How Many Ways Can Google Transform Tolling?
When a technology company is into everything from big data to driverless cars, it can quickly become an icon for everything that is hopeful, exciting, and innovative about a more efficient, prosperous future.
When that company is Google, it’s tempting to think about how its next wave of discoveries could transform a technology-driven industry like tolling. And that’s why Transformed by Technology is such an apt title for the keynote session at IBTTA’s 81st Annual Meeting and Exhibition that features author Daniel Sieberg, Google’s Head of Media Outreach. His book, The Digital Diet: The Four-Step Plan to Break Your Tech Addiction and Regain Balance in Your Life, looks at how to integrate technology and communicate effectively in today’s fast-paced world.
Sieberg was already a recognized technology writer and sought-after speaker by the time he joined Google in October 2011. His reporting for CBS News, CNN, ABC News, and BBC News America earned him an Emmy nomination. He appeared on MSNBC, NBC News, Fox News, Al Jazeera, and National Public Radio, on two of Canada’s national television networks, and in the Vancouver Sun.
Working for a company with a hand in so many fields that are all moving so fast, Sieberg might have trouble deciding what to cover in his keynote address.
- Should he talk about autonomous vehicles and their potential to make highways safer, denser, and more efficient, including Google’s talks with car-sharing start-up Uber about a major play in smart transportation? Or focus on the risk of hacker attacks in the vehicles we already see on our roads?
- Will he look ahead to a new generation of wireless technologies to support all-electronic tolling and interoperability? Talk about smartphone apps that could either disrupt or improve on today’s systems? Or tie in Google’s recent billion-dollar acquisition of a congestion-busting consumer application called Waze?
- Could he outline how standard tools like Google Analytics help businesses of all sizes tap the power of big data? Or boast about the sheer size of Google’s current cloud storage capacity of four trillion transactions?
- Or will he just focus on the Google tools that tolling agencies can use to supercharge their social media outreach?
Whatever we hear from Daniel Sieberg, it will prove once again that we all have a lot to learn—and that industries often spot their best ideas and innovations in other sectors.
There are so many great reasons to attend IBTTA’s annual conference in Vancouver next month, but Sieberg’s keynote will be a moment that you won’t want to miss. There’s still time to register for IBTTA’s 81st Annual Meeting and Exhibition, September 22-25, 2013 in Vancouver.