Seven years ago, the Media Future Week was born in the head of my colleague Frank Visser. Our main goal was to bring students and lecturers of different Universities of Applied Science to the next level in their professional and personal development. The working title of Media Future Week was: ‘De knal week’ (the bang week). It would be a week with positive energy and good vibes where great ideas and collaborations are being born. Looking back at these seven years of Media Future Week, I can see that the bang is getting bigger and bigger!

Media Future Week is a pressure cooker event for students and lecturers with different backgrounds. Together they work on a challenge and present their solution at the end of the week. During the week, they are in an intense (9.00 am- 9.00 pm) program of inspirational speeches, practical workshops and co-creation sessions. Quite a journey where you learn a lot about the future of media, working in a team with people you’ve never met before, and about you as a person. One of the participants once described MFW as a rollercoaster ride.

MFW vibe was born

The first Media Future Week was in 2011 in Almere. Wednesday, we had the first big bang – everything came together! That was the first time I experienced the MFW vibe: a big hand of applause when a speaker finished his speech. The team spaces that became a playground, working space and experimentation room all in one. Friendships that emerged.

Another big bang was the introduction of case partners during the second Media Future Week. It was so great to see the professionals being infected with the MFW vibe and refreshing view of our participants. I remember one of the case partners saying: “we would like to invite this team to make their idea reality with us”. The Media Future Week instantly served another goal: connecting media organizations to (the ideas of) young talent.

Hilversum Media Park: MFW to the next level

After three years Almere, the Media Future Week moved to Hilversum in 2014. Here we introduced something new: The Media Park Safari. Here, the participants got the chance to visit media companies for a look behind the scenes. Nowadays, Hilversum Media Campus organizes these Media Park Safari’s on a regular basis because it was such a success at Media Future Week.

We also started to enlarge our big bang by generating more buzz during Media Future Week. More and more professionals find their way to MFW for masterclasses with MFW speakers. We started to make more and more MFW videos to capture the vibe. In 2015 we had our own vlogger who made incredible nice and funny video’s (parents loved the vlogs to see what their kids were doing all week). Last year we had a pop-up VR Cinema during Media Future Week.

This year: the biggest bang?

Could the bang get any bigger than it is right now? As a communications adviser, I still have a dream: to get national television coverage for Media Future Week. Last year we thought we were going to make it happen when one team said to us they were approached by RTL Late Night. At their end presentation, they revealed that this was fake news! It was part of their presentation about literacy, to show that we shouldn’t believe everything on (social) media! Unfortunately, our bang hasn’t reached national television just yet… Maybe this year?

Marlies Hakvoort
Communications, Media Future Week

Interested in joining Media Future Week this year? Join us on a rollercoaster ride through the media future, meet new interesting people, get inspired by international speakers and go home with a cocreation toolkit that is useful for the rest of your career. Keep me posted!