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The creator of Wikipedia closes the IMPULSA Forum by encouraging young people to explore the future and share it

Over 1,200 people have followed the fifth IMPULSA Forum on collaborative and open society

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“The future is open: explore it and share it”. With this message the creator of Wikipedia, Jimmy Wales, closed the fifth IMPULSA Forum, held in the Auditorium-Conference Centre of Girona. Over 1,200 people, mostly young, followed the Forum, which has become the platform for disseminating successful collaboration-based initiatives and experiences.

“IMPULSA Forum: open and collaborative" was the theme of this year's IMPULSA Forum, which is evolving to become the platform for young people with concerns to meet, to connect with one another and to activate their talents for social transformation. While the previous two editions focused on exploring the potential of collaboration, this fifth Forum has demonstrated the results of initiatives based on combining resources and distributed capacities aimed at generating value both for all those involved in them and for society as a whole.

At the opening ceremony, the President of the Prince of Girona Foundation, Antoni Esteve, therefore urged attendees to “be open, cooperate, get involved and make a commitment”. This message was reiterated by the former president of the World Bank, James D. Wolfensohn, who insisted: “our future will not be a world of isolated compartments, but a world that communicates globally and instantaneously”.

Antonin Léonard, founder of the collaborative Ouishare movement, for his part stated: “A new world is emerging and you are going to create it”. He added: “if you start sharing, you will observe that many people will want to share with you”. Paul Mockapetris, creator of Internet DNS, expounded this message in greater depth and, in the field of technology, asserted that “the important thing is who takes part in it. Let it be a technology available to as many people as possible”, while Andreu Veà noted that “we have to rate the power that lies in giving things, offering them to society so that it can improve them”. This opinion was shared from the perspective of scientific research by Elizabeth Marincola, founder of the PLOS publishing house, who stated: “I am confident that the fully free flow of information will translate to the faster and better advance of research. And that is good for science, good for education, good for taxpayers, good for doctors, good for patients and good for all of us”.

From the field of research, José Manuel Leceta declared: “if we want to educate a future society for the better, we obviously need to mobilise the universities, make them more entrepreneurial".

The CEO of Repsol Josu Jon Imaz, in a dialogue with Antonella Broglia, highlighted the importance of a person’s environment and emphasised that “we need a country that gives people opportunities and this is accomplished through education, technology and industry”.

The founder of Shareable, Neal Gorenflo, also gave a resounding message in asserting that “the time has come to run for your lives towards this goal, because your lives depend on it. Sharing can save your life”.

After the performance of Berklee College of Music, the Forum was closed by Jimmy Wales, who told of how his project has evolved from Wikipedia to Wikia: “the sum of human knowledge was the start but now our aim is to ensure that the sum of knowledge reaches everyone”.

Two days of activities

The talk by Jimmy Wales has ended two days of activities that began yesterday with the Close Encounters and the Open Sessions, which together were attended by over 600 people. The main event yesterday was the Prince of Girona Foundation awards ceremony, presided by Their Majesties the King and Queen of Spain. The winners of the 2014 Prince of Girona Foundation Awards are the painter Hugo Fontela (Arts and Literature); entrepreneur in biomedicine Ignasi Belda (Business); researchers Alberto Enciso and Rui Miguel Dos Santos (ex aequo Scientific Research award); and Mohamed El Amrani (Social); while Valnalón was presented with the Organisation award.

Activities parallel to IMPULSA Forum also included events associated with communication and culture. Throughout the day grand pianos were placed at different points in the city of Girona so that anyone who so wished could improvise. This initiative arose from a cooperation agreement with the Maria Canals International Music Competition of Barcelona.

Meanwhile, as a result of an agreement with the EFE news agency on the occasion of its 75th anniversary, children of different ages from schools of the city of Girona, some of which are participants on the Prince of Girona Foundation’s Pygmalion project, took part at a press conference held by Jaume Sanllorente, journalist, writer, founder of Mumbai Smiles and speaker at the 2011 IMPULSA Forum. Young journalists sponsored by the same agency also followed the events of the Forum.

On Friday, the second Annual Meeting of the Mentoring Talent project was also held. This project is promoted by the Prince of Girona Foundation and aimed at enhancing the employability and access to the labour market of young people. 150 people, including young participants and project mentors, attended the meeting.

 

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