Ian Curtis. I cannot separate the myth from the music. Maybe if they were still alive maybe we wouldn't be as obsessed with them, because their music is amazing but their story is equally so. There's sort of a mythology around all these bands and the fact that they all took place mostly in england. You know all those sounds that we're talking about, the cure and joy, division and depeche mode and around that time of late 70s, early 80s, and it's just a forever hub, I guess the other thing that you picked upon was about your identity.

Speaker 3 26:43

I think you said that when you're working, you never think, oh, I'm a woman working on this, or any gender actually. You just feel like an artist, and it's later that those labels are put on you, usually by other people.

Speaker 8 26:56

Yeah.

Speaker 3 26:56

So do you always feel that that's an extra level of something you have to deal with? That is uninvited, of course, but something that you could really do without?

Speaker 8 27:05

I don't know how it would feel to do without. I just feel like it's just an inherent part of being a woman. It's just that during the creative process, I'm not aware of it. During the release process, I'm aware of it because others make me aware of it. Essentially so, I don't want to be looked at as a female composer, I just want to be a composer. As a female composer, I just want to be a composer. I just want to be a producer and be worthy of the title detached from gender.

Speaker 8 27:27

But at the same time, is it beneficial to me that women are being highlighted, of course, and I think it's necessary and it's all those good things. It's just that I don't want to be a good female, you know, good driver for a female type of thing, good composer for a female? It's the same essence, I guess you. It's good to highlight all minorities, whether it is gender, sexuality or whatnot. At the same time, I feel like we're entering an era where it should be seamless and it should be blended in a way that it doesn't have to be a point of discussion. At least, that's the hope and the aspiration.

Speaker 3 28:04

You also talked about how you incorporate technology, including working with AI.

Speaker 8 28:09

I have a very negative connotation to AI. I'm still in the fear stage. I feel like there's people that are way cooler about how they incorporated AI and they have way more progressive views about it. I don't really know those techniques of how to create music and I've made it a purpose not to learn. Maybe it's a joy kill that. I don't want to know that tool. I don't want to know a joy kill tool.

Speaker 3 28:30

You go under the moniker of Kid Moxie. One thing you showed us at the end there was a clip of a video of a collaboration you did with Depeche Mode and you were invited to collaborate on their most recent album. But interesting to find out that there's no real story behind how that happened.

Speaker 8 28:46

It was a fluke. You know, I was lucky that they heard something they liked and they reached out, and I was lucky that I didn't trash the email, because I wasn't believing that this email was actually somebody reaching out on their behalf and I just didn't think this was going to ever happen. I mean, this is my favorite band, so when you get an email from your hero, you doubt it.

Speaker 3 29:05

Yeah, I can believe it, but you called it a fluke. I don't know, because it's really an endorsement of your previous work.

Speaker 8 29:11

Yes, yes, I mean I would like to think that they had heard something that worked for them and that is the biggest compliment. That was the scary stage. I was like, oh so you chose me for this. How do I actually really make it right by them that they actually picked me for the right reasons? So I was actually doubting it till release day.

Speaker 3 29:31

Let's just say A little bit about Act in Sync. They brought the event to Athens this year. It's an interesting market. It's a great place to come and find new collaborators and people who can join the European Sync Network as well. Do you find networks like this where people gather to collaborate on exchange of information and things like that? Do you find that useful for the work you do?

Speaker 8 29:59

I find connection useful. I mean, sometimes it turns out that work-wise it makes sense that you meet people through a panel or through a event like this. More than anything, I find the connection because it can get isolating, and I am in a field that I've made it very isolating for myself. So branching out, connecting with people that are having similar journeys or adjacent journeys to mine, that's what I find the most helpful, like sharing our stories with each other.

Speaker 3 30:22

Yeah, wonderful. Well, I know you've got a few other things to do here as well, but thanks for joining us for a few minutes.

Speaker 8 30:27

Thank you so much, you're. Yeah, thank you.

Speaker 3 30:37

You're called Klaus Knut, but everyone calls you Knut. Yeah, that's all right, is it? Yeah, knut is so good. All right, ok, very good. You kicked off the whole event here in Athens yesterday morning with a really quite brilliant talk. I think mainly about human behaviour and how people are manipulated by clever marketing and advertising strategists People like yourself. Is that fair to say? That would be fair to say yes. And how did it go? Your talk, you enjoy it.

Speaker 11 31:09

I enjoyed it. Yeah, I think it's always like really interesting to be the first at anything of these kinds of events, because there's a lot of experts coming on. So I'd like to put some layer on top of everything that people will hopefully remember, so that there's sort of a glue thing going on.

Speaker 3 31:29

It was very impactful. It worked on so many levels, I think as well. You started talking about how suffering is not optional. If we want to be good humans, then you have to suffer along the way, and one of the key problems we have as a society and as a world is that we're avoiding suffering way too much in this age and that's leading to worse and worse problems for us.

Speaker 11 31:51

Yes, exactly, and there's actually a bit of child psychology to building children's resilience, and resilience is actually teaching them that things sometimes hurt, that they can't have that ice cream and things like that. And I think the more busy we become, the less time we have for conflict and for suffering. So it's not that we don't necessarily want to suffer, we just don't have the time to take the fights with our kids and so we sort of skip those little things. I have a five-year-old daughter I notice myself doing it once in a while where I should really be helping her be resilient to the kinds of suffering not getting an ice cream can inflict on a five-year-old. But I think it is overall also a Western thing because we've got technology now. I think a lot of people think AI is also going to take away a lot of the work we don't want to do, and I think that's dangerous sometimes. I'm not saying that AI is dangerous, but the way we use it for seamlessness it could be dangerous in many aspects.

Speaker 3 32:57

Yeah, and when you talk about suffering, you're not talking about it as a negative entirely. That's the important point, isn't it?

Speaker 11 33:03

Yeah, the important point is that I don't want to inflict anyone suffering, of course, but, like with elite soldiers, they put themselves in in really, really cold water. They jump from helicopters, everything. Not because they're elite soldiers, that just thinks it's fun to play games. They do it because they want to train their bodies to exactly know where is my limit of suffering and to get to know themselves. And I think that is one of the interesting things about talking about suffering, because I know the term to many people is like I got to avoid that, which is why I'm constantly trying to drag people back into it. Even making decisions is some sort of suffering, because it involves risk. When it comes to decision making, we have to learn and muscle-memorise bad decisions and say, hey, we have to make bad decisions in order to make good decisions, because it's a learning process. And I think, to me, putting the term career into the mix is something that actually frightens leaders, because they think that a bad decision could be damaging their career, whereas 30 years ago, a bad decision damaged a Monday.

Speaker 3 34:21

So I think there's some structures that we need to look at in order to address these things In the example of the soldier that could be a life-saving thing Within an office and career, this idea that one mistake will end your career. How do we reset that way of thinking, do you think?

Speaker 11 34:40

I think we do it basically by celebrating failure To a larger extent, get people to feel like, oh, we've got a culture where you can fail, and I think there's a certain amount of trust that we need to build, which the system in itself does not contain as things are now. It's both for leadership to recognize that okay, we actually got to do this in order for people to feel comfortable. Taking risk and I mean innovation in itself is risk-taking and being agile, which many companies expect from their employers. Human beings are not agile. We can train to be agile, which is basically what elite soldiers are doing. They're training in different terrains to actually be more agile and less fearful of certain reactions to certain things. So I think we could learn a lot from that mentality.

Speaker 3 35:35

It feels like fear is a central trigger or a central problem. This fear of failure, sometimes fear of success, fear of offending, saying the wrong thing or doing the wrong thing that will immediately close down your options and immediately make your life worse because you've made that one false step or one false move. The media stirs up a lot of fear, so fear is a big trigger for a human emotion, isn't it? It's something that we respond to very quickly and very well, and I guess AI, which you mentioned, is the latest trigger for our fears. Is that fair to say?

Speaker 11 36:12

That is fair to say, and one of the fears we have is the latest trigger for our fears. Is that fair to say that that is fair to say? And one of the fears we have is the unknown. I mean, I don't consider myself very clever, but I have a tendency to have some sort of overview of things. Back in the days, you could always say, oh, this will happen in three years. And there's a movement, there's a trend. This is not a trend. This is something that's coming so fast. Every morning you open the newspaper and they've evolved into something new, and now we're using it for for this and that, and, of course, it's human beings being in control of it. But I think it involves risk and that the way we then address risk as a species is that we are a group animal, so we stick together with someone else, and the fear is actually a superglue. It actually makes us bond with each other, and those mechanisms are really really hard to get around, but I think it's important to have a debate about them.

Speaker 3 37:09

When it comes to AI, I get this fear of the unknown. It's something that I'm not fearful of. It's quite exciting, but it's unnerving as well because it is so big and it's moving so quickly. It reminds me a little bit in quantum physics, where physicists suddenly announced that they discovered that even nothing is full of something. So it feels like that. Ai feels like things are created out of absolutely nothing, just an entirely new universe. I find that fascinating and scary. I get the feeling that the introduction of AI and the more we kind of learn to live with AI harness it where it's harnessable. Do you think it's going to be something that kicks us into remembering how important we are and how influential we are on what we can achieve ourselves, that we might grab hold of our responsibilities again, decide that it's OK to suffer because it makes the world a better place, using AI to support a new way of living as humans, without turning into machines or however people think it might turn out?

Speaker 11 38:17

I think that's exactly the elements that are separating us from AI, and I think the elements that makes us human can only be simulated by AI. You could never inflict pain on AI. You could make an algorithm that makes AI simulate inflicted pain, whether you pinch it or say something bad, and I think that's interesting. The little scary thing about AI to me is that man has always tried to build himself in his own image. And that's the scary thing, because I'm not scared about AI. I'm scared about who controls it and who has the willing ears of AI through their capacity to feed it different data, because to me it's still a machine.

Speaker 11 39:05

But it's quite funny because when I chat GBT things, I find myself being very, very polite towards AI, because I'm thinking at one point, if they take over, they'll remember that Knut oh, at least he was kind to us. So I actually try to show it kindness. And then I also think that it's a little rebellious thing to actually be kind to it because it remembers, I mean, what we are loading it with. If you look at humankind and the state of the planet is loads of suffering data that this entity that mirrors us, you know it has basically our whole history. That is to me, to try and answer your question. One of the things we will use AI for is to rediscover ourselves and maybe rediscover that we can suffer. They won't, they'll simulate suffering, and that, to me, is really, really human, and I think that is something that we will at some point appreciate to a large extent, if we understand it.

Speaker 3 40:02

Yeah, if we understand that AI can actually help us get through the suffering. Yes, yeah, brilliant, just want to talk about how this applies to us in the music business. You also talked at some point yesterday about brands and advertising on another panel, which was again really interesting. One thing that came across in it was this imbalance in perception of music people towards advertisers.

Speaker 3 40:29

I think it's fair to say that. You know artists and labels and managers. They've been looking to advertisers, as well as film syncs, as a way to propel everything like a make or break, and it seems to have got more and more desperate that we need to get the advertiser on board and there's this perception that the advertising companies can make or break careers and it gives them too much power. So there's a misconception, I think, in that. How do we change the mindset of people in music to not see this route as such a make or break or be all and end all, and how do we get a better balance between the parties, more of a collaboration, rather than this desperate approach from the music world towards the world of advertising, to please?

Speaker 11 41:15

help us out. I think to a large extent that advertisers and music people should recognise that we're in the same boat. But we came from two different islands and if you look traditionally back in history artists, they were going like you are not going to get me to advertise with you. They were king of the hill. And then it suddenly reversed with the crackdown of the industry and Napster and streaming services and everything and people were looking for new business models. And then, wow, advertising has got something. But I think to a large extent, advertising agencies it's not the end of the rainbow. There's not a big thing going on there.

Speaker 11 41:59

I also think that the general mechanism of using advertising to break an artist is actually just like it was on radio stations in the old days the more rotations you got, the more obviously you sold more records, and that was not because people heard you more, it was actually because your brain started recognizing you as a pattern.

Speaker 11 42:21

And in advertising today we really have a pattern machine because it's it's shorter videos, it's shorter messages but with higher. But I think it makes me curious to see how also AI will make the music people and the industry people or the advertising people mainly the creatives seek each other in new ways and I think there's going to be a revolution about that and I also sense that brands to a larger extent is actually starting to get wow. We need to be real, we need to mirror real people. So we can't do AI, but I think the music industry, the artists and the agencies will find each other in that chaos and I think maybe that's the chaos. We need the disruption. We need to actually feel like, ok, what is music, what is advertising and emotional things? What is it that we want to evoke as a brand? So I think that conversation is interesting.

Speaker 3 43:28

We're close to that conversation taking place. It sounds like.

Speaker 11 43:31

Yeah.

The Impact Hub, Athens - Sophie Lamprou

Speaker 3 43:32

It's been really great hearing you talk on the panels here and talking to you today. I don't know where or when I would have had that chance if it hadn't been for this wonderful event that we're at. Europe in Sync have organised the Act in Sync Summit here in Athens. Do you agree? It's been a great opportunity to be able to have these discussions, get the ball rolling on these kind of conversations.

Speaker 11 43:55

Yeah, definitely. Most people here have been at many conferences and we know the format, we know the keynotes and everything. I think what's really really interesting with this is that we stick together for a few days and we hang out afterwards, and I think that's where the change is happening. It's not necessarily in the conference room, and I think that is the main success of what we're doing here, and to me, it's been really really nice to talk about music. It's the arts that we're circling around trying to get that to work. We're starting to have a conversation about music as a tool for evoking emotion. We're talking value now, not the business model of the thinking.

Speaker 3 44:37

Putting value back into music or maintaining the value of music, very important. Well, you've got about 60 seconds to get from here to your next panel, but luckily it's just across the road. Or your next meeting. Thanks for joining us. Thanks a lot for having me.

Speaker 11 44:53

You're welcome. I appreciate it, thank you.

Speaker 3 45:03

We're joined now by Sophie Labreau, who is the co-founder of the Impact Hub, which is where we're holding the Acting Sync event over the next couple of days. Hello, Sophie.

Speaker 10 45:14

Hello, thank you for having me.

Speaker 3 45:16

Yep and thank you very much for hosting our event here. It's been fantastic so far. It's such an interesting building you have here. It's like a magic trick. When you're out on the street it looks like a very small building and you come inside and it goes on forever. There's dozens of small rooms everywhere. It's a very cool neighborhood. What was the reason for putting the hub in the neighborhood here?

Speaker 10 45:40

So Impact Hub it's bringing people who work for positive impact together, so this has to have some certain characteristics. Let's say so in 2013, when we found this building and we chose to make our roots here, this was the situation. So this was a very abandoned district of the center. We are super downtown, as you know, we are in the Monastiraki city area and at that time, you know, really outside it was only drug addiction very, very dark, very, very dirty. But this area traditionally was the maker's zone of the downtown Athens. So all these buildings around were places where people were making hats, shoes, they were working with leather, they were working with metal, and so at that time, it was some of them and us, so we were the impact makers, they were the hat makers, the craft makers and all that. So this is, let's say, the reasons why we came to this area the last 10 years. Of course, it has been transformed.

Speaker 3 46:49

Yes, very dynamic moment, right now, yeah, a lot of really cool bars and cafes and restaurants everywhere. Really nice vibe. Yes, that's great. So by putting the hub here, you impacted the neighborhood. It wasn't the other way around.

Speaker 10 47:02

You didn't look for a cool neighborhood to know, on the contrary, we were looking something that could, a place, with a story, you know, and us being, you know, a little bit on the fringe of entrepreneurship, economy, innovation and all that because we speak about social, environmental, innovation and impact, and we were also, you know, a bit misfits, so we wanted a place that would fit our character, let's say and what kind of people do you have that use the space all the time?

Speaker 10 47:30

So again, it's a great variety. I should say that the people who use the space are a very small percentage of the people who are in our community. Some of them need also a space to work and they use this or host their events or their meetings, etc. There is a gigantic diversity you have from people who work with the to people who work with tourism, people who are researchers, people who are working to develop data For example, the room that we are in now. They are building electricity networks for energy communities, for scale geographic areas. You have artists, you have producers, you have business consultants, freelancers, a lot of people coming from abroad, people who visit Athens and they just want to work for a day or people who want to do a podcast, for example.

Speaker 3 48:26

That's a wonderful mixture of different industries and different kinds of people. That's nice.

Speaker 10 48:32

Yeah.

Speaker 3 48:33

And how important is it then for there to be workspaces like this?

Speaker 10 48:38

Having spaces like this allows people to have an affordable working environment. Whoever has an office has to do a lot of things that do not have to do anything with their actual job. So what we do is that we take care of all the ordinary things of an office space so that each one can do their extraordinary things of their work, but at the same time, we are hosting all these extraordinary things of what a community needs, and this is what I think we do the best. What our art is, if I may say that is this engineered serendipity, so how we can bring people together and build this community, because this is the other important thing that these places bring connections and customised networking.

Speaker 3 49:30

And you have a lot of events here as well. Yes. You have two today. You have the Act in Sync event that's been here for two days, and you have the Hearth Summit that starts today. We're doing a collaboration, a cooperation with them. How many events do you have and what kind of events do you have throughout the year? Summit that starts today and we're doing a collaboration, a cooperation with them. How many events do you have and what kind of events do you have throughout the year?

Speaker 10 49:48

I would say it's definitely more than a thousand, to be honest. Yeah, like conferences, exhibitions, debates, trainings, co-creation workshops, think tank meetings and you have a lot of really great people working here.

Speaker 3 50:02

that's been so lovely, so helpful. It must be a great place to work, very inspiring.

Speaker 10 50:07

I hope so. I hope so Because it's also tough. You know, we do all these things and many times it requires a lot of stretching.

Speaker 3 50:15

A lot of people making demands.

Navigating Work-Life Balance as Freelancers - Tianna Amore & Vickie Amiralis

Speaker 10 50:16

Yes, but also it needs a lot of heart, you know, because if you want to really take care of the other despite, if it's a person that comes here every day for the last five years, or if it's a person that will come one hour for an event only to participate and then will go, it's very important for us to host them with you know, true and authentic heart, because this is what also makes it feel like a home and not like an event space and it makes us realise we're in Athens not one of your other hubs.

Speaker 3 50:45

It gives it its own personality.

Speaker 10 50:48

Yeah, I appreciate hearing that.

Speaker 3 50:50

But the Impact Hub here is part of a global network, right, I know there's one in Berlin, for example, but this is a huge network of spaces like this, isn't it Right?

Speaker 10 50:59

Yeah, yeah, yeah. There are 126 Impact Hubs in the world. We are independent local businesses, but at the same time, we have international association, so all the founders of a local impact hub are also members of this association. I think it's a nice prototype for people to see how collective ownership can also work.

Speaker 3 51:21

Yes, absolutely, and I think this kind of thing is here to stay.

Speaker 10 51:26

Yes, hopefully.

Speaker 3 51:27

Sophie, thank you very much for joining us I know you're very busy.

Speaker 10 51:30

I appreciate that. Thank you thank you.

Speaker 3 51:39

We're back at the Acting Sync Summit here in beautiful Athens. We're at the Impact Hub and we're with Tiana Amor from Black for Nature, a filmmaker and activist, and with Vicky Amiralis from In Place of War and Earth Sonic, and you're currently the label development manager at In Place of War.

Speaker 12 51:59

That is correct.

Speaker 3 52:00

And you've both been here for a couple of days and I was at one of your panels yesterday. You've still got panels coming up later which we can mention, but the one I was at was the panel about time the time talk and that was related, I think, really to the balancing of all the things that go towards giving us a well-maintained, healthy, successful life. So did you solve that? Did you answer the question how we do that in the 45 minutes you had?

Speaker 13 52:26

I don't know. I guess it depends how you took our answers really I think, on reflection, it is.

Speaker 12 52:31

It's interesting because we have such busy lives in our work life and the way that our projects work, especially in in place of war onsonic. They're so big and ambitious and it's really important as a freelancer to give room to these big ideas and give the right time to to being able to plan and and make these things happen. And by having the ability to do that, you have to create space and and organize your time to give space to make this work and reach those ambitions, and I think it really helps to have such supportive colleagues that respect your time as well. As a freelancer, it's important to manage the time so you're not working too much over and acknowledging when you need to rest and not put too much stress on yourself.

Speaker 3 53:23

And do you find this difficult to do though?

Speaker 13 53:26

I think, kind of going back to what we were saying yesterday about, like you know, how people take time and stuff, I think that one thing that we actually discussed as well in private was that it's kind of a luxury to be able to say that you are able to take the time off. We're both freelancers, so we do have that kind of luxury of being able to say that you are able to take the time off. We're both freelancers, so we do have that kind of luxury of being able to say to ourselves that we are going to prioritize other things besides work, whereas a lot of people aren't able to do that. So it's not a thing that everyone can do. It has to be an appreciated thing in itself. I don't really struggle to do it just because I don't have any responsibilities except for myself and my own projects. So I am quite lucky in that sense that I am able to take that time off. But obviously everyone's in a different boat.

Speaker 12 54:08

So, and I think to add, to Tiana's comments that it's important to recognize that risk has to be taken to be, able to achieve these things, like I was in London, working full-time and 24-7.

Speaker 12 54:20

I was on emails and working for a very big company and I had to have the guts to take a step back and 24-7, I was on emails and working for a very big company, and I had to have the guts to take a step back and reanalyse my priorities and my health and have the confidence to be able to take that risk and kind of jump out of it. So it doesn't come without losses and I think there is a struggle to get to that point and constant work does need to happen to be able to be in that position where you can have order about your time and get yourself to a position where you can be more flexible, and I think it takes a lot to get to that point.

Speaker 3 54:58

But I think there's always this feeling that we're under pressure and we put a lot of the pressure on ourselves, that we can't take time out or we've got to be seen that we're always available or we might lose our place or we might lose out on a project. That was always a thing when I was growing up in the industry. You couldn't take a day off, you couldn't admit to having a cold because you'd feel like you couldn't afford it. It felt like a competition all the time Because you'd feel like you couldn't afford it. It felt like a competition all the time. Is that still the case? Are you just handling it in a much more sensible way than we did?

Speaker 12 55:28

I would say it's very much still the case. However, there's the ability to be selective with who you're working with and being selective about the kind of characters that you work with as well, and I think, especially in place of where everyone is so supportive and, as such a small team, it's really important that we have that support from each other, because we're dealing with really big initiatives and it's only with that support that we can make these big initiatives happen and everyone feels part of the team and there, kind of, is a safe space. I think, as a freelancer, you can at some point be selective with the people you work with, and I like to be selective just to avoid that pressure. And if people don't understand that you know this is the way I work, then they won't have the kind of luxury, of working with us and I think that's important because it's a collaboration at the end of the day.

Speaker 3 56:26

So you're setting boundaries.

Speaker 13 56:28

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3 56:29

And if anyone wants to go outside those boundaries, you can walk away from it. And, tiana, I think you said that you relatively recently graduated. Yeah so you're relatively new into the workforce. Let's call it yeah. So you're coming into this already with that mindset, whereas Vicky perhaps has had to kind of adapt to that a little bit and learn the hard way at times. Do you think that's an advantage for you that you're coming in with these boundaries in place from the very beginning?

Speaker 13 56:54

I think so. Yeah, I would say it's kind of interesting because I was thinking about this last night and I was thinking about like the, the generational differences and stuff, and just growing up with like social media and technology and all these different things that have changed or shaped each of our views. I just graduated last year so I've I've been in that position of putting myself under a lot of pressure to find work, to use my degree, to actually get somewhere in my field. But that's not just me, that's a a graduate thing. You know, people all across the globe right now are also in the same position as me.

Speaker 13 57:27

But the thing that I like to recognize and appreciate, I guess, is that in more recent years it's been easier for us to set boundaries with companies because they are more susceptible to the boundaries that we put in place.

Speaker 13 57:41

So I don't really go into spaces where I don't feel welcomed. I'm not going to put myself in a position of feeling uncomfortable somewhere that I'm not going to be recognised or heard or appreciated or valued. For me that's always been how it's worked. You know Just as Vicky was saying as well about these initiatives like In Place of War and stuff like that. These companies. They create spaces for underrepresented people to have a voice and to have a platform and to be able to connect with one another and to connect with their workforce. So I haven't really struggled in that sense of being able to take my time and to set my boundaries. It's just, I guess there's a fine line between setting too many boundaries and being like you know what, I'm not appreciated anywhere, whereas you know, back in the day it was just kind of like well, if you want to do something, you've just got to rough it out and then build your way up, and I kind of am trying to adopt that mindset now.

Speaker 3 58:35

Take it or leave it.

Speaker 13 58:36

Yeah, exactly, not everything is going to be rough. So you've got to kind of step up the ladder, but do it within your limits, but that reminds me.

Speaker 3 58:47

One of the other themes of the day yesterday was canoe, talking about suffering, having to suffer. That really stuck with me. How did you feel about that, this feeling that perhaps as a society and as a newer generation, that you're not prepared to suffer as much as probably other generations felt they had to. They felt at times that their suffering was beneficial in some way. That probably feels really alien to you and stupid.

Speaker 13 59:13

It's not that like it's alien to me. I think it was interesting because when he was talking about the suffering, everyone was in such agreement. Like you know, we have to struggle and strive to get to where we want to be and I'm not completely opposed to that idea. But the reality is like nowadays we're not really focused on that anymore. Nowadays we're much more open. A lot of things aren't hidden behind closed doors anymore. They're not left in the shadows. A lot of things are brought to light. When there's discrimination or all kinds of things that can make you uncomfortable in a workplace, they get brought to light now. So it's not that you have to choose to suffer. It just depends how you're able to manage that suffering. Essentially, regardless of where you are in your career, you're always going to find some challenges. But seeing a challenge as a suffering, as opposed to a challenge, is very different and broad line that you know, I guess everyone has to figure out for themselves.

Speaker 3 1:00:05

The word success has always been a big word as well, and people's definition of success, and it was always a feeling that to be successful, you had to be the hardest working, always available, suffering a lot, it seems to me. Thankfully, people have very different ideas of what success is. It's become very individualistic, which is a helpful thing. Do you feel that way as well?

Speaker 12 1:00:30

I definitely think success is defined differently by each individual and, thinking about the panel and the question about what's our form of success and the answers that we're given, they're all very personal. But I think actually success is learning to deal with your suffering and how you reach that output. And I think, from a creative space, you do have to suffer in some way to kind of create as an artist and reflect on things, and you know, music, paintings, are it?

Speaker 3 1:01:01

all kind of comes from a place of suffering and it's about learning to cope with that suffering and having an output for it yeah, I talked with canute a bit more about that and we've talked about how maybe something like ai could be something where it could be useful to help us get through the suffering so we don't mind the suffering so much. It becomes something that is part of a central process, the human process. But the other thing you talked about a little bit in your panel was about routines, and I'm someone who's not good at routines. I tend to be in better shape when I ignore the routine. I'm not a routine kind of person. So I just think this is also a pressure where you think well, if I get into a routine, I'll improve on everything. Do you feel the same way about that, or do you feel that that should also be very individualistic about whatever is best for people?

Speaker 13 1:01:50

I think it is very individualistic as well. The way that I think of it is everything is personalized, like if something works for me, it might not necessarily also work for you. We have so many differences on our lives. I would say I'm quite a routine person just because that's how I grew up and I'm very like OCD and organised. So if I don't have a routine, I'll feel like my whole world is falling apart, like everything is crumbling beneath me. A lot of people are able to just work under pressure. I need extra time, things like that. It's honestly just what works for you, yeah.

Speaker 12 1:02:21

I mean for me personally. My days are structured so differently, but the start and the end of it is exactly the same most days, like I wake up, I have breakfast, I walk the dog, but then I go to the studio where there is no routine at all. But then when I leave the studio, I'm walking the dog, I'm feeding the dog, I'm eating, I'm sleeping, and then it's a repeat. So every day for me is completely different, apart from the early morning and the evening. So it's mixed.

Speaker 3 1:02:47

What else, then, do you have coming up while you're still here in Athens at the event? You're both speaking on panels a bit later, vicky, what are you doing?

Europe In Synch Network & Conference Circuit - Daryl Bamonte & Alex Maiolo

Speaker 12 1:02:55

So at 5pm I'm doing a panel on our environmental initiatives within the music industry and I'm representing Earthsonic, and Earthsonic is a new project that we launched in August from the charity In Place of War, and I basically developed the record label for Earthsonic, and Earthsonic is a project that is a record label, a collection of sound archives and also live performances and the record label is releasing new music a collection of sound archives and also live performances and the record label is releasing new music that are collaborations between well-known musicians and international and indigenous creatives, as well as raising awareness of biodiversity and the kind of impact of climate change on these landscapes that we're dealing with. We're also doing some research at the moment about how a record label can be 100 carbon free, and this research will be open to all others in the music industry to follow suit in terms of take action and become more carbon free and tiana, you're going to be talking about something related to your filmmaking yeah, so at six o'clock I have another panel.

Speaker 13 1:04:03

Um, it's a mixed panel between music and film, about using your creative skills to advocate for climate change and for all sorts of environmental initiatives as well. I am going as a representative of 100 climate agents of change, which is a program created by in place of war, and I will also be talking about my project which is called black for nature, which is a collective created by In Place of War, and I will also be talking about my project, which is called Black for Nature, which is a collective for BAME individuals from low social economic backgrounds that want to get into wildlife filmmaking.

Speaker 3 1:04:33

So have you found it very useful to be here amongst I was going to say like-minded people. They're just minded people, so have you kind of enjoyed the process of this.

Speaker 12 1:04:42

All of the panels have been so inspiring to listen to and really engaging, so I'm really thankful to act and sync for organizing it, because it's a room full of really interesting people and really amazing initiatives and I'm thankful for being here and being a part of it, and I hope what I say on the panels have been as insightful as the information that I've learned from the other panels.

Speaker 13 1:05:08

Really, yeah, I completely agree. I'm taking this more as like a learning thing, because I'm like the youngest as well, so I'm getting inspiration from each person and I'm learning a lot about business and sync and all kinds of different things, and it is really inspiring as well.

Speaker 3 1:05:22

It's been great you've been here. I'm glad you've enjoyed it, even though you've been made to work quite hard. But thanks a lot for that and thanks for talking to us now.

Speaker 12 1:05:30

Great. Thank you so much.

Speaker 3 1:05:40

We're still at Acting Sync in the amazing city of Athens in Greece, joined by another couple of very busy delegates and speakers. At this year's event, we're with Daryl Bermonte, one of the people involved in Europe in Sync, which is the organizing party of Acting Sync, and we're with Alex Maiolo from North Carolina. Are you here as Alex Maiolo today? Alex Maiolo from North Carolina.

Speaker 9 1:06:03

Are you here as Alex Maiolo today? I'm here, yeah as. Alex Maiolo and I did a modular synth set under Action Group and I'm not only based out of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, but I'm also in San Francisco now. Nice, High coastal.

Speaker 3 1:06:15

But you got the right Athens.

Speaker 9 1:06:17

Yeah, not Athens, Georgia. I finally made it to the real.

Speaker 3 1:06:20

Athens Cool, very good, and yeah, you've both been very busy. You were one of the first panels yesterday morning when the event kicked off. Brilliant panel that you did. How did you find that, daryl?

Speaker 14 1:06:32

Well, I recommended Alex to Nis and Ren as the moderator because I've seen him do it before and it's essential to have a really good moderator, and I also recommended Elena Kidmoxie to them as well, because I thought the balance between the three of us would be really good and it was actually really enjoyable and a bit of a shame when it ended because we could have kept going. Elena is very confident, very sort of DIY, in what she does and it was amazing to hear her express how she gets on living six months in LA, six months back in her native Athens, and I thought you know overall that it was a really, really enjoyable panel.

Speaker 3 1:07:15

Yeah, it was great, alex. Brilliant job with the moderating as always.

Speaker 9 1:07:18

Thanks very much.

Speaker 3 1:07:19

Beautifully put together.

Speaker 9 1:07:20

I enjoyed doing it. That's the main thing.

Speaker 3 1:07:26

You'll be pleased to know that Elena Kidmoxie came on the podcast and we had a good talk, so we went into some of the topics and things that were discussed, so that will live on Excellent.

Speaker 9 1:07:34

Yeah, it's great. Once again, Daryl has put me in the orbit of making a new friend. Anytime I'm around Daryl, I usually end up with a new lifelong buddy, you know, yeah, good.

Speaker 3 1:07:44

And Daryl, what about your role or your work with the Europe in Sync Network?

Speaker 14 1:07:49

It was back in 2017 when at Westway Lab with Nuno and Marcus and they proposed it to me and I thought it sounded really interesting. So I was kind of a founding partner but couldn't become a partner because, you know, I live in the UK. But the guys found a way for me to be an ambassador from a third party country because obviously it's part funded by Creative Europe and that actually suits me because I think it's better that I go around and recommend people to participate and to spread the word about the work they're doing. So it actually turned out for the better. It suits me to do that.

Speaker 9 1:08:30

And I don't have to submit any reports or accounts. But you are also the ultimate connector. I think bringing people together is well, really sadly needed in the world we live in today, you know.

Speaker 14 1:08:39

Well, that's exactly what European S sync is connecting because, the sync industry in europe wasn't in a terrible place, but we did identify deficiencies in it, and that was about communication between all the prime actors in it between the rights holders, songwriters, ad agencies, and then the brand clients, and people were telling us that they couldn't get through the door of a different area of sync, and vice versa. So it was set up to foster a better understanding and better communication of sync in Europe, hence the name, and it's doing exactly that. So that's connecting, isn't it?

Speaker 14 1:09:14

It is absolutely connecting To create an umbrella to say to people we're here to help you and if you are having trouble getting hold of a rights holder or an ad agency, and it's working really well. And then what Marcus does? He does all day workshops where he will invite people to come in and then teach them basically all the aspects of sync and how it works. And that benefits all of us in the long run, because I'm a rights holder as a publisher, you know. So it's going to benefit me from that aspect.

Speaker 9 1:09:42

Sure, I mean, it's all about sharing information, obviously, and another thing that I see is a lot of my British friends were so gutted by Brexit that they've doubled down in any way they can on promoting a unified Europe, and I look at Europe in sync as okay. Well, I'm going to run away from this isolationism and I'm going to run towards bringing people together and sharing and being part of one big, beautiful thing and the spirit between the people is absolutely brilliant.

Speaker 14 1:10:13

I mean, the work gets done and everyone's serious and focused, but I think it is important at the beginning of the day and at the end of the day that we really enjoy each other's company. Sure, sure, sure.

Speaker 9 1:10:23

I mean that's it.

Speaker 9 1:10:23

You have people who are creators and who make things and sometimes they can be not so great at getting that out and then on the other end, you have people who are hungry for new things and new experiences, new music, new art and all of that. And it takes these connectors in the middle and one of the things I love about coming to these places is you've got these goodwill ambassador vectors and they all gather in one place and they all go home and have these evangelical moments. You know where they're like. I've just come from the most glorious thing Let me share with you and it matters. It matters so much. It changes things. This stuff has changed my life and I feel so privileged to have been a part of it and to get to talk to these people, but also to go home to my music communities and share what I've learned.

Speaker 14 1:11:12

But talking of your music community, are your peers where you live? Are they aware of how vibrant the European conference circuit is?

Speaker 9 1:11:21

Part of the reason they're aware of it is because of the previously mentioned evangelical work.

Speaker 3 1:11:26

I do so you are a connector there I like to be. Yeah, talking about the conference circuit. We're very experienced at going to all the different conference events and of course, there's the big famous ones, but I think these more bespoke boutique events, like the one we're at here in Athens now, are always in interesting locations, where the location becomes a character in itself. These tend to be more meaningful. You make more meaningful relationships with these ones, right?

Speaker 14 1:11:54

Yeah, I think absolutely Some of the smaller ones. You actually find that you get to meet more people because you all club together and move around in one large group, so I pretty much got time with everyone over the three days.

Speaker 9 1:12:08

I fully agree with that. Yeah, because I do some work with South by Southwest. I help pick the panels and do some other things for them and that's obviously a massive festival and if you do it wisely, it's the ultimate choose-your-own-adventure festival. If you do it wisely, you will make international contacts. It will matter, it can break your band, depending on you know hustle and luck, but it's a lot. It's really overwhelming, you know. Whereas you come to something like Thailand Music Week or MENT, they're manageable.

Speaker 3 1:12:39

I think the secret to these smaller events is that it's a shared experience, and people love shared experiences.

Speaker 14 1:12:45

Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 3 1:12:46

So we all have stories of how we met at these smaller events For sure, what we did there, who we saw there, who else we met. Yeah, one of the extra layers of Acting Sync is that it looks like they're going to be moving it around city to city, which gives an additional point of point of interest.

Reflections on Act In Synch 2024 - Nis Bogvod & Ren Harvath

Speaker 14 1:13:02

The partners all had different tasks, like when Marcus does the workshops and Nis took over what was known as the lab, and then he came to Reaper Barn two years ago and said this is how I want to do it. I want to make it act in sync, and I just thought it was a brilliant idea immediately to encourage the sync community to do more to combat climate change, and we came up with some initiatives that we're still exploring and he went out there with so much passion and got such an immediately good response from so many places. People are like, yes, absolutely. You can see it's only the second edition.

Speaker 14 1:13:39

Berlin in September of 2023 was amazing, but already it's scaled up. And when you see the profile of the people who are coming here and the interest and the attendance and the way that everyone stays and is engaged with the events and it's such a brilliant idea and so many people are behind it, you know partnering up with Earth Percent, brian Eno's organisation and various other organisations, united Nations, live and real big players that immediately really were inspired by what NIST was proposing and so, yeah, the job they've done on NIST has been outstanding.

Speaker 9 1:14:17

I like the idea of Europe in sync, going to cities that aren't the natural choice. I like being in Athens, because it's the story of civilisation, europe and think.

Speaker 3 1:14:24

Going to cities that aren't the natural choice. I like being in Athens because it's the story of civilization.

Speaker 14 1:14:28

Yeah, the cradle of democracy.

Speaker 3 1:14:30

I found that additionally meaningful and inspirational as well. But yeah, I agree, they've done a great job getting this together. Great that you're involved in it, great that you don't have to do the admin you can turn up but certainly, from talking to the group as well, your expertise has proved essential to getting this off the ground as well.

Speaker 14 1:14:50

Well, thank you for saying that, Paul, yeah.

Speaker 3 1:14:52

Thanks, alex as well, for coming and doing your thing so beautifully Always a pleasure. We're back here with NIS and REN again. You'll remember them from yesterday. They're the organizing party for the Act in Sync conference, event or summit that we're at at the moment. And, guys, we're coming to the end of two very full, very busy days. How are you feeling? Or have you not had time to even think about this yet?

Speaker 5 1:15:23

Yeah, it's super exciting, and what I said yesterday about putting people together who are really inspiring and energizing and they did energize each other, like there were a lot of really great conversations and we were really happy with that. I think it all came together really nicely and everyone felt really really inspired yeah, I can only second that.

Speaker 4 1:15:43

More than we expected. Actually, it's been so warm and inspiring. People's reaction has been so welcoming.

Speaker 5 1:15:50

I was really happy to see that we managed to mobilize the local Greek community a bit through Athens Music Week largely, and some other partners, and they all came and they were all really interested and they were here with us and there was a lot of really great conversations besides the panels also, so people who met each other the first time but just really made the connection between them.

Speaker 3 1:16:13

Well, I think the concept you had of creating something very intimate, very full of knowledge and such a diverse mix of people from all different fields has really worked well. I've been in a lot of these panels and learned so much about how people are thinking and working these days.

Speaker 4 1:16:30

But again, you know, knowing the people that we invited and had all the previous talks with them, we also knew that they were talkative, that they had an open mind to speak their minds and what we want to create, and what we have created, is a community feel. I just asked everyone to see this as a community and we did that yesterday morning, saying we hope you will all listen to each other, ask questions, and people have been here so it is like a whole community feel and that is also what makes it special.

Speaker 3 1:17:03

They're very invested, aren't they? It's the right word. Yeah, boutique events like this. This seems to be the way to go.

Speaker 5 1:17:09

Yeah, maybe that's the ideal number of people to bring together for a couple of days so they can get to know each other, and they have the mental capacity to get to know this many people.

Speaker 4 1:17:20

But it is also the staging, and this venue is like we have two big rooms where there's a place for 100 people in each and there's a courtyard in the middle, and when you change from room to room you will always meet someone in the courtyard and we interact and it just makes it so vibrant.

Speaker 3 1:17:41

Absolutely Probably too soon to ask, but what plans do you have, if any, for an event in 2025?

Speaker 5 1:17:47

We do have a mandate to organize at least two more events during the European Sync Program, hopefully more. We are still very much under the effect of this one, I guess, and the setup that worked out really well here, having found this local community, who are giving us this space and and environment, is something that perhaps initially we would like to have again somewhere else and find this again somewhere else.

Speaker 4 1:18:14

I think we have the bricks to build something from. The most important thing is actually to go home and to evaluate and make like a protocol of what was good here. So we know that. Okay, we need to tick all these boxes because we cannot do it alone. We need a team and we cannot afford a team, so we need to hook up with someone. We need a space that is not too big. It should be intimate, it should be somewhere people want to come, you know. So all these elements we have to put into account a lot of pieces to put in place.

Speaker 3 1:18:43

You've done a fantastic job getting it together. It's been a success. As far as I can see, Everyone I've talked to for the podcast has been very positive, very invested, as we've said. So great, and I hope you do it somewhere equally as inspiring next year as well. Yeah.

Speaker 5 1:18:57

I hope so too.

Speaker 3 1:18:57

Congratulations.

Speaker 5 1:18:58

Thank you, paul, thank you. Thank you, paul, thank you, thank you.