Future Today #060 - Ubiquitous computing, Law of AI, Future of work
David Alayón
Chief Executive Officer @ Innuba · Innovation Advisor @ Mindset · Fellow @ Acumen · Professor @ IE & Headspring · Author of UPGRADE · Futures & Foresight enthusiast
Welcome to Future Today!?A newsletter for those curious about social innovation, disruptive technologies and futures studies. In it I share weekly articles, reports and interesting links, and recommendations of books, movies, series, events and courses.
?? World Building Contest . The Future of Life Institute is welcoming entries from teams across the globe, to compete for a prize purse of up to $100,000 by designing visions of a plausible, aspirational future that includes strong artificial intelligence. Explore the worlds of the 20 finalists our judges selected. Tell us – what kinds of futures do you want?
?? Google is betting big on ambient computing. But it’s getting it wrong . This is Google’s vision of “ambient computing”—also called “ubiquitous computing,” “quiet computing,” and “calm technology”—an idea first popularized by Mark Weiser at Xerox PARC in the 1980s. In the same magical space that inspired Steve Jobs to build the mouse and graphical user interface behind the Macintosh, the late Weiser envisioned how computers would one day weave so deeply into our lives that they disappeared.
?? 7 Essential Ingredients of a Metaverse . In many ways, the metaverse is just another name for evolving the internet: to be more social, immersive, and far more economically sophisticated than what exists today. There are, broadly speaking, two competing visions for how to bring this about: One is decentralized and the other vision is centralized.
?? Trends are dead . Everything and anything can be a trend on the internet. Why are we so determined to name them? Last month, Harper’s Bazaar fashion news director Rachel Tashjian declared that “we’re living through a mass psychosis expressing itself through trend reporting.”
?? The Working Future: More Human, Not Less . It’s time to change how we think about work.The relationship between workers and firms is changing radically, forcing leaders to rethink their approach to talent. And there’s never been a more critical time to do so: Talent is rapidly becoming the firm’s most precious resource.
?? How to Imagine Climate Futures . If you want to know what the climate might be like one or two centuries from now, talk to a climate scientist. If you want to know what it’s like to live in a world transformed by these changes, your best bet is to talk to a climate fiction writer. Climate fiction —?referred to as “Cli-fi” by its fans as a play on Sci-fi — is relatively new as a coherently defined genre.
?? In Extremely Confusing Twist, Facebook Says It Isn’t Building a Metaverse After All . In the rambling piece, Clegg reveals that Facebook isn’t planning to build its own metaverse after all. “There won’t be a Meta-run metaverse, just as there isn’t a ‘Microsoft internet’ or ‘Google internet’ today,” Clegg writes. “It isn’t a single piece of cloth, but a patchwork quilt.”
?? 5 video games to play for a better tomorrow . A playful approach to solving problems can help us tap into our collective creativity, use the power of imagination together, and have fun while we crack the code of the world’s greatest challenges. From a greener planet to a happier metaverse, from health to empathy, join us as we embark on the game-changing virtual adventures that are making the future a better (and more fun!) place to be.
?? Laserdisc, Teletrébol, Google Glasses and other technologies that never worked (and today seem ridiculous to us) (ES) Do you remember the Laserdisc? At the time, that technological ingenuity seemed like a good idea, but now it seems like an eccentric idea. A golden CD the size of a vinyl LP? Who conceived such a thing? I have friends who bought a player as soon as it came out, to watch the Godfather trilogy with the highest quality but, unfortunately, the Laserdisc was not very successful and soon fell into oblivion.
?? A quick guide to the most important AI law you’ve never heard of . It’s a Wild West out there for artificial intelligence. AI applications are increasingly used to make important decisions about humans’ lives with little to no oversight or accountability. This can have devastating consequences: wrongful arrests, incorrect grades for students, and even financial ruin.
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