Blogs

Okay. You got me. I can’t really tell you everything you need to know about big data. The one thing I discovered last week – as I joined more than 2,500 data junkies from around the world for the O’Reilly Strata conference in rainy Santa Clara California—is that nobody can, not Google, not Intel, not even IBM.

How do people view their virtual possessions?

A study was commissioned by the cloud services company Rackspace, but carried out independently in partnership with the Centre for Creative and Social Technology at University of London.

Quoted below are some of the findings that caught my eye.

originally posted at the Trend and Foresight Blog.

Decreasing our carbon footprint—most of us who recognize the dangers posed by climate change make that a priority. But some alternative-energy engineers are taking a slightly different view. Instead of simply reducing the carbon dioxide around us, they are finding ways to channel it by using it to create clean energy.

March 1 is the inaugural celebration of future day, and it's got me thinking about urban futures again. On my futurist bookshself at the moment: Aerotropolis, by John Kasarda and Greg Lindsay. It's a business book, really: breathless descriptions of fabulous capitalists and the globetrotting edge cities they build. I'm reading it because South Korea's Songdo is a poster child for this vision of the future.

They are all positive role models. There is a common thread of hard work, humility, and talent for all three men.

The return of uncomplicated heroes signifies an uptick in public mood. After years of expecting (and finding) the worst in everyone, people are ready for a "feel good" story.

Nike's new Flyknit line of shoes was discussed in this post from Co.DESIGN yesterday. As a runner, I'm eager to check these shoes out...even though I haven't run in a pair of Nike in years. Professionally, I found several things of interest in the chatter that emerged yesterday about the Flyknit shoes. In particular, the way Nike approached the project echoed many of the things we hear our colleagues at Strategos recommend.

originally posted at The Trend and Foresight Blog

In the new book Abundance: The Future is Better Than You Think Peter Diamandis and Steven Kotler offer a vision of the future that’s truly awesome in both the most traditional and modern understandings of the word; it’s as big as it is awe-inspiring.

I have long followed the original thinking of Nikkol Kondratieff, a Russian economist, who was the first to base his theories on actual statistics. He saw the economy as a 55- to 60-year cycle where technology supplanted the old ways of doing things by increasing productivity and through the replacement of certain industries and ways of thinking with new industries and approaches.

A new meme (“What People Think I Do / What I Really Do”) has been spreading around the social media scene and we thought we'd try it out and create one for the Futurist community. Let us know what you think and if you share yours with us, we'll post it at our blog.

originally posted at The Trend and Foresight Blog

The most important change happening in the minds of consumers today is a shift towards post-modern values systems. ConsumerShift is a comprehensive cartography of the emerging consumer psyche.