LAWBYTES 123: THE INFORMATION COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY (ICT) SUMMIT FOR MILLENNIALS AND THE FIRST LEGAL LECTURE ON 4D PRINTING IN THE PHILIPPINES (Copyright by Dr. Atty. Noel Guivani Ramiscal)

 

Last December 4 and 11, 2016 were significant occasions for my cyberlaw advocacies. I got to lecture for, and interact with over 500 millennials on current and present issues on cybercrime, social media, cryptology and 3D printing. The one day ICT summit on Gensan and Davao cities were endorsed by the Philippine Commission on Higher Education, the Professional Regulatory Commission and the newly formed Department of Information Communication Technology, upon the efforts of one of the providers, UPRC.

Needless to say, I was thrilled. This was the first time that a summit covering all those topics specifically geared toward the concerns of millennials was ever held in the Philippines. These gave me the opportunity to reach out to the young people and leaders in these places and share with them my cyber law advocacies and at the same time learn from them, particularly the matters they really desire to know and lack guidance in. When I finally got to these places (the KCC Convention Center in Gensan and the Philippine Women’s College activity area in Davao) I was bawled over by the warm reception I got from the millennials who attended and stayed for the entire duration of the summits. The audience comprised of students, educators and professionals who are mostly 18 to their late 20s who actually paid in full the registration fee. Some of them stated that they paid with their allowances. Not desiring to disappoint, I took them through the “essentials” in the commission and means to address cybercrime; the scientific, technical and legal developments in cryptology and how these concern their security and privacy; the various ways 3D printing can disrupt their professional and personal lives, as well as intellectual property concerns; and how social media’s usage can determine one’s survival in both the virtual and real worlds.
In both summits I conducted, where I spoke and interacted with the audience for more or less 8 hours, I felt their authentic desire and hunger for cyber law knowledge, which were also reflected in the comments they gave me on the evaluation sheets. It is truly my privilege to have done this for them.

In my pursuit of blazing the trail for Law and Information Technology (IT) Evangelism, I have decided to incorporate in my 3D printing lectures, the newest development which is 4D printing. This type of printing added a new dimension, i.e. time, to 3D printed objects, and what were once static printed objects become “alive” as they interact with “time” bound elements like water and atmospheric pressure. I analyzed the emerging legal issues concerning 4D printing and presented my research findings for the first time last February 16, 2017 for the UP Law School’s IAJ. It was my honor to present this for my alma mater and I am so grateful to the supportive attendees, one of whom is Atty. Bob Dela Fuente, who is in what is probably my longest, in terms of time, group of a few close friends from UP.