By the end of this year, the world will be a different place. Not the actual world – the trees and the birds and the oceans – but the digital world we increasingly inhabit, of memes and celebrity politicians and technologies that are set to shake us from our relative stillness. Here are four things that will have happened by the end of 2018...
Read MoreA person may feel free even when confined or incarcerated, and likewise imprisoned when able to roam unrestricted, owing to and owned by no one. Freedom isn’t about space or the number of options we have in any given scenario, but the control we wield in choosing...
Read MoreChanges in our digital experience have no associated ‘moment’, and so no memory is created. We don’t remember the instant we make a new digital connection (whether it’s Tinder, Facebook or LinkedIn). It happens sometime during the daily commute, or when we’re out shopping. There’s no sensory input – sight or smell or sound – so the instant cannot be recalled...
Read MoreAutomation isn’t evil. As a precipitator of performance and efficiency, it’s the stuff of dreams. Pursuing automation blindly, however, leads us towards a cliff edge, with nothing other than manmade systems to prevent our fall. ..
Read MoreBeing human once meant living in close communities, hunting, socialising, breeding. It meant existing in tandem with the earth and nature, a close and intimate relationship that’s foreign to our modern mindset. Now, we view the natural world with scepticism. We build fences around it and place warning signs; we crop and trim its contours until it falls within our definition of safe...
Read MoreThe issue with the MVP culture, however, is exactly what it first sought to solve – the unending stream of new products introduced onto the market each year. Viable is subjective, and initial consumer enthusiasm is easier to cultivate than sustained interest and eventual product realisation...
Read MoreThose who found the concept of an automatic gear box disturbing have had scarce time to adjust; we’re already onto the next marvel in automation, and this time we’re barely involved. We’re substituting the role of master for that of watcher, even servant. With automatic cars, human presence takes a diminutive role – providing little more than context (i.e. the reason why a car drives from A to B)...
Read MorePersonal time is a luxury. The more we see of information, the more deep, innovative thinking escapes us. This is paradoxical to the common view of technology as an enabler – producing tools and services that improve our quality of life. We’re no longer required to visit shops for our favourite products, just about anything can be delivered to our door within a day and we’re less connected to the food we consume than ever. Instead of empowered, we’ve grown detached; our attention is amenable, up for grabs...
Read MoreDeep learning technology is progressing at an astronomical rate. The idea that Alexa can go beyond machine learning to consider meaning and context as well as verbs and nouns in recognised patterns, is both exciting and terrifying...
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