Dear London Futurists – Let me share a few snippets of information that you may find useful…
1.) The FutureShow TV is coming (this Monday…)
Here’s some encouraging news from http://thefutureshow.tv/:
The Future Show (TFS) is a new web-TV show created and hosted by Futurist Gerd Leonhard. TFS is the first web-TV show that explains the fast-paced world of technology to a general consumer and business audience in an irreverent, critical, engaging and exciting way. The TFS episodes are 4-7 minutes in duration and focus on topics that are relevant, impactful and of immediate interest to the curious consumer as well as to the global business professional that wants to stay ahead of the curve. Engaged consumers and curious professionals, the millennial generation as well as the so-called digital immigrants and foresight-minded business and civic leaders will enjoy TFS without necessarily having to be experts, geeks or early adopters.
Subject matters include how quickly and irreversibly technology is changing our lives, our jobs, our culture and our economies as well as the overall way we conduct business, how the future (personally and societally) will be impacted by what Gerd Leonhard calls ‘total digitisation’ i.e. by ubiquitous connectivity and powerful yet low-cost electronic devices, and what it will mean to ‘be human’ in such a fully-digital society. Some of the episodes will discuss privacy and surveillance, so-called big data, artificial intelligence, robots and the rise of ultra-smart machines, the rise of sustainable capitalism, the future of knowledge and education, ‘digital obesity’ and information overload, ‘offline’ as a kind of new luxury and much more.
The first show will be published on Monday. There’s already a preview of the series available here.
2.) Cybersalon “Reclaim our Big Data” (Tuesday)
The Cybersalon meetup are holding an event on Tuesday evening (29th April) on the subject “Reclaim our Big Data”. It’s at Digitas LBi, on London‘s Brick Lane.
The speakers are:
- Kenneth Cukier, the Data Editor for The Economist
- Smári McCarthy, director of the International Modern Media Institute and a prominent member of the Icelandic Pirate Party
- Alan Patrick, co founder of Broadsight
- Daniel A Smith, Research Fellow with the SOCIAM Project at the University of Southampton
This event is chaired by Wendy Grossman, technology journalist and writer and winner of the 2013 Enigma Award.
For more details, see the Cybersalon meetup page. Hyesoon & I will be there, along with several others from the extended London Futurists organisation team – come up and say “Hello!”.
3.) Augmenting Reality & Virtual Reality (Wednesday)
From Big Data to AR and VR…
The Augmenting Reality meetup have an event on Wednesday evening (30th April) on the topic “Augmenting Reality and Virtual Reality”. It’s at Seven Dials in Covent Garden.
The speakers are:
- Steve Dann – Amplified Robot -The Virtual Reality Renaissance Is Here, But Are We Ready? – Presentation
- Edward Miller – Business Tours UK – 360 Degree Video and Virtual Reality – Presentation.
- Steve Dann (again!) – Amplified Robot – The latest Augmented Reality news and ideas from around the world.
For more details, see the Augmented Reality meetup page.
4.) Brain Boosters (13th May)
Looking slightly further afield, Imre Bárd, Research Officer at the LSE, has organised a fascinating event called “Brain Boosters” on Tuesday 13th May. From the details at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/brain-boosters-tickets-11284138161:
Can and should we use drugs and other neuro-technologies to boost our brain function and become smarter, wiser or kinder? Join a cozy evening discussion at The Book Club on the potential perks and perils of neuro-enhancement.
Our expert guests will be Dr. Molly Crockett (UCL), Professor David Nutt (Imperial College), and Dr. Aldo Faisal (Imperial College). The evening will be chaired by Professor Ilina Singh (King’s College).
The event is organised by the London School of Economics as part of the EU Project “Neuro-Enhancement: Responsible Research and Innovation.” (www.nerri.eu)
Tickets cost £5 and guests will receive a voucher for the same amount, which can be used at The Book Club’s bar.
5.) Business 2025 – Pathways to Transformation (19th May)
The following event is happening on Monday 19th May, and is organised by Rohit Talwar of Fast Future. From http://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/business-2025-pathways-to-transformation-an-experience-in-aid-of-street-kids-international-tickets-11398339741
We are pleased to announce the first event in a series of Fast Future multi-sensory transformation experiences. The aim is to kickstart the debate on how businesses, key industry sectors and individuals can transform themselves to survive and thrive in a rapidly changing reality. Each experience will include a range of multi-sensory activities designed to stimulate the mind, body and soul of attendees. 100% of the proceeds from each experience will go to Fast Future’s chosen charity – Street Kids International www.streetkids.org
The main speaker for this first event will be Rohit Talwar – a global futurist, transformation advisor and CEO of Fast Future Research. Rohit will share the results of Fast Future’s latest research on foresight driven transformation. Rohit will argue that future success demands a complete rethink of the mind, body and soul of business. He will describe critical drivers reshaping the business landscape, highlight the resulting strategic imperatives and present a framework for driving genuine organisation-wide transformation. Rohit will illustrate this highly interactive talk with case studies of how organisations across the globe are using future insights to drive their transformation efforts.
You can also find this event on Facebook, here.
6.) Google+ Event Pages for forthcoming London Futurists Hangouts On Air
The two forthcoming London Futurists “Hangouts On Air” panel discussions now both have G+ event pages created for them:
In each case, we have a world class panel of speakers lined up. If you want to help spread the word about these events, please don’t hesitate to share these links on your own G+ page.
7.) The Future of Healthy Longevity – Tomorrow (Saturday 26th April)!
Finally, I’m looking forward to a great audience at tomorrow’s London Futurists event in B18 (basement level) lecture theatre in Birkbeck College.
The speakers are Phil Micans, Tuvi Orbach, and Avi Roy. For my own introduction to this event, see my recent blogpost.
The three speakers each have fascinating and well-informed things to say about the subject. I expect those of us in the audience will all be individually challenged and inspired, at various times in this meetup, to rethink our own personal health strategies, and/or to alter our thinking about how to change society’s presently inadequate approach to this topic.
Audience members will have a chance to contribute to the discussion too – I know several of you are already preparing your remarks…
// David W. Wood
Chair, London Futurists
PS In case you missed them, ALL the videos from the recent Anticipating 2025 event are now online at http://anticipating2025.com/agenda/.
London Futurists 