thinkfuture: technology, philosophy and the future

There are always more than two sides to everything. Human beings are more complicated than that.

Melissa Rojo is leading the data migration and conversion of one of the largest American bank's most prominent loan products. She is also a project manager of an internal IBM initiative known as TechTalks. This end-to-end internal strategy is started by inviting the most up and coming startups, across all sectors to present to an exclusive group of IBMers and interested external parties. These sta...

There is one phrase that I dislike more than any other - and that's "low hanging fruit" - I've lost count of the number of times we talk about this in meetings - we have to stop focusing on the low hanging fruit and reach higher in the tree. You can't dent the universe without reaching to the top of the tree.

If you find yourself saying the above phrase to yourself when you are working on your startup, that is an indicator that something is wrong and you might need to pivot.

We return to the luminal spaces with Jesse Adenji - we are now living in uncertain times - COVID is a luminal space - we don't know if we will be back where were are - however it is a fantastic opportunity for innovation - we need to understand what we need to change and what we can change - chaos vs order - the world is almost too complicated for the human brain to comprehend - we need to be "tri...

Great rewards require great risks. What does that say if we are not even able to take small risks? We used to risk our lives for human progress, now we are afraid to leave our homes without a face covering. If we can't take risks, we will not progress. Risk-taking is required for us to move the human race forward.

Even though all fireworks are banned in California, we still heard tons of fireworks going off all around us. This tells me that we haven't totally drunk the Kool-Aid of Safetyism - we can still take risks.

Jeff goes into detail on the differences between new product development and innovation - working with the unknown - creating the right innovative culture - risk mitigation - expectations and creativity - innovation councils and developing the right innovation strategy.  https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffrey-j-weiss/

Chaos created coincidences, and these coincidences can create new thinking. Agile software development accounts for chaos - we can all account for chaos by developing the skill to account for chaos.

Why don't we ever listen and implement any of the studies that we all agree are valid? Working from home has been proven to increase productivity and happiness, but we still force our people back to work. Our environment contributes to our thinking, but we still don't have organized environments for productivity and chaotic environments for creativity, and its proven that we need psychological saf...

Martin Walker is the VP of Digital Experience & Innovation for Sound Credit Union. He has led digital transformation efforts in the financial services, sports and entertainment, retail, and foodservice industries, helping marketing, product development, business development, and operations functions become digital, data-driven enterprises. He holds a BS in marketing and an MBA. https://www.lin...

You need to be unhappy with the status quo in order to change things. Being reasonable is not connected to change and innovation.

We spend too much time in our little hyper-personalized bubbles - make it a habit to try to experience randomness outside your algorithms. Outside of your feed.   Mentioned in this episode:  http://gimmeserendipity.com  http://forgotify.com

Chris Wexler is one of the Founders and CEO of Krunam, the best in the class image and video classifier of Child Sexual Abuse Materials (CSAM). Krunam is in the business of removing digital toxic waste from the internet using AI to identify CSAM and other indicative content to improve and speed content moderation.  Krunam’s technology is already in use by law enforcement and is now moving int...

Humans crave order. We have built a very orderly world. But what happens when the chaos pokes through? A Black Swan. We need to embrace the chaos to be creative and grow. 

Our hyper-personalized experience of the internet today won't help you come across new ideas or new discoveries that you can mashup with things that you already know. 

For the last several years Preston has been deep in the design, development, and bleeding edge of AR / VR / MR and immersive computing. He loves looking into the near & distant future to come up with practical ways to solve design problems for today and tomorrow. https://www.linkedin.com/in/preston-mccauley-immersive-ux/

To grow in life - to create new and innovative products - sometimes you must run towards the pain instead of away from it. 

If there is any indication of how far Silicon Valley has fallen among the pantheon of risk-takers, you just have to look at the timidity of the culture. Whatever happened to the rollicking, risk-taking culture of the earlier days - we are no longer interested in making a dent in the universe, we'd much rather sit at home, trembling in fear and having everything delivered. 

Sergio Mastrogiovanni is a senior data scientist, executive, entrepreneur, AI evangelist, and data storyteller with career success leveraging advanced data analytics and technology integration to boost sustainable revenue,  inspire high-performing teams and manage change through digital transformation and continuous improvement, and his passion in this world is about making data accessible to...

Companies are not buying your service. People are buying you.

Why do we have to keep building new platforms? It's time we built the uber platform for all. Support The Show: https://anchor.fm/thinkfuture/support

Working within the web technology and standards community to advance a publisher-centric, user-respecting future of digital advertising. Experienced problem-solver in complex product and community environments, with deep knowledge of product strategy, marketing, community, and market design, and software development. Skilled in web-scale technologies including containers, databases, Software as a...

Continuing the conversation on electric vehicles - IMHO, electric vehicles are a cop-out - we need to innovate better power sources - why not hydrogen? Why not geothermal? Why not humans? (cue the matrix theme) https://anchor.fm/thinkfuture/support

Depending on the kind of business you want to start, you may want to be pickier about where on the pyramid you'd like to fall. In the higher levels, unless you are deeply embedded in the niche, then you might have a tough time selling premium products at a premium price. If you are looking for quantity instead of quality, no one ever really got fired for betting on money or food.