100: Greenwishing, degrowth, and blackouts

June 2, 2023

Jun 02, 2023

Welcome to this 100th issue of our newsletter “Weak Signals and other Trends”. 100th means 100 weeks of searching, surface scratching, signal spotting, connecting dots… what a workout. Why not leave a comment about how you’ve used the learnings from this newsletter ?

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. This week, I received this feedback, which made my day:

Competitive Intelligence

You, in data breaches. How TikTok Shares User Data . Cached view of any page on Internet through multiple cached sources. Find Other Websites Owned By The Same Person. A way to get ChatGPT to connect to the Internet and generate responses based on Yahoo search results.

We have scheduled the dates for 2023 for our courses. “Advanced Search Techniques for Competitive and Customer Intelligence” will be offered on June 5, 2023. Registrations are now open.

Strategic blindspots

Looking at the familiar with “alien eyes” allows you to unlock new business model opportunities while avoiding risks stemming from strategic blindspots.

Model evaluation for extreme risks. Swedish internet provider Bahnhof plans to use small nuclear reactors to power its data centres and sell surplus energy to the city grid, powering 30,000 households. Kroger turns coolers into digital ad space with ‘smart screens’. IKEA Becomes First Retailer To Let Customers Pay Using Time. Florida must borrow millions to pay insurance claims . Game theory as a dark art. Care bots’: a dream for carers or a dangerous fantasy? The menopause gap.

Our future

Generating harms. Danish studio BIG has been named as the masterplanner of the floating port city of Oxagon, part of the Neom. Foresight: The mental talent that shaped the world. Trends have lost all meaning. Brain and Spine Implants Allow Paralyzed Man to Walk Naturally Again. Unregretted user minutes. Swedish company Husqvarna says its robotic lawnmower now comes with a mode called "rewilding ». Chatbots are not the future. Singularity, simplified. How developers make games for players with disabilities. Making sense of long-term thinking.

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?

The AI girlfriend. Mercado Livre's interactive fashion campaign lets viewers decide which body type is shown. A lawsuit over a jointly owned Anna Weyant painting is making opaque art market structures more transparent. What Timothée Chalamet at Chanel signals about men’s beauty. The rise of Europecore. France has banned short-haul flights, provided the same trip can reasonably be made by train. Insurance giant halts sale of new home policies in California due to wildfires. The knitting scene.

Down the rabbit hole

This section highlights a subject that lead me to many useful threads, or a single site, that opened many doors: “A rabbit hole is not a distraction. A rabbit hole is your brain trying to tell you to pay attention to something you’re curious about. Ignore algorithmic rabbit holes” ( by are.na)

This week, I discovered the Hearst Newsreel Collection is an online repository of news broadcasts shown in North American cinemas in the mid-20th Century.

Hodgepodge discovery

Articles for curious minds and the polymaths

Body languages. The perfection of the paperclip. How design is governance. The laws of the sea needs new vocabulary. Currencies matter. Locals and tourists. The future of trash. Chemists can now move single atoms in and out of a molecule’s core. A Culture Virus is an idea that rapidly spreads unproductive habits and mindsets from person to person in an organization. Data, Prices, and Central Planning. An Illustrated Guide to Mouth Gestures and Their Meanings Around the World.

On our radar

I have lately focused for a keynote address I gave this week in Quebec on systemic risks, and our difficulty in looking at risks ‘ « ripple effects ». In particular, I have been digging into the economics of electrification and energy transition. I am paying attention to the looming unsolvable equation between minerals needed, and those that are mined:

The dynamics of greenwishing. How Does Degrowth Apply to Our Minds? The U.S. Is Running Low On The Machines Needed To Avoid Blackouts. Analyzing the environmental impact of mining, geologist Simon Michaux calculated that

“since 400 BCE, various civilizations dug up 700 million tonnes of metals (everything from bronze to uranium) prior to 2020. But a so-called green transition will require mining another 700 million metric tonnes by 2040 alone… Current copper reserves stand at 880 million tonnes. That’s equal to approximately 30 years of production. But industry will need 4.5 billion tonnes of copper to manufacture just one generation of renewable technologies, estimates Michaux. That’s six times the volume of copper mined throughout history.”

Numbers

14%- According to a survey, six in ten adult Americans have heard of ChatGPT, but only 14% of them have tried it.

14,000- In the U.S. waters of the Gulf of Mexico alone there are 14,000 unplugged, nonproducing oil wells in offshore and coastal areas.

Feeling good

Guess the time. Stories of kindness. Sunstream. Who knew moulds could be beautiful? Set transitions. The Surprising, Overlooked Artistry of Fruit Stickers. Impossible street art. Worse UI, best laugh.

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Weak signals and other trends