We have a new addition to the keynotes of OPEN 2009 Symposium. Massimo Menichinelli is interested in studying how openness affects the design practice.

Massimo Menichinelli is a designer working and researching on open collaborative projects (Open Design/Open P2P Design) and the systems that design them since 2005. He’s interested in the relationships between design, localities, communities and complexity, learning from Open Source, P2P and Web 2.0 software and adopting their principles and practices. He has worked as a designer and also at the Politecnico di Milano where he has given lectures about the relationships between design/locality/community/complexity and he has been interested in the organization of the design community of some courses. He has participated both as participant and as organizer of Design and Open Source related conferences and events both in Italy and in Spain. Recently he was invited as facilitator for a workshop about Open Innovation at UrbanLabs 08, an event organized by Citilab-Cornellà (Barcelona) dedicated to the use of new technologies to generate social innovations for the city and citizens. He was also invited as a co-facilitator for a workshop about Post-Industrial Design at I Realize 09 (Turin) organized by TOP-IX and aimed at researching disruptive innovations.

He collaborates with the P2P Foundation and publishes articles and books within the openp2pdesign.org project, an under construction network for the research and design of open and collaborative projects, systems and processes for communities and localities.

Massimo will present his keynote on Friday 6th November. In the mean time, you can find out more on his ideas from the blog Open Peer-to-Peer Design and follow him on twitter as openp2pdesign.

PS. Don’t forget that on Wednesday 14th of October is the final deadline for short paper submissions.

We are happy to inform that we have confirmed our first keynote speaker. Professor Yrjö Engeström will deliver his keynote address on the 5th of November.

Yrjö Engeström is Professor of Adult Education and Director of the Center for Activity Theory and Developmental Work Research at the University of Helsinki. He is widely known for his theory of expansive learning and his work in the field of Activity Theory has been adapted to different contexts ranging from organisational development to interaction design. Currently he is interested in co-configuration as a new way for organising work.

He’s the author of several books, including the most recent From Teams to Knots (2008). The book outlines the shift from fixed teams into fluid collaboration across organisational borders. We’re all very excited to hear his thoughts on openness.

Stay tuned for more confirmations.