Takeaways From Digital-Life-Design 2024

AI in everything

This year’s conference was clearly dominated by artificial intelligence, or AI. At DLD, the "doomers” – those who consider AI mainly a threat – were clearly in the minority, but even the biggest proponents agree that AI needs guardrails to mitigate the risks:

• Deepfakes, algorithmic biases, plagiarism – there is no quick fix for these problems.
• The quantity and quality of training data limit the performance of large language models.
• Development requires supercomputing power, which is expensive and limits the number of players.

Speakers from the EU institutions at DLD were confident that they have created a regulatory "gold standard" with their risk-based approach in the first legislative framework – the AI Act. However, AI stars such as Jonas Andrulis from Aleph Alpha fear that Europe is once again leading the way in regulation rather than innovation – strengthening the dominant position of US tech companies while talking about European digital sovereignty. Nevertheless, industry representatives such as Claudia Nemat, CTO of Deutsche Telekom, called for optimism: “Don't let German angst ruin the huge benefits that responsible AI use can bring.”

The role of Europe

It was clear at DLD that geopolitics is also becoming increasingly important in the field of technology. Digital sovereignty remains at the top of the political agenda in Berlin and Brussels. And Brussels legislation is decisive in determining whether the EU can keep up in the global race for leadership in key technologies. It came as no surprise that DLD organizer Steffi Czerny wants to hold another DLD in Brussels this year given it’s the year of the European elections: "We need to strengthen Europe.”

As the digital landscape continues to reshape industries, the DLD conference emerges as a dynamic platform where the forefront of innovation is not just discussed but actively shaped.