Welcome to this 62nd issue of our newsletter “Weak Signals and other Trends”. Each week, I sift through hundreds of sources of inspiration to track where we’re heading. If you are a new subscriber to this newsletter, take the time to send me a note and introduce yourself, I love to understand who is reading.
We are taking a break for the summer from our weekly chats on Clubhouse ( Saturday mornings at 9am) but will be back in the fall.
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This is what I noticed this week, thank you for sharing this newsletter to those who look into the future.
Competitive Intelligence
Tech CEOs want to take your work performance data public. Make quick charts and maps. The Rise of Community-Curated Knowledge Networks. Oldestsearch.com Reverse-orders all Google search results so that you see the oldest web pages first.
Strategic blindspots
Looking at the familiar with “alien eyes” allows you to unlock new business model opportunities while avoiding risks stemming from strategic blindspots.
We just didn’t have a critical mass of people imagining it. Mumbai’s Models of Service Excellence. Taco Bell's Futuristic Drive-Thru Restaurant Uses Tiny Elevators to Deliver Your Meal. Fearing lawsuits, factories rush to replace humans with robots in South Korea. Dyson has been secretly building robots. Can Democracy Include a World Beyond Humans? CryptoCrash: what it means & doesn't mean for music.
We have scheduled the dates for 2022 for our “Strategic Blindspot course” . Our next course will be offered in Montreal on October 26-27, 2022. Registrations are now open.
Our future
Data Is Vulnerable to Quantum Computers That Don’t Exist Yet. Scientists Have Developed 'Living' Skin For Robots. Between 20 to 30 percent of new cars being “sold” in 2025 will be on car subscriptions. NASA’s mission could start a scientific renaissance on Venus. MIT Media Lab trials tiles that assemble into space architecture. How to Eat the Future. "Bye-bye to architecture, hello to arboriculture". Evolution, influence, and trends in digital advertising. New cities could pop up. Global Wealth and Lifestyle Report 2022. Welcome to the summer of robots.
We keep you updated on those trends and more on Twitter.
Weak signals
Weak signals are indicators of a change, a trend or an emerging risk that might become significant for the future. They allow us to run hypothesis, expand our thinking, and challenge assumptions. How will you interpret those in your industry or field of expertise?
So wrong it’s still… wrong. Did a TV show cause a housing crisis? Farm sells for more than twice its price. The Rise and Rise of Bhangra in North America. Apple launched its own “buy now, pay later” competitor, Apple Pay Later. Tik Tok’s trending page. Low sodium. Strip clubs can be a 'leading indicator' in forecasting a recession. China Says It May Have Detected Signals From Aliens. The migration of world’s millionnaires. A collection of contaminated lip glosses.
Join us to discuss those trends and signals most Saturday at 9am EST on Clubhouse. We have a panel of futurists that illustrate what those signals might mean, and a fantastic group of curious minds in the room.
On our radar
I am revising our Competitive Analysis course and looking at a section about how to draft inpactful deliverables. This left me to pay attention to common mistakes: Ugly visualizations, graphics that don’t make sense , Junk charts, 27 visuals that didn’t quite work, Misleading visualizations. And good examples: The End of the World is Just The Beginning Maps and the amazing work of Flowingdata. Check out also the Gapminder.
Down the rabbit hole
This section highlights a subject that lead me to many useful threads, or a single site, that opened many doors.
This week, I went down the rabbit hole into how everything is connected.
Hodgepodge discovery
Articles for curious minds and the polymaths …
Elephas Anthropogenus. The lucrative economics of expert witnesses. Inside the risky world of “Migrant TikTok”. Saran wrap. When They Had a Contest to Rename Jazz. The last of the Lehman Brothers. In Struggling Murano, a Design Intervention . The customer obsession. The kilogram. Why Do We Sleep Under Blankets.
Feeling Good
A zero-emission superyacht. Dishes for sight-impaired. An email network with rhythm. The walking forest. How we feel. Randomness.
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Contact me at Competia with your feedback or ideas. Thank you for reading.