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At this year's Berlinale Keynotes, members of the digital media avantgarde - including top producers from the international games industry, Wikinomics pioneers and Open Movie directors - will discuss some of the most challenging questions facing the film industry.

In the current entertainment industry, the internet is the new key medium and games are the most important format. In view of the rapid developments in digital technology, the film industry is facing ever growing challenges and new forms of competition. After the successful premiere of the Berlinale Keynotes in 2007, this year's meeting will focus on creative, strategic and trend-setting alliances between film, games and Web 2.0. This year's meeting is also designed to open the festival even further to representatives of new media and to encourage innovative questions and an interdisciplinary exchange of ideas.

On Tuesday, February 12, 2008 in the Kaisersaal at Potsdamer Platz, festival director Dieter Kosslick and Medienboard managing director Petra Müller will welcome prominent representatives of the digital avant-garde to the Keynotes, which this year bears the title "The Age of Collaboration?":

Jade Raymond. This ground-breaking 32 year-old is considered to be the first star producer in the games industry. In November 2007, she launched her much anticipated game "Assassin's Creed", which went on to sell 2.5 million copies within 4 weeks. Ms. Raymond was already developing software on her computer at the age of 14. She went on to work as a programmer at Sony and also collaborated with "Sims" creator Will Wright at Electronic Arts to produce "Sims Online". Today, she is a video game producer at Ubisoft in Montreal. In her Keynote, Ms. Raymond will be speaking about her work as a creative producer and how the narrative structures of video games and cinematic images influence each other.

Jordan Mechner is the screenwriter for Jerry Bruckheimer's (Pirates of the Caribbean) current Disney project Prince of Persia, which is a live action version of the video game of the same name created by Mechner. "Prince of Persia" also happens to be the most successful and best selling computer game series of all time. Mike Newell (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Four Weddings and a Funeral) will direct Prince of Persia, which will be the first installment in a series of films in the spirit of Pirates of the Caribbean and Indiana Jones.

Don Tapscott is a top consultant and university professor as well as founder and head of the international think tank New Paradigm. As the creator of the Wikinomics Theory, Mr. Tapscott knows his way around the networked universe and has written eleven bestsellers on the digital economy, all of which have been translated into 20 different languages. In his Keynote, he will outline how the knowledge of the many and the co-operation of the masses are destined to turn the film industry on its head. 

Matt Hanson, director, producer and founder of the Visual Intelligence Agency, has set himself an ambitious goal, namely the production of the feature film A Swarm of Angels using the Open Movie principle. The budget of 1.5 million Euro will be helped along by roughly 50,000 community members who will in turn have a say in all project phases of the film. When complete, the film will be broadcast on the Internet - for free of course. 

Ton Roosendaal is the head of the Dutch foundation Blender and chief developer of Blender, the free 3D graphic software. Elephant Dream is the first short film to have been created using the free software and the input of developers worldwide. Roosendaal subsequently started the Open Movie project "Peach" and is now also working on a parallel project entitled "Apricot", which is set to be the first Open Game ever. Both are based entirely on free software, open formats and community participation.

Melinda Crane will moderate this year's Berlinale Keynotes. Ms. Crane is a presenter in several different formats at Deutsche Welle TV and also Executive Producer of Sabine Christiansen's "Global Players", the top international talk show on CNBC.

The Berlinale Keynotes are an initiative of the Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg and the Berlin International Film Festival in co-operation with the Medienanstalt Berlin-Brandenburg (Medienwoche) and media.net berlinbrandenburg. Attendance at the event is by invitation only. The language of the conference is English. For more information visit http://www.berlinale.de/ and www.medienboard.de/berlinalekeynotes.