BARCELONA—The keynotes on the last day of Mobile World Congress (MWC) were all about entertainment, and the industry got two big-name artists to help promote the cause.
Two-time Academy Award-winning actor Kevin Spacey took to the stage today to support the MOFILM Film Festival and share his insights; later, singer Will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas fame discussed his involvement in mobile.
Spacey diplomatically declined to say which kind of mobile phone he regularly uses when he appeared at the show dominated by the world’s mobile industry executives. (He later teased that he has some experience with BrickBreaker, the game on BlackBerry.) He also joked that he’s not a techie and people are always giving him phones that break after he gets a hold of them.
Spacey explained how he got interested in the mobile genre after launching a Web site, triggerstreet.com, with producer Dana Brunetti six years ago to showcase emerging filmmaking and writing talent. This was after he started to do well in film and was advised that he should only look at scripts that come from a studio. Back then, he felt he was being punished for having done well and then was being cut off from the pipeline of new emerging talent.
As an actor, director and producer, it’s important to keep the lines of communication open to first-time writers and others, he said. He also said he believes those who succeed in their professions have an obligation to help others who are on their way up. He calls it “sending the elevator back down,” saying it’s important to make sure the floor you live on is not so high that you can’t hear the voices of young people trying to make their way up.
Will.i.am described the process that led to the famous Barack Obama video that he put on his Web site, dipdive.com. He said he gets most excited when talking to programmers who write the code for mobile technology, and he discussed how the phone represents so many untapped opportunities, including using the phone as a musical instrument.
Last year, Robert Redford and Isabella Rossellini appeared at MWC to promote film on the small screen.
