Michael Schießl, co-founder and CEO of eye square, opened the conference with a perspective presentation on the impact of technological change on the human experience. This development has also transformed eye square's research approach.

He conceives eye square's development as a laboratory of technologies and models coming from fields of applied and digital arts, IT development coding or gaming.

In his META analysis, he described the increasing fusion of text, image and material design in advertising and communication.

Boundaries between media and real reality are broken and blurred. For him, 3 factors are crucial: total connectivity, artificial intelligence and augmented reality.

As an example, he presented a personal work of art: "MariAI" - a digital representation of the Mother of God, created with the help of midjourney and DALL-E by the design studio CreateCreate.

How can new concepts, ideas and technologies be commercialized?

The Memex Conference is also a venue that addresses the triad of code, commerce and creativity. Jekaterina Cechini, chief product officer at Zenhomes/Vermietet.de, presented a case study of the results of a strategic shift the company made.

Last year, Vermietet.de shifted from a supply-driven approach to being more user-friendly and demand-driven. Her team examined the important relationship between customers and the company.

The result: the key lies in user-friendliness. Users can be led into a closer and more "valuable" customer relationship this way, just like in a funnel. Better UX leads to more activity, more subscriptions, more revenue and more success for the company.

Dr. Martin Andree captivated the Memex audience with his presentation on the amazing link between advertising and product performance.

In essence, he tried to clarify whether marketing, or better semantics, can be part of objective, measurable product attributes.

How can placebo effects be harnessed in marketing, how can they be measured? The placebo effect is located on the emotional level of human experience and can therefore contribute significantly to the success of a product.

Dr. Andree described the effect using the example of pharmaceuticals: the effect of drugs (and placebos) increased significantly, by up to 30 percent, when logos or positive information were added. The logo is a subjectively effective "painkiller".

The same is true for other products. Dr. Andree fascinated the audience with the insight that sensory and cognitive perception can have effects on emotional perception as well as on physiological constitution.

What opportunities does AI offer in the analysis of large, implicit data sets?

For Dr. Frank Buckler, there are treasures hidden in the data. Seemingly unrelated volumes of seemingly random, qualitative data hide valuable data: important trends, patterns, or insights that can be leveraged.

With implicit intelligence, as an example, purchase decisions and loyalties can actually be predicted from sheer volumes of data.

With text categorization and driver analysis, optimizations become possible, here especially in pricing. AI is not more intelligent per se, but it is faster and more consistent in dealing with large data sets than humans.

Once again this year, we welcomed Olaf Schlesinger from SevenOne.Media and Screenforce as a speaker at the Memex Conference.

This year, Olaf Schlesiger presented the findings of the follow-up study to "Track the Success" from 2021. The study "Mapping the Moods" goes even deeper into researching the world of television and focuses on the moods and lifestyles of viewers.

What do people feel and experience when they watch television? What else are they doing while watching? How does the mood of media users influence attention?

A better understanding of moods will enable better attribution of advertising to the viewers' needs. The next study, "Mapping the Impact," has already been launched for this purpose.

Art historian Zoya Dare provided the conference audience with unusual insights into experimental procedures of art viewing with examples from the laboratory and field studies.

The topic of perception has always been part of the art discussion, but until now there has been relatively little knowledge about actual patterns of perception.

People spend an average of seven seconds in front of a work of art in a museum.

Important differentiating factors in art viewing are faces, composition, the fame ("brand") of the work, but also the context and the viewing situation. Lighting, positioning in space, and neighboring works play a major role in the experience of art.

The interference of experience systems goes hand in hand with media familiarity and visual literacy. The more familiar a medium, the longer the attention.

Mathias Krupna has been closely associated with eye square for ten years. The entrepreneur and designer traveled through space and time with the visitors.

We are moving faster and faster towards the future. How can we prepare and unfold for the future? The future is already hidden in the present, in people, things, processes, organizations.

In his talk, the founder of CreateCreate dealt with utopias and the conceptualization of ideas through methods from design and art.

His conclusion: People live facing the future, but process experiences retrospectively. AI also helps with this. For the future, it is important to leave spaces unoccupied and not to try to plan and intentionally occupy everything.

An intermedial-entertaining lecture was held by the art historian Katharina Weinstock. She also addressed the media and post-digital context and the existing human need for haptic touch and materiality.

She skillfully explained the differences between substantial and other reality, including an outline of developments in the representation of objects and haptic impressions on screens and in print.

Her talk was a trip from Marcel Duchamp's 1947 surrealist book Touch to current trends like ASMR (Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response). To understand and serve people's digital needs, research into sensory-bodily response, especially the senses of taste and touch, is essential.

People have complex relationships, with each other and also with objects and products. Virtual spaces become more real through haptic elements or simulations.

With the Memex Pre-Week last year, the conference is a meeting place for the creative business scene.

The new format "Berlin Pitch Night" started in this year's supporting program of the conference. The eye square Human Experience Family supports start-ups with advice, training, further education, intellectual exchange, financing and networking.

The pitch gave young entrepreneurs the opportunity to present themselves to a community of entrepreneurs, investors, science and art.

Sally Abdelghafar, resident entrepreneur at eye square, moderated the evening where six start-ups introduced themselves.

Clearco2.com, the platform for corporate carbon footprint management, Quantpaper.com with systematic innovation research, Meicook.com, sustainable fast food vending machines, MetaLearning, a language learning app and Allaboutcurating.com, a one-stop-shop project for art curators and AltSpace.com, which wants to activate the creative potential of users.