 Welcome to the 33rd Chaos Communication Congress. It's great that you all made it here and join us for this huge event. And of course, we also want to say hi to everybody who is watching the stream today, whether you are at home with friends at your local airfare or at the heck space of your choice. I've got a question to the people who are here in the room today, everybody in the room, also people in this wonderful police box, who is at the first Chaos Communication Congress ever? Please wave. Wow. That's a lot. Wow. Welcome to all of you. It's great that you found your way here. When I came to Congress first, I had mixed feelings before. Like my first feeling was nervousness, like it was like, what should I do here? And there were many questions. Like the first question was like, could I connect to people or would I stand like in a corner hiding because I'm intimidated by all the cool stuff people I'm doing? But people looked down on me because I'm not like the lead taxer or because I'm not fluent in Pearl. But like, yeah, the following years it was okay, but like today the nervousness came back because like something to do with the stage, but yeah, we'll get better. Before I came to my first Congress, I had similar feelings, but as soon as I arrived, all my worries and fears were gone. I was so fascinated by all the blinking lights, by the awesome projects, and by the openness with which people talk to each other and work together. I was really overwhelmed by how Congress is an event that is shaped by all its participants, that is made by all of us for all of us. Like first dimension, first dimension the angels, like all those volunteers who make Congress work for us, who work for us and who can't be thanked enough. Like they do a lot of tasks and some of them you see, some of them you don't. For example, they collect bottles, and you really help them by dropping your bottles at the bottle drop points when you exit those halls through the exit. In this hall, there are 16 emergency exits that are marked with a green exit sign. There are 10 main doors, four left, four right and two central, six doors at the rear of the hall, three left and three right. Please note that the exit nearest to you could maybe behind you. Angels do a lot of other tasks too. For example, they watch the doors so the halls don't get overcrowded. They announce speakers, they do translations and subtitles, this year also in French sometimes. They help you if you should get lost. And they care for a constant supply of ice cubes and limes behind the scenes at the bar so there's always enough junk to go around. To list all their tasks would take us a lot of time. So let's thank all the angels, even those we couldn't mention here with a sundering round of applause again. And becoming an angel is really easy. All you have to do is register in the angel system which is on the internet, go to heaven which is in this building and find a job that suits you. Even as a first-time attendee of Congress, you can be a part of it with the positive side effect that you will get to know new people. And if you are shy, maybe you should take the night shift and watch the entrance because then you will have to talk to your co-angels in order to avoid falling asleep. When I first went to Congress, I was also fascinated by all the people who seem to be living in this Congress building for days to build up this huge event and to bring us all the infrastructure. For example, they brought us the internet. But they also bring us couches, they bring us a decked phone infrastructure and they bring us a giant snow globe to dance in. All this is only possible because people have incorporated one guiding principle which of course all of you know, be excellent to each other. For sure, yeah. For sure, Congress is not the island of the blessed. Conflicts exist here as they do everywhere. But you and we and so many people in the past years and even decades have been trying hard to make it work, to make it better step by step. And I think we've come a long way in doing so. After only a few days at my first Congress, I was sure Congress works for me. This would not have been my last Congress. But suddenly as every year Congress was over, I left the building that was not blinking anymore. I went to the train station and I got kind of sad. People weren't excellent to each other anymore. People were just rushing into their overcrowded trains. There was no mutual consideration. And I fell into kind of a post-Congress depression. I think some people know that. And I asked myself like, where are all the people that are inspired and enthusiastic? And where is like the respect towards these other not considering like anything like features or appearance? Any day that is not a day of camp or Congress or another chaos event leaves something to be desired. I guess most of us will agree on that. But the last 12 months provided us with even more reasons to be subdued and to yearn for another world. For a few days, we will now have that. We can live another life in another world. We can do what we love and share all this with like-minded people, which is great. But when you take this year's motto, works for me, there could not be a stronger contrast to my feelings towards the world out there. There, nothing seems to work. And I've got a lot of bug reports to file. Not all of those bug reports are technical. And not all of them might be ours to fix. But they all make the world out there not work for me. Do you think it's not that bad? Then let's look at a few examples. Our freedoms are cut back more and more. In the 90s, people fought the crypto wars to make strong encryption accessible for everyone. Today, state actors call for laws to build backdoors into products leaving every single person less secure. Secret services all around the world infiltrate standards and software to get access to the communication of simply everyone. Didn't we learn anything since the groundbreaking revelations of Snowden? And now we rely on a few big corporations to withstand these developments, which of course they only do to keep their unique selling point. This doesn't work for me. But it's not just about the digital world, which might be a focus for many of you. Violation of human rights are at the order of the day. People all around the world face repression if they stand up against totalitarian systems and injustice. Free speech is censored and persecuted. People are facing years in prison, face being tortured or worse if they speak up and stand up against the system. All across the world, right-wing populists now dare to act in the open and in some places they even saw this power. From the idea of a connected world, we now face a shift towards parochialism, towards isolationism and from there also to national supremacy. In this climate, aggression and hate towards perceived minorities flourish. Houses burn, people get chased through the streets and people die. These are only like a few prominent examples. Many people on this place face existential threat every day. We don't see them or we don't feel them yet. Shorts caused by over-exploitations causes wars and causes death. Just because a problem doesn't happen in our backyard means that it's not terrible or that it doesn't affect us anymore. But how long do we dare and I include myself to look away and to ignore this? Does this really work for us? I know my answer and I believe many of you share the will to make things better step by step. All those problems and there are many, big and small, can easily make us feel helpless. So how can a single person change anything at all? Well, there's one good message. There is no need to travel alone. Just take a moment and look around you. Look at your seat neighbors. There are 3,000 people in this room alone. And there will be 12,000 people at Congress, which is amazing. 12,000 people for you to get to know, to make friends with or to meet again. And all of you have unique skills, big ideas and all of you can do great stuff. It's up to us not to just make Congress work for us but to use this Congress to connect, to share ideas, skills and knowledge, to work on projects, start new projects and connect to people. It is up to us not to stay in the gated communities that evolved and transport what we do here in Congress and what we start here to the outside world. We cannot hide under a cozy blanket and wait until the world magically gets better again. No more than ever. It's time to take action. This is not a game. There is no game. You can start right now, gather into gangs and practice for the coming year. After you got your wristbands, you have the opportunity to get one of these cards. Who got one already? Yeah, that's a few. That can be improved. Okay, you know what to do. So maybe those of you already got one, named yourself and selected your special skill that is your own. If you did not grab a card, don't worry, you can still get one. To start, no game, but action. You need to form a gang with other people with different skills, nine skills which you can combine to solve tasks and to succeed. You can move and act together. You don't have to travel alone. There is no game. There's action. And now let's Congress begin. Work, have fun, enjoy, get to know each other and try to make the next year a bit better than this year. And by the way, don't forget to wash your hands, wash your hands, take a shower from time to time and don't forget to sleep and eat. Thank you.