my kids will be playing a game, which i am total in not understanding at all, and my kids say, "jump," and i go, " how?" everything that is intuitive to them is completely foreign to me. the good news is i am at no risk of becoming addicted to video games. the last point i would like to make is that the environment is really changing rapidly. 10 years ago, if we had sat down and talk about seniors and technology, a lot of people would have wondered why seniors would want to use computers, but that has shifted. over the next few years, as all of us move toward being seniors, we will not be wanting technology. we will be demanding it. the field is going to change, and more and more people are going to be here. so the ability to make technology accessible is there. those of us charged with doing

this have a really important role. we have to be able to provide the tools for the technology in ways that the people can hear. i am happy to be your speaking with you because i think this is an incredibly important topic. this afternoon, there is a workshop on addressing multiple barriers for accessing technology, and it will be a brainstorming session where someone from my office and a couple of other people will be leading a discussion of what issues people run into and how you deal with them. i think it is a really important topic and i think it is probably one of the most important things people could be talking about now. for all of us, technology is here and going to be here, and we all need it. thank you very much. [applause] >> thank you. thank you. thank you.

i am really pleased to be up here -- well, not really, but you're so pleased to be able to tell you about two things before lunch -- i am pleased to be able to tell you about two things before lunch. as you know, this is the middle of a process to train and teach more people how to use computers. we wanted to showcase a little bit of what folks are learning out there. first, we will show a video, and then wind up -- linda will explain about lunch. i know a few people have slipped over there, but i ask everyone to be quiet for a few minutes. there is plenty to go around. the video we're going to show right now -- i got a feeling this morning at 4:00 a.m. that tells you how dedicated people were to be able to produce it and have it here today. i wanted to thank paul grant, who has worked with the project with the family services agency senior community services employment program. you will see his good work here

also john boswell, who came in at the last minute and help us pull this together. he did it in exchange for tyne bank hours with the bay area community exchange time bank. if you want to know about that, you can learn about that across the hall after lunch. finally, from the broadband technology opportunity program, which provides opportunities for seniors and people with disabilities to teach each other, to learn from each other, and create more connections across all of our communities. please q the video, and after that, we will dismiss for lunch after a little explanation. >> we want people to come into the center and learn how to use all the different social media so they are not left behind. we do not want the whole community to be left behind. >> i have always been intimidated by computers. afraid that i would break anything. i wanted to learn.

i wanted to see if i could, you know? but i was not sure, because of my age. i have grandkids i did not get to see as often as i would like, but my son post pictures all the time. >> i thought it would be important to bring my mom and my sister to learn basic computer skills so that they are not isolated. even the medical community wants to send her notes and things via e-mail. so it is important for her to be able to learn how use the computer, at least for those simple things. >> we are part of the social media team. we will be teaching twitter, facebook, skype so the seniors in our community will not be isolated. >> there is no dumb question. we tried to make this an easygoing environment for everyone to learn here. >> they understand what you're

talking about. i want to get on the internet and, like, if i need to, call the social security office or any other business. that i would know how to get in touch with them. >> people like us who are in wheelchairs in rehabilitation situations, in hospitals -- it opens the windows of the world to us. to be able to put your eyes anywhere in the world that you want to at a moment's notice. i paid acrylics. sometimes i search the internet or put images on the internet through cameras, through different pictures that i take of the subject matter. -- i paint acrylics. >> all my life, i did not use this, but i had to learn how to tight and everything, so i tied

to find, and moved the mouse fine on my computer, so it was not a real problem -- i typed fine. everything is on the computer, and easy to find. it is like a road map. all these blogs, etc., and so on, because i have all this time. i concentrate on a few at a time. >> i never expected to have a computer. i am 96. as they say, it is hard to teach an old dog new tricks. and as you say, we do have this resistance to it. my daughter taught me how to play games. i am really hooked on that now to exercise my brain, and i

started doing other things more quickly. i find that it really helps me. i can see pictures either that i have taken or that other people have taken if they are on a digital camera. i put them into my computer, and then i can crop the picture, enhance it. find out what safeway has on sale, and then michaels. they have their ads. i do use people who advertise, e-mail, so it is a very important part of my life. i love to e-mail, and i like to hear from people. i have trouble hearing from people on the phone, so if you send an e-mail and one in answer to a question, they can find it, or if they do not know the answer, they call you back again. it has been a big help with the family in many ways.

now, i cannot be without my computer. i would be lost. >> it becomes second nature, and it becomes easier. it becomes a tool in your hand. >> it is so wonderful. memaw is on the computer. i would recommend coming here to learn the computer. it is not as hard as you think it is. >> do not be afraid. it really is kind of easy once you get the hang of it. >> go at your own face. do not get frustrated. >> do not be afraid of the computer. the only thing to be afraid of is that you will get addicted to it. [applause] >> you will see some of the

stars are around. please thank them for being so brave and consider signing up to be one of them yourself. i wanted to invite dave up again to say how much we really appreciate him being part of today's program, helping shepherd it and share his own experiences. so thank you so much. >> thank you. thank you all. thank you. you are very, very kind. can i just be selfish and say that you inspired me? i am so happy. even if i do not see you again for regularly, i am taking pictures of your faces and thinking of all the successes you will make technologically, even when i do not see you, so feel good about it. do not be afraid of it. tackle it. it is yours, and congratulations. thank you for being a wonderful, wonderful audience.

thank you. [applause] 0, and happy birthday.

>> five years ago here in san francisco, and i was toque -- joking with the mayor that it only took us four years to realize the error of our ways and move back here. it did the warriors 41 years. on a day when the city is excited about the basketball team coming back, we are thrilled to have the mayor here to help us open our san francisco office. thank you very much for all you have done. want to hand it over to you. [applause] >> congratulations. i wanted to come by.

my staff let me know the background and history of this company, and i'm very excited for it and not only wish you success, but it is our success as well as the success of the city to have you here. you're so glad to join our friends at pg&e as well as the department of the environment. their staff. we have some past commissioners as well that have served in various capacities. we are excited about clean energy, and we are excited about the reason you started here. actually started back in virginia, but you came back to san francisco, and we are excited to have you here. the model you have about the ability to communicate with people, using the social media platform, and getting kind of a personal relationship with our environment and with energy savings -- that excites us because it has been a challenge for us to talk to people. i know the department of the

environment has had that challenge. how do you educate people about helping themselves as well as help the environment? the q you canuote -- you can quote all kinds of information, but it does not become relevant to their lives, and by old power having tools to allow -- to become personal, for me, it becomes personal. do you like tequila, or do you like champagne? [laughter] i happen to be a tequila guy, but anyway. that is part of the excitement here for the staff. i love your bike racks and the way you are conducting yourselves here and growing, and by the end of the year, talking about 75 or 80 people working here, that relevancy for my neighbors, me, the residents of the city, who actually, when you

talk with them, they all want to do better. they live in a city where they want to feel they belong to the whole movement. that is why i moved to san francisco. there were a lot of movements i wanted to lead and others i wanted to join. when it comes to improvement of the environment, we want to be part of them -- the movement. we want to be part of the best city in the country. how do we get there? we personalize it. we go about every week. this is where we are saying what goes in the green and blue boxes, and we personalize our challenge making sure we know the things we use where it goes so we can get to the 100% recycling, zero ways. we talked about it to our friends in china. do you live in a city that is committed to zero ways? you are not up there yet. when it comes to energy efficiency, when it comes to

clean tat, -- to clean tech, we would like to talk to people and make sure it is personal to them. that is why i am excited about personalizing it, making it relevant, creating a competitiveness to it, but also a friendly, social environment where people can say, "i am part of san francisco. this is what i do to live here." when we reduce energy consumption, that will meet other people and more people can live in our city. it becomes expensive and unaffordable if we do not start thinking about shared values and shared living standards. that is why i am also excited about the movement about our shared economy. you are part of that. we can reduce the footprint of our people, and more people can enjoy the richness of our city. i am year for all those reasons as well as what you mentioned earlier. they are coming back, and we get

to celebrate that with you. five years from now, 3000 employees here at full power celebrating an nba championship right in our water from rita. this will be great, right? first of all, thank you very much for being part of a great company. thank you for so many of you living in our city, and thank you, alex, and the whole staff for having such a great model for clean tech, energy- efficient, and thank you for partnering with the city. we will find those opportunities to partner with you. you have a great model, and we are going to search for ways to do that. already been educated about what i do not have, which is digital thermometers in my house. i have a baby thermometer. that is how i feel warm, but thank you very much, and congratulations for being part of a great, successful -- now i know why president obama came to

you back in 2009. this is that great feeling. he had a vision there to share with you. i get to share that vision now, and hopefully in the next four years, we will do a lot of work together. congratulations. [applause] >> i want to introduce steve, the vp who oversees all of our work at piccinni, oversees the service is brought to you, who are customers of the utility -- all of our work at pg&e. thank you, steve. >> let me just say -- welcome to the neighborhood. thank you guys for choosing to come out here and join us in our home city. we are proud that you are here. we are proud to be part of this city and a partner with you and we look for to achieving those goals you laid out. we talked about making energy

personal for our customers. you have to make it personal for it to have an impact on your life, and there's probably no better example of that then the relationship you have an old power and the work you help do for our customers. i heard this morning the commission from thecpuc -- the cpuc was making a speech, and she was happy to get her report and had one smiley face and was committed to getting to two. that is one great example of making it personal. there is the work we do with social. we have the opportunity to engage people. we have a passion. we give them the information so they can help accomplish their goals. there is another aspect of this, which is really important, which i wanted to thank you all for. i have talked to a lot of our other customers, some of whom are less fortunate in terms of their income and what they have the ability to do.

they may be struggling on a monthly basis to pay their bills and to do the things they want to do in their lives. i was speaking to one customer in particular, who was excited to get their report because it helped start them on a journey to use less energy. they did simple things, they took civil actions, they became more aware, and as a result, they were saving about 20% on their bill. that has a huge impact on their life and what they can do. that is another way we can make it really personal, and that is another thing i get excited about. energy has the opportunity to power our lives and help us achieve our goals. i'm excited about where we can go with the partnership. again, thank you for joining us. thank you for the partnership. i know many of the folks in this office have probably work some

late nights to deliver for us and deliver for our customers, and i want to thank you for all that commitment. i also want to say how happy we are to have you as a customer year in san francisco. i have a feeling you are probably one of our most efficient customers in san francisco. i saw your groupon, the facebook atp -- app to see how you were doing, and you kind of put us to shame. thanks, and welcome. >> thank you. to bank a few more people and provide more context for why we are opening this office here in san francisco, we started this company five years a po intrero hill with the notion -- in potr ero hill with the notion that most customers all over the world think energy is boring and the only time they think about it is when something does not

work or when a bill comes that is unexpectedly high. we realize -- we thought, anyway, that if we provided people with more compelling information, took the phenomenal data that was coming into utilities, that we could begin to drive behavior change and drive changes in everyday lives of ordinary people. earlier this month, we celebrated having saved a tara what our of energy in partnership with utilities and customers. et al. what our of energy means practically nothing to anybody, but it is a lot of electricity, enough to power a city of 200,000 people for a whole year. what is just as exciting -- more exciting than saving the first taro hour of energy is we are going to save another tarawa of energy over the next 12 months. it took us five years to get to the first tarawa hour. it will take less than 12 months to get to the next. to put that in context another way, the entire solar industry

in the u.s. produced around 1.7 tarawa hours of electricity last year. this small company in partnership with really phenomenal large companies is having an impact that is approximately 2/3 of that, and we feel like we are just getting started. i feel confident that our ability to have an impact will grow strongly because of the partnerships that the mayor has highlighted, the partnership with facebook. the partnership with honeywell. to be imagine the thermostat. particularly the partnership we have with utilities like pg&e. i think there is someone here from the city of palo alto utilities, and we have worked with for a long time. utilities like back -- you guys are brave. utilities have had the same business model and the same basic delivery for a very long time. to recognize and appreciate that

your customers could become real partners is a really brave thing to do in an industry that has been understandably risk averse before. we are thrilled to be your partner in that change and to be providing better services and tools to your customers, to give them more control and in doing so, to build a stronger relationship and help them save. the one thing i wanted to thank were our partners. the second group to thank is government. diane is here. she was commissioner on the puc. have beenn 0 fromrdc -- we have people from nrdc. thanks of great regulation -- regulation gets a bad name these days, but when implemented

correctly, it can be a phenomenal force for good, and the state of california has led the way. local governments -- this is a phenomenal city to do business in a, a city which has attracted and under the mayor's leadership accelerated the attraction of other tech companies and built an ecosystem. when you want to start a business, you want to open an office, you need to go to where the talent is, and there is not a city in the world that has more talented people than the city of san francisco. we are thrilled to be here and to have your leadership. i do not know if we will be at 3000 employees, but if the warriors win the championship, we will be there to celebrate and to help in any way we can. we look forward to being a long- term partner of yours and the city's for years to come. of course, the third group to thank here it is it is great to

have a beautiful office, but what's most important it are the people who come in every day. i feel phenomenally blessed to have such wonderful colleagues. we started two of us at a desk five years ago. there are now 250 of us that the company. 50 people worked out of this office. we plan to double that in the next 12 months. the mayor already met our lead recruiter are here. when president obama came to visit our offices in virginia, we were 60 people. we told him we would double the company in 12 months, and he went to donny and said, "i understand you are the job czar." and she was, and we did. it is really special to be part of a community of people who are incredibly talented, who are

hard working and who work those late nights and come from different industries to work together on such an important issue, an important issue for our city, an important issue for the state, and an important issue for the planet. really appreciate you guys all coming to celebrate our opening of this office. i know there is a ribbon for us to cut. i am ready to cut it. [applause]

good evening and welcome to tonight's meeting of the commonwealth club in formed division, connect your intellect. that is our tagline.

i am the president of the inform board. tonight, we have larry hardy. the founder of burning man and he is here to talk about the amazing place and phenomenon known as black rock city. he is one of the original planners and architects. we are going to talk about the path of burning man, the future as well. before we jump into the question that had to do with what is going on, tell us about your new headquarters and how that came to be, why the move into the heart of san francisco? >> well, we were on third street, in what is left of san

francisco's industrial district , and we got lonely, really. [laughter] we saw real estate values dropping precipitously. as far as we were concerned, that was a good thing because it enabled us to move into market street. the city had encouraged us to do so, too, as they were very much interested in revitalizing market, 6th and market, which is essentially part of the tenderloin. we thought there we