I was chairing a conference for MTV Europe and CSquared Communications. The aim has been to give an international perspective on youth trends to the Central and Eastern European markets, hence the conference being in Prague. Here is a quick summary of my quick opening to the conference: Kids on bus swapping home-made tunes via their mobile; the young Hotel staff uses Bearshare to download music for free; a young guy wants to download music for free, but also wants to be a musician; Won't pay for music, but ready to pay for mobile and World of Warcraft… Many brands wanting to connect with youth are confused by all of this, as are their agencies. Too often the response by brands and agencies is - Chase the latest thing with little understanding how youth use and create with what is available to them Meanwhile the creative industry (as opposed to many creators) clamp down on young people who try to access stuff for free. They even head for court for copyright infringements instead of questioning both the law and their own business models. Problem with youth conferences is that: 1 Few youth actually are present, let alone speak 2 Those who talk are sometimes distant from youth thoughts and actions 3 Lots of theory and very few really great examples 4 Little on what the key influences are on youth culture Thankfully this conference had a bunch of great speakers that overcame this. First up was Andy Davidson, Research Director at MTV Europe. I have posted a summary of his speech here over at the citizenbay blog