Of course, the music industry has a long tradition of separating a song’s profit from its creators. Still, wrote Krukowski, “the ways in which musicians are screwed have changed qualitatively, from individualized swindles to systemic ones.” May 16, 2013 at 12:43AM

You’d like to see that happening again now. But the data show that it just isn’t happening as fast. We’re having the automation and the job destruction; we’re not having the creation at the same pace. There’s no guarantee that we’ll be able to find these new jobs. It may be that machines are better than that.

That said, I’m not sure that’s a bad thing, because ultimately the purpose of economic progress and technological progress is to be able to create more wealth with less work. I mean, isn’t that what we want? More wealth with less work? So, if we are in a Star-Trek economy, where replicators create all the essentials that we need, that doesn’t have to be a bad thing if we can have an economic system that matches to it and find a way that people can share in that benefit. And people can still continue to find meaning and value in life. May 11, 2013 at 10:23AM

O’Reilly argues that the concept of a business that exists solely for the purpose of making money for its shareholders is fundamentally flawed. Every business has an obligation to create value.

Gerd adds: great summary of where the future of capitalism is going ! May 10, 2013 at 09:38PM

A new study from the International Labor Organization takes a global tour of youth joblessness and finds that what’s gone up won’t come down in the next five years. The youth unemployment rate* among the richest countries is projected to flat-line, rather than fall, before 2018. As a result, the global Millennial generation could be uniquely scarred by the economic downturn. Research by Lisa Kahn has showed that people graduating into a recession have typically faced a lifetime of lower wages. May 10, 2013 at 11:43PM

If the last century was marked by the ability to observe the interactions of physical matter—think of technologies like x-ray and radar—this century, he says, is going to be defined by the ability to observe people through the data they share…”
Really not sure I am willing to extend the Faustian bargain that far (adds Gerd) May 04, 2013 at 11:21AM

Yesterday three economists, (Tobias Preis of Warwick Business School in the U.K., Helen Susannah Moat of University College London, and H. Eugene Stanley of Boston University) published an eye-opening paper that said Google Trends data was useful in predicting daily price moves in the Dow Jones industrial average, which consists of 30 stocks.

Gerd adds: yet another reason why the current form of stock markets won’t exist in 5 years;) May 04, 2013 at 08:36AM

There’s just one thing about Santiago Swallow that you won’t easily find online: I made him up. Everything above is true. He really does have a Twitter feed with tens of thousands of followers, he really does have a Wikipedia biography, and he really does have an official web site. But he has never been to TED or South By South West and is not writing a book. I—or rather he—flat out lied about that…”

Gerd adds: great story indeed. April 18, 2013 at 07:14AM

the challenges of the connected future are less technical and more legislative, political and philsophical. The shift from a generation that started out un-connected to one that is growing up connected will result in conflicts, disruption and eventually the redrawing of our societal expectations. The human race has experienced these shifts before — just not at the speed and scale of this shift. March 20, 2013 at 01:01PM

How much attention is OTT getting? The Interpret LLC’s New Media Measure syndicated report sets the number of US consumers age 18-65 that own an Internet-enabled set top box (like a Roku player, Apple TV, Slingbox, Vudu box, etc.) at 13.6%, reported a company spokesperson. Less than 14% may not sound like much, but OTT has been around for only three years. And Interpret’s numbers don’t include the millions of users watching alternate video sources like YouTube and Vimeo. March 17, 2013 at 02:09PM

Specifically, they imagine the application of data as a “disruptive” force, upending health care in the same way it has upended almost every other part of the economy—changing not just how medicine is practiced but who is practicing it. In Silicon Valley and other centers of innovation, investors and engineers talk casually about machines’ taking the place of doctors, serving as diagnosticians and even surgeons—doing the same work, with better results, for a lot less money..,

Gerd adds: great piece - really made me think February 25, 2013 at 08:49AM