News coverage of Google’s acquisition of YouTube has focused on YouTube’s three young inventors, including St. Paul native Jawed Karim, and their $1.65 billion payday. But the merger, with its huge payment for a year-old website, also raises broader questions about the changing nature of the Internet.
 
No longer is the Internet merely for sharing facts and figures; increasingly it’s for creating connections with people. The hundreds of social networks springing up all over the Internet are changing how people keep friends, find jobs, enjoy hobbies and even choose life partners. What is the social web? How did it happen? And why is it so important?

John Riedl, professor of computer science and engineering at the University of Minnesota, will discuss these and other questions. He will present a selection of YouTube movies, social websites, and massively multiplayer online games in action. An audience Q&A session will follow.

Professor Riedl’s research has been featured in The New Yorker, NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw, and Dateline.  He holds four U.S. patents and is co-author of Word of Mouse: The Hidden Marketing Power of Collaborative Filtering, and co-founder of Net Perceptions, a leading real-time e-marketing company.

Get tickets at The Continuing Education & Conference Center site or call 612.624.4000.