In March 2011 taking advantage of the prize-awarding authority granted by the America Competes Act and with help from the non-profit Wright Brothers Institute and Innocentive, an industry leader in open innovation the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) opened this challenge to the world to solve by posting it on its open innovation portal.

WHITEHOUSE: Office of Science and Technology Policy Blog

"The action against the US bills was based on websites voluntarily censoring themselves in order to protest the restriction and damage to the internet that these laws would cause, " Dr Joss Wright, a fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute, told the BBC.

BBC: Hackers retaliate over Megaupload website shutdown

Among the luminaries who waltzed on stage for conversation were artificial intelligence godfather Marvin Minsky, Boston Scientific founder and billionaire John Abele, Oxbridgian longevity messiah Aubrey De Grey (who's got 536 friends on Facebook), Tesla Motors founder Martin Eberhard, sculptor Chuck Hoberman, Sims creator Will Wright, genomics pundit Juan Enriquez and computer scientist Sandy Pentland from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

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