Ray Kurzweil predictions and other big moments from Postback day 1

The first day of Postback started with Broadway and ended with a brain teaser, thanks to a fascinating keynote filled with Ray Kurzweil predictions. Get highlights on all the action of the day below.

Ray Kurzweil predictions

Author, computer scientist, inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil is famous for his predictions. And today, he previewed a world in the not-too-distant future where genetics, nanotechnology and robotics converge amidst a crowd of digital marketers and ad tech professionals.

“Mobile computing is really the cutting edge of communications, computations and information processing,” he said. “But it is just the beginning.”

Citing his own law of accelerating returns, where technology is predictable and exponential growth, Kurzweil says the pace of change progressively increases in a predictable trajectory. This is the basis for his book, “The Singularity Is Near,” a New York Times bestseller.

He discussed the breakthroughs in 3-D printing as an illustration of this concept. While we are presently in the hype cycle, with expensive and somewhat clunky technology, we aren’t far from being able to print food, clothing, buildings, and more, revolutionizing the world of physical things.

Similarly, though we’ve made important advances in virtual and augmented reality, these technologies are also in their infancy. In the future, they will surely become part of our nervous system and brain, allowing us to permanently live in artificial reality. Yet, he is optimistic about the future.

“There is no doubt that this exponential growth is improving human life. Life is measurably better, but people think life is getting worse. I run into that all over the globe because our information about what is happening is getting better so we know more of what is going on around and when we can’t do anything about it, we get exasperated. But life is getting better.”

For more Ray Kurzweil predictions, check out his book, The Singularity is Near.

CEO Peter Hamilton does… well, Hamilton

Postback is legendary for its grand openings, and this year was no exception. CEO Peter Hamilton topped last year’s operatic ode to apps by this year singing a parody rendition of the runaway hit Broadway musical Alexander Hamilton, complete with revolution-era costumes and a full cast of backup singers. Even TUNE co-founders Lucas and Lee Brown joined in on the fun by opening the scene. Check out the full standing-ovation garnering performance.

An excerpt of the lyrics from this epic opening performance:

“…There’s gonna be so much here to do
And not just party through
You’re gonna be dead and tired
Happy, so happy you decided to
Join us, in Seattle, welcome to the place ya’ll
Tradin’ office hours for two days of livin’ large ya’ll…”

There was even a reference to the biggest announcement of the conference, adding:

“And there’s a million things we haven’t done
But just you wait, just you wait
They’re gonna launch something, but you don’t know yet…”

Multiverse gives marketers return on ad spend

And speaking of launching something big, the day’s biggest announcement didn’t disappoint. TUNE continues to identify challenges and address them with innovative tools that move the industry forward.

And there has been a big problem for digital marketers: Not being able to determine return on ad spend across all channels in one platform.

“Calculating return on ad spend is annoying and it really shouldn’t be,” Hamilton said. “How are you guys doing it today? Logging into a bunch of different platforms and exporting all the data and guessing? It’s manual labor and it’s just not accurate. The things don’t line up. Maybe you’re paying for a platform to be able to do that. And that’s crazy. You’re paying for all the data and you have but then also have to pay for someone to make sense of it all.”

And that is why TUNE has created Multiverse, a new free product for customers to quickly determine return on ad spend across all channels in one platform.

“We think it is a basic human right for marketers to be able to aggregate return on ad spend,” he said.

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