Technology News
The future of books
Having long been an avid reader, a report on ‘the future of books’ was bound to catch my eye. As I’m sure you can guess, it talks about the emergence of ebooks and their implications for the older relative: the hardcopy book.
It’s a fascinating read, which covers six key drivers:
- Digitization of books (see our ease of publishing online driver)
- Emergence of wireless ebook readers
- Spread of wireless broadband (also have a look at our ubiquitous connectivity driver)
- Generational shift - (explore...
Sharing: does online leave you hollow?
For strapped for cash charities, spreading information online can seem like a golden option. Think of the print and posting cost of your annual report and the idea of a pdf emailed out (or whatever version you use) beckons seductively. But there is still a widespread wariness of engaging with web technologies for this. Sometimes such a view takes the form of top-level reluctance to, for example, engage with twitter; or manifests itself when an organisation plans and designs for publications ...
Reflections on yesterday's seminar
We had a great session yesterday afternoon at Third Sector Foresight’s latest Leading Lights seminar. If you weren’t able to make the session, I hope this will give you a taste of what you missed. If you were one of those taking part in a bursting-at-the-seams room, I’d welcome your comments on what most struck you about the speakers and the discussions. And if you’re interested in reading more, the links below will take you to drivers on key areas on our site.
Tessy Britton, our...
Set some trends
If you believe What the trend?, tracking Twitter’s trends is useful. So useful that they charge $450 per month to analyse the trends for you! Now, I’m not suggesting that any of you engage their services, however, the fact that this service is one of the many available to track the trends on twitter and other social networking sites indicates there is something else going on here, and something that might be worth the VCS having a look at.
Twitter trending (listing the topics that are...
The virtual world is your oyster
Ever fancied adopting a homeless person? Well now you can! iHobo, a recently launched iPhone app, offers you the opportunity to adopt your very own iHobo who will come and live in your iPhone for 3 days. Following an initiative in 2006 where a Spanish charity used a homeless avatar in Second Life to raise money, the aim of iHobo is that after 3 days of dealing with all the problems thrown up, you’ll understand a little more about homelessness, and feel compelled to donate to the charity...
Private actions, public consequences
What One Alfred Place can teach us about how to treat your membership in the age of social media.
The private members club One Alfred Place is a very nice institution. I’ve had delicious lunches, relaxed teas and friendly drinks there, and admired the congenial, professional atmosphere and the people I’ve met.
But there’s trouble in paradise: the new Chief Executive, Sharon Brittan, has been forced to publicly apologise after emailing members to tell them their memberships have not been...
Techie trends - flash in the pan or key tools for your work?
It’s the turn of the decade and predictions abound. The Evening Standard recently produced its version: what impact will technology be having on our lives in 2020 ? You’ll be able to control the TV with your mind, play games telepathically, and even have your fridge make your shopping list for you. Sounds like this will all make for a great weekend, but how is it also relevant for your working week?
The Power of your mind
How can using the power of your mind to control machines help you...
I am what I read?
For a while, my news mainly came from the RSS feeds I chose to come into my netvibes account. This was a form of personalising the news I received grouped into things more likely to interest me (so tabs for politics, culture, the third sector, technology etc) – still in the main from news providers and journals, but divided up by topic not source. Then I started to use my network on delicious to find my way to articles that friends and colleagues had bookmarked as being of interest. ...
Social media and membership organisations
The apparent threat (or opportunity) that social technology presents to membership organisations is summed up in the subtitle to Clay Shirky’s zeitgeisty book Here Comes Everybody: The Power of organizing without organizations. If ‘everybody’ can organise action by themselves (or rather, together), what possible reason is there for organisations to exist?
The first answer is, of course, that ‘everybody’ is not coming quite yet. Older people in particular – precisely those who,...
Teasing out the technology drivers
If I started a conversation with you by stating ...
online revenue, cloud computing, social media, ubiquitous connectivity, data handling, on-demand services & the real-time web
... besides looking at me askance, you'd probably assume I was talking about technology.
You'd be correct, but in fact these are just some of the most significant drivers we've singled out for further analysis from the 58 initial technology and internet trends we've spent the last month looking at here at 3S4.
58?
I know.
T...
