Papers
Papers, Articles, & Trend Reports
At the DaVinci Institute we are continually adding to our vision of the future. We have immersed ourselves in the fine art of launching new businesses, attempting to separate the myths and the fantasies from the things that work. Listed below are a few concept papers produced at the Institute. Additional papers can be found at FuturistSpeaker.com.
- Fourteen Future Trends for Business in 2009 and Beyond - Different aspects of our society are moving at radically different paces. Businesses that are flying executives around the world, marshaling resources to capitalize on new opportunities, and working teams 24-7 to meet deadlines, face a rude awakening when they have to interface with a government agency operating at a pace that makes a turtle yawn.
In his recent book Revolutionary Wealth, Futurist Alvin Toffler describes how the desynchronization of society has created more and more speed bumps along the fast lane, and with a nearly unlimited set of options for circumventing anything that slows them down, systems are becoming marginalized at a record pace.
While the radical pace differential is not just between government and business, it is precisely this desynchronized relationship that is driving the disruptive changes we’re seeing around us, the most radical of which are happening on a governing level.
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- Future Libraries: Once a Refuge, Now They Mean Business - Traditionally a quiet place for lovers of books to unwind, libraries are a place for serious students to escape to, a treasure trove for aspiring writers – and even a great hiding place from bullies where a kid can find cover among a labyrinth of shelves. They always have been a refuge. These days libraries are becoming something more than a place to hide out. Only recently did libraries become a bustling resource center for a growing number of jobless. People seeking work and budget-strained families seeking entertainment are now flocking to libraries as never before.
…….. - Future Libraries: Nerve Center of the Community - Ever since the people of ancient Nineveh began storing and classifying their books nearly 3,000 years ago, libraries have been hallowed and largely unchanging bastions of learning. But in the information age, libraries have been caste with a new identity, and the future is evolving into a very different place. Ten years ago, as the Internet began to take off, many in the tech elite were predicting the death of the public library. What the critics failed to predict, however, was libraries’ stirring ability to reinvent themselves. Much like plants that flourish with good soil, water and sunshine, libraries have actually begun to thrive in our information-rich environment.
…….. - The Future of Library Series: Part 1 – The Time Capsule Room - Most libraries will find that the Time Capsule Room will take on a personality of its own, as local people begin to participate in populating the spaces. Ideas about what constitutes a Time Capsule Room will vary from city to city, but it is the ability to differentiate, uniqueness of operation, and variety of perspectives that will give a dimension of personality to the library.
…….. - The Future of Library Series: Part 2 – The Search Command Center – One thing that is not commonly understood is that libraries have access to resources that most home-based computer researchers do not, including extensive database collections free to their patrons. For the most part, these consist of expensive pay-to-subscribe databases that few individuals can afford. As a way of shifting attention, the Search Command Center will replace the tradition card catalog as the first stop in finding information in a library.
…….. - The Library of the Future Series: Part 3 – The Electronic Outpost - As a public entity, libraries have been evolving. No longer are they the book-centric institutions of the mid 1900s. But the changes we’ve seen to date are only a tiny fraction of the changes we will see in the coming decades. There are no roadmaps that give us a clear picture of where we are headed, only fuzzy ideas. For this reason we will begin to see more and more experimentation in the area of digital libraries, and in this discussion, a version of the digital library I’ve termed the Electronic Outpost.
…….. - The Future of Libraries - We have transitioned from a time where information was scarce and precious to today where information is vast and readily available, and in many cases, free. People who in the past visited libraries to find specific pieces of information are now able to find that information online. Traffic counts in libraries are dropping. So what is the future of this once valuable resource?
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- The Future of Colleges & Universities: Blueprint for a Revolution - As the disruptive forces of the Internet bear down on colleges and universities, everyone is beginning to feel the leading winds of this impending storm, but few have a clear view of the changes to come. Newspapers, travel agencies, yellow pages, and record labels are all industries that have been greatly affected by the Internet, and each foretell a different version of what may lie ahead.
College 2.0 will witness a massive peeling apart process. Learning will become separated from the classroom. Courses will be created organically and formed around an on-demand, any-time, any-place delivery models. Professors will declare their independence and work for multiple institutions rather than just one specific college. Accreditation will shift from the Institution to the course and to the individual. And textbooks, the ink-on-paper version that we know today, will all but disappear.
- The Future of Education - While many people are making predictions about the direction that education systems are headed, we have found the best predictors to be hidden in the participative viral systems springing to life in the online world. This paper is the result of an 18-month collaborative research study conducted by the DaVinci Institute, its members and associated research teams. The focus is on the key missing elements that will cause disruptive next generation education systems to emerge.
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- Seven Predictions for the Coming Age of Micronations – On a recent trip to Dubai, I spoke at the prestigious “Leaders in Dubai” forum along with the likes of Tom Peters, former NY City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, former World Bank President James Wolfensohn, Citi Group Chairman Sir Win Bischoff, and former McKinsey CEO Rajat Gupta. While most were trying to address issues surrounding our depressingly screwed up economy, I decided to take a rather different approach. My focus was on emerging new Power Tools for the coming years, one of which was the idea of selling islands as autonomous countries.
Dubai and the UAE are on the cutting edge of island-building technology. Their creative approach to building Palm Island along with the coming Palm Jumeirah, the Palm Jebel Ali, Palm Deira, and The World, have become an inspiration to other countries such as Bahrain, Thailand, and the Netherlands where new islands are also springing to life. Countries in the Middle East have a distinct advantage when it comes to island-building because the Persian Gulf is a far more stable body of water than any of the major oceans.
My talk centered on the concept of building islands, and rather than selling them as real estate, to sell them as autonomous countries.
…….. - When Systems Collapse – Systems collapse for all manner of reasons. Historically, problems have stemmed from waning confidence associated with severely injured financial systems.
Economic turmoil has humbled great nations. The worst chapter in modern history was prefaced by Germany’s economic collapse. Argentina descended into a nightmare 10 years ago (and may never forget the horrors visited on its citizens). Mexico came close to collapse in the 1990s when the peso was allowed to float on the open market.
So, we find ourselves staring into the abyss. What brought us to this crossroads in history? Two key decision points have been cited as culprits. One, a mismanaged formula for calculating the risks associated with subprime loans, and two, the limitless money expansion properties of derivatives. But the root cause is far different.
…….. - Ten-X Stimulus Projects – As we begin the process of thinking through the places where we can insert the electrodes and shock new life into the global economy, I would propose a new way of reviewing proposals, allowing the best of the best to rise to the top. I propose we only consider projects that can provide at least a 10X rate of return on our investment dollars.
As most taxpayers who are watching this process unfold, the idea of borrowing today against future revenue streams becomes a contentious issue with severe implications for almost everyone. If we invest the money poorly, there will be no revenue streams in the future to pay the money back, a scenario that will not end well.
However, if the money is invested into some truly remarkable developments with the ability to not only jumpstart the economy but also pay handsome dividends in the future, we will have created a win-win situation that everyone will benefit from.
So what are these 10X projects and how do we decide if they have the explosive potential needed for the situation we find ourselves in today?
…….. - Watching the Income Tax System Implode - In 2003, I wrote a paper titled “The Coming Collapse of Income Tax” in which I predicted that our current income tax system would collapse within 10 years. My prediction stands, even as the clock is running out of time. I am convinced more than ever that the collapse is near.
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- The Future of Automobile Transportation - The automobile industry has literally cemented a firm grip on global cultures with streets and roadways that are designed for cars and little else. As part of my job at the DaVinci Institute, I come in contact with many of the people working on next-generation vehicles, engines, navigation systems, and power sources. The amount of effort going on in this area, driven largely by the desire to wean our nation off our reliance on oil, is truly staggering. But so far, no real disruptive technologies or systems have emerged.
…….. - 2050 and the Future of Transportation: Frictionless Vehicles and Binary Power will Define Transportation in the World Ahead – Transportation technology is progressing at a much slower pace than some of the other sciences such as information technology, biotech, and nanotechnology. As an example, the world’s human speed record was set in 1969, a full 37 years ago, when Thomas Stafford, John Young, and Gene Cernan flew in Apollo 10 at 24,790 mph. While there is much talk about flying at a speed that approaches the speed of light, very little effort is actually being expended in this area. But that is soon to change.
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- The Future of Gaming – Where brilliant thinkers like DaVinci, H. G. Wells, and Mandelbrot inspired much of the world around us today, the world of tomorrow, the very world where we will be spending the later years of our lives, is now being imagined inside the young minds of today’s gamers as they learn to harness the awesome power hiding in each gamer’s toolbox.
…….. - Messing with the Reality of Reality - Life is a game. Every day we find ourselves in the middle of the game, involving the work we do, the people we hang out with, and the social structures that surround us. But who exactly created this game? Each day we live our lives as animated playing pieces, playing by rules that others created. Conformity is a constant force, imposing a lifestyle that most of us were born into, saddled with goals that often go cross-grain with our personal strengths. All of this, however, is about to change.
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- The Future of Agriculture – Can better food create better people? Will a better food supply lead to healthier, stronger, better thinking people? This is exactly the premise that is driving many of the advances in farming today.
Additional papers can be found at FuturistSpeaker.com.
