2013 DIGIFAM SPEAKER: Jason Finkelstein

This is a series of interviews with the speakers of Digital Family Summit 2013, October 11-13.
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Jason Finkelstein is a consumer product and communications leader with more than ten years’ mobile technology experience. Jason runs marketing for mobile software company Location Labs, leading customer engagement through their Safely division. Safely’s family of mobile safety apps, available through AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon, include Parental Phone Controls, Drive Safe and Family Locator. Jason formerly managed the company’s Safely Family Locator product suite and continues to work closely with wireless carriers worldwide. Prior to that, he ran the platform business, giving developers access to tools like geofencing and location streaming.

 Jason earned his MBA in Marketing and Entrepreneurship from Columbia Business School and his Bachelor’s in Computer Science and Economics from Duke, where he started an email storage technology company. Jason lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife, son and daughter. A proud Baltimore native, Jason is also a blue crab devotee and an ardent ACC lacrosse fan.

twitter: @Safely,  @locationjason 
website: http://www.locationlabs.com
website: http://www.safely.com

How did you get involved with blogging?

In working with Safely, I’ve worked to create a blog, newsletter, and social media content that can help parents who are raising “digital natives.”

What blogs do you read regularly?

TechCrunch, Wireless Week, HubSpot

If you could travel back in time and send yourself a message, what would it be?

Find your passion and follow it. Early.

What do you think is the greatest opportunity for digital teens today?

Doing good with connectivity, more quickly and broadly than ever before possible, from promoting positive ideas to a broad audience to raising funds for those who need it, to simply offering support and encouragement to people you know in real life and those you’ve met online.

What’s the biggest danger facing digital teens & their families today?

Being used by technology, rather than using it. Best way to cope is to create and establish habits that ensure that everyone in your family–baby to adult–is exercising discretion, control and choice when it comes to mobile phones, tablets, you name it. And to hold each other accountable!

What are you going to talk about at the conference?

How “digital wellness” starts at home, and starts with *parents’* habits.

What’s next for you after the Digital Family Summit?

Keep working on ways to help families not just manage in a digital age, but to thrive.

Who are your Creative Heroes?

Ansel Adams.

Do you have any hobbies other than digital media creation? What are you passionate about?

Photography, particularly black and white. Acoustic guitar. Juvenile diabetes research awareness-raising and fundraising support.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

 Adam Gertsacov is the co-founder and co-organizer of Digital Family Summit.  He wears many hats, including those of a professional clown, an author and publisher, an artist/educator, a non-profit administrator, a P.T. Barnum impersonator, a flea circus impresario, and the esteemed hat of the Clown Laureate of Greenbelt, Maryland.