Jarmo Eskelinen

Jarmo Eskelinen (also Elukka Eskelinen; s. 20 November 1962) is one of the leading media and creative industries experts of Finland, living in Helsinki. He works currently as the executive director of Forum Virium Helsinki, a development cluster of digital services formed by major corporations and the City of Helsinki. Forum Virium Helsinki coordinates also the Helsinki Living Lab initiative. Jarmo Eskelinen travels frequently to give talks about user generated services, digital media, open innovation and Living Labs.

Career

Jarmo Eskelinen studied architecture and worked in architectural bureaus through the 80's, organising clubs and DJíng on the side. Hobby turned into profession when he established his own production company, PopZoo Promotions in 1993. PopZoo created the concept and program for the club tent Huvila of the Helsinki Festival from 1995 to 2000, promoting for example Massive Attack and Radiohead in the venue.

Eskelinen sold the company and joined the Helsinki 2000 team in 1998 as the program director, responsible for the architecture, design, cinema, popular music, photography, digital media and urban events programs of the European Capital of Culture year.

From 2001 to 2006 he was the director of the Media Centre Lume in the University of Art and Design Helsinki. Lume is a production centre for TV, film and new media productions, coordinating research, educational and commercial projects, such as the European New Media for a New Millennium project developing interactive storytelling.

Jarmo Eskelinen has been the executive director of Forum Virium Helsinki from the beginning of 2006. Forum Virium Helsinki is a non-profit R&D company owned by the major media, IT and service corporations (including Nokia and YLE (Finnish Broadcasting Company), VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, TEKES National Technology Agency of Finland and the City of Helsinki. The company coordinates R&D projects in digital services (mainly in the areas of healthcare, intelligent transportation system and interactive media), runs networking activities, develops open innovation processes and participates in the design of the new centre of Helsinki in Pasila

ome keynotes abroad

*LabforCulture Assembly, Lisbon, Portugal, 12/07: "No Strings Attached - Wireless Possibilities for Culture"
*International Ubiquitous City conference, Seoul, Korea, 10/07: "Ubiquitous Helsinki"
*Finnish-Russian Cultural Forum, Tvér, Russia, 9/07: "Young Folks & the Internet"
*PIMRC 06, the 17th international IEEE symposium on personal, indoor and mobile radio communications, Helsinki; "Trends and Challenges"
*ENCATC Conference, Helsinki, 09/2005: “Practice based research cases”
*Banff Television Festival, Canada, 2003: “Best Interactive Format” prize in CyberPitch competition with "Accidental Lovers" TV concept
*Cambridge University, 03 / 2003: “Practice Research Research Practice” symposium, keynote “Practice Based Research models in Interactive Media”

Links

* [http://www.forumvirium.blogspot.com/ Blog: Forum Virium Naked]