{ "blyg": "0.4", "id": "6kyhzpvdaq1svqqqjpe1cnt57v", "kind": "thread", "origin": "https://notionparallax.co.uk/", "page": "https://notionparallax.co.uk/2021/futurecards", "author": { "name": "Ben Doherty", "url": "https://notionparallax.co.uk/" }, "created": "2021-01-01T09:00:00Z", "updated": "2021-01-01T09:00:00Z", "version": 1, "content_md": "# Updated: A Game About Possible Futures - the cards \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## 5G/đ’©G\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/5gspeed.png)\n
Wildly optimistic speeds, but in the rough orders of magnitude. Do Yourself A Favour – Don’t Get A 5G Phone Just Yet\n
\n
\n\n\nEach increase in G increases connectivity speed, and changes the types of things that you can do while connected to that network. 3G allowed full webpages rather than just WAP[^wap].\n\n5G untethers broadband speeds from the geographical constraints of fibre optic or copper networks. Once there's a 5G network in place, high tech applications can be set up with no digging, it also allows for easy reconfiguration of data rich robotics in warehouses.\n\nConspiracy theorists think it's a mind control mechanism.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- In the 2030s 6G will bring even faster connections, what will that allow\n\n\n- If you don't need to re-cable, what will this mean for factories? For offices?\n\n
\n\n\n[^wap]: Not the song, but [Wireless Application Protocol](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_Application_Protocol)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## AGI fast take off\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image50.png)\n
\n
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\n\n\nSpecific—or weak—AI is useful for things like image recognition, or playing chess. Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) is different because it can solve general problems.\n\nOne of the problems that it is likely to want to solve is making itself more capable. In an AGI fast take off scenario, the AI will put all its effort into improving its ability. It may well start at dog level intelligence, and maybe over the next week or two it'll get to chimp level intelligence. Within another day or so it'll get to a stupid human, and within a minute or two will have become far smarter than the most intelligent human ever to live.\n\nThis card gives you the choice of whether you want to assume that the AGI will try to kill us all, or if it'll think of itself as a loving parent to us.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Who \"owns\" a greater-than-human intelligence?\n\n\n- Is it unethical to turn it off?\n\n\n- What impacts would AI/AGI have on a future city or workforce?\n\n\n- What if the AI's motivations don't align with ours? It's much smarter than us, should we treat it as a god?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## AI Bias\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/face_depixelizer_obama.jpg)\n
The PULSE algorithm takes pixelated faces and turns them into high-resolution images. However, it has a strong bias towards white faces. ∎ Obama -> white guy. The Verge\n
\n
\n\n\nBias can be built into algorithms in several ways. The obvious one is through the datasets used to train the system. If a dataset has only cats, it will classify a dog as a cat. It can also be introduced through the hyperparameters (the setup variables of the system).\n\nPropublica[^propublica_bias] showed widespread bias in sentencing based on an algorithm that baked in, amongst other things, geographical biases, e.g. if you live in a black neighbourhood, sentence more harshly.\n\nMany ML algorithms are considered \"black boxes\" so can't be explained. There is a lot of work on trying to make that not the case.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Whose responsibility is it to make sure that algorithms don't discriminate against particular groups of people?\n\n\n- Is there an acceptable rate of failure? What is that relative to the human rate of failure?\n\n
\n\n\n[^propublica_bias]: [Machine Bias - There’s software used across the country to predict future criminals. And it’s biased against blacks. by Julia Angwin, Jeff Larson, Surya Mattu and Lauren Kirchner, ProPublica May 23, 2016](https://www.propublica.org/article/machine-bias-risk-assessments-in-criminal-sentencing)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## AI creativity\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/alpha_go.jpg)\n
Artificial intelligence: Google's AlphaGo beats Go master Lee Se-dol Published12 March 2016 BBC\n
\n
\n\n\nAlgorithms like alpha go have been displaying signs of non-human creativity, i.e. they're doing things that their creators think are beyond the scope of their training.\n\nOther algorithms, like style transfer GANs, look creative, but are quite predictable. However they produce art-like outcomes which—it could be argued—is what most \"creative\" human \"artists\" do.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What is creativity? Can it be defined in a way that doesn't involve humans?\n\n\n- Can a machine think? If you take a pragmatist view, does that matter?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Advert free internet\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/adblock.jpg)\n
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\n\n\nThe dominant business model of the internet is making a service that people use, and then serving adverts to those people while they're there. If you could opt out of those adverts there would need to be some other kind of value transfer to make the service worth running.\n\nEach time an ad is served (an impression), it costs the advertiser a tiny amount of money, more if it's clicked. These sums would be dwarfed by transaction fees as an impression is in the order of $0.012 per impression and a transaction fee is somewhere between $0.03 and $0.30. So the payments would need to be aggregated by another party before being passed to the banks.\n\nCompanies like Blendle[^blendle]\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Would you pay money to avoid adverts?\n\n\n- Adverts make you aware of products and services that potentially make your life better. Would you suffer without them?\n\n\n- How would graphic design trends change if there was less to put on the page?\n\n\n- If the wealthy paid not to see ads, would ads change? Wealthy customers are worth more to advertise to, would people need to pay a % of their wealth to avoid adverts?\n\n
\n\n\n[^blendle]: [Blendle is a Dutch online news platform that aggregates articles from a variety of newspapers and magazines and sells them on a pay-per-article basis. The key differences to similar websites are the participation by otherwise commercially unrelated news services in a single platform and the ability for registered users to easily pay a small price per article.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blendle)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Amazon Nations\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/autofac.png)\n
\n
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\n\n\nThe relationship between enormous corporations whose resources increasingly dwarf actual countries and small countries in need of debt relief will lead to unusually baroque tax-evasion schemes and complex international monopoly issues[^monopolyIssues].\n\nPhilip K Dick predicted this in Autofac[^autofac], and there's precedent with the British and Dutch East India Companies, and Unilever in Nigeria[^unilever_nigeria].\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Given how much more powerful global corps are than states, will we start to see them taking control of nations soon? Why would they get involved at that level?\n\n\n- The nation is a relatively new concept; should we treat it as a permanent one? What other models could superscede it?\n\n
\n\n\n[^autofac]: [\"Autofac\" is a 1955 science fiction short story by American writer Philip K. Dick that features one of the earliest treatments of self-replicating machines](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autofac)\n\n\n[^unilever_nigeria]: [How Nigeria transformed from a business into a country](https://www.pulse.ng/news/local/unilever-royal-niger-company-and-how-nigeria-transformed-from-a-business-into-a/15tym8p)\n\n\n[^monopolyIssues]: https://www.home.saxo/insights/news-and-research/thought-leadership/outrageous-predictions\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Architectural team size\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image39.jpg)\n
Life as an intern, Paris, 1935 (via Fondation le Corbusier)\n
\n
\n\n\nDesign Technology has long promised a world of increased productivity. BIM is supposed to decrease the amount of work that design teams do to get given outcome.\n\nHowever, scope of work is going up; soon teams may need to deliver an _as built_ model to the client's facility managers. How do these trends balance?\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What were Architectural teams like in the past?\n\n\n- How have Architectural teams of past the coordinated with builder, client and consultants?\n\n\n- What is the Architectural team now?\n\n\n- What is the Architectural team size of the future?\n\n\n- What does the future Design Team look like?\n\n\n- What are the implications of a Design Team who are all from the same company?\n\n\n- What happens if there is no design team?\n\n\n- What if resourcing within the Design Team was a matrix of availability on a weekly/daily/hourly basis? (based on task, skill, expertise, training)\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Audio AR\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/zombiesRun.jpg)\n
zombies, run!\n
\n
\n\n\nMost Augmented Reality (AR) is thought of as visual, but there are significant technical hurdles in image processing and rendering to overcome before it has widespread adoption. Audio AR is already available; if you use google maps' walking directions through your headphones without looking at your phone then you've already tried it. (Many sports apps use audio cues to prompt performance too.)\n\nFor it to be audio, only the output needs to be audio, the input can be anything, GPS, accelerometers, microphones, even cameras.\n\n\\\"Hey Siri, who's that guy over there? Do I know him?\\\"\n\nSee the Ender's Game series for an audio AR, AI character.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- if you have an audio assistant that's able to understand the world, what would they need to be able to do for you to make it worthwhile?\n\n\n- Historical characters like Jiminy Cricket or the angel and demon on your shoulders are prototypes for audio AR. What sorts of things could this system help you with?\n\n\n- would it all be voice prompts? How else could you sonify the interaction?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Battery density\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image21.gif)\n
battery statistics battery university\n
\n
\n\n\nThe ability to store energy and then release it later has been a constant human obsession. Mill ponds are there to turn water wheels when it isn't raining and clocks run on weights and springs that release their energy slowly.\n\nChemical batteries make that energy portable in a way that was previously inconceivable[^21].\n\nTesla's PowerWall batteries allow solar power to be used at night, and the same batteries that are inside the power wall are used in cars. These allow the power providers to load balance/peak shave so that they don't need to turn on more power stations to handle peak loads.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Peak loads cost power suppliers a lot of money, who else stands to gain from batteries apart from consumers?\n\n\n- Will consumers prefer ever thinner phones or longer battery lives. What would life be like if you only charged a phone once a month?\n\n\n- Will the distribution of metals that make up batteries change global trade/power?\n\n
\n\n\n[^21]: Watch springs are the obvious precedent, but their energy density is tiny in comparison.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Bee population crash\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image45.jpg)\n
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\n\n\nBee populations are declining.\n\nIn recent winters, in Europe alone, bee losses up to 53% became a reality.\n\nPlants rely on insects like bees to reproduce. Plant reproduction is vital for our food supply. If the bees die, then we die too!\n\nThis dramatic decline in bee populations is the result of multiple factors such as diseases and parasites, climate change and wider industrial agricultural practices.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What would we need to do to support bee populations?\n\n\n- Could we come up with a technology solution to replace bees? What would the risks be?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Betting markets\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image1.png)\n
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\n\n\nOn _Who Wants To Be A Millionaire_, the _Ask the audience_ option is almost always accurate. The problem is that if you don't really know, then there's no incentive to keep your mouth shut!\n\nClassical economists like markets because of their information aggregating capacity. People who know something are incentivised to share that information with the world through the market.\n\nBetting markets, or Prediction markets are the same, but for ideas and questions. E.g. there was a question: _Will Greece declare a new national currency in 2015?_[^48] The PredictIt market said that there was only a 14% chance that it would happen; it didn't.\n\nThese sorts of markets are generally very accurate, but have had negative press because they can be seen as \"betting on terrorism\" etc.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Will being a knowledge aggregator become a profession?\n\n\n- Will a track record of accuracy be a mark of social status? A hiring criteria?\n\n\n- Are there things that are unacceptable to bet on?\n\n\n- Does this create perverse incentives to manipulate the world to win bets?\n\n
\n\n\n[^48]: [See an example prediction market](https://www.predictit.org/?marketId=1294#data1) \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Big data analysis\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image13.png)\n
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\n\n\nBig data analytics is the process of examining large data sets containing a variety of data types.\n\n> BIG DATA: to uncover hidden patterns, unknown correlations, market trends, customer preferences and other useful business information. The analytical findings can lead to more effective marketing, new revenue opportunities, better customer service, improved operational efficiency, competitive advantages over rival organizations and other business benefits.[^bigdata]\n\n[^bigdata]: [definition from here](https://crossing-technologies.com/big-data-analytics/)\n\nThe goal of analysis is for companies to make more informed decisions. They could use Web server logs and Internet clickstream data, social media content and social network activity reports, text from customer emails and survey responses, mobile-phone call detail records and machine data captured by sensors connected to the Internet of Things.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- How could this scale of information and its availability influence not just business but also society?\n\n\n- Are there negatives to a society driven by 'big data' metrics?\n\n
\n\n\n[^bigdata]: [definition from here](https://crossing-technologies.com/big-data-analytics/) \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Breakdown of traditional education paths\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
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\n\n\nAs the pandemic has interrupted schooling[^schooling] for millions, new relationships to online learning will continue to flourish, in addition to trends like unschooling, which will penetrate new demographics (beyond the fringe). The weight of student debt and continued class conflict will also draw people away from the traditional path of college education.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What is the value proposition of universities? Why not just move somewhere extremely cheap and do MOOCs for 3 years?\n\n\n- Is education about getting smarter, or about conforming, and signalling that conformance?\n\n\n- As we live longer what is happening to the proportion of our lives we spend in education?\n\n\n- Why do we generally educate in one block? Is that better than, for example, 2 years a decade?\n\n
\n\n\n[^schooling]: https://www.mintel.com/global-consumer-trends\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Broadband access inequality\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image7.png)\n
for live data[^12] \n
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\n\n\nThis is important because access to the internet gives citizens knowledge and power.[^13] These numbers[^broadbandNumbers] are mainly growing across the board with a few exceptions.\n\n* They may have reached saturation for developed countries. In these countries it may even start to drop as people start to use wireless internet instead.\n\n* In totalitarian countries access to the internet is restricted so they may not have the option to connect.\n\n* In some developing nations they may skip wired internet all together and go straight to ubiquitous wireless internet.\n\nHaving access to the internet unlocks economic and trade goods, education, political information (that may contradict official sources) and generally raises quality of life.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Will wired broadband still be needed if we have fast satellite connections?\n\n\n- What would getting broadband to the countries at the bottom of this list do to their politics?\n\n\n- If developing countries skip wired internet completely, what impact will this have?\n\n\n- Why are France and Korea so far ahead of everyone else?\n\n
\n\n\n[^12]: As far as I can tell this counts the number of connections, but doesn't take into account how many people share that connection. The number is 40 for France, but there might be more than 2 people sharing each line. Which would mean more than 1 connection per person! Data via [Google: World Development Indicators](https://goo.gl/7jVzHM)\n\n\n[^13]: Illustrated by how many totalitarian nations restrict access to the whole internet.\n\n\n[^broadbandNumbers]: \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Carbon labelling for consumer goods\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
\n
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\n\n\nLike nutrition facts on food, listing carbon expenditures[^co2expenditure] related to various products on their packaging or in marketing materials will become a norm. This could be used to justify higher prices[^fasionpricing] for certain more “carbon-responsible” items.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Is there space on the packaging? Packaging itself has a CO2 cost.\n\n\n- Does the public have the topic-literacy to understand carbon labelling? What other comms would need to accompany this?\n\n\n- How would it account for varying CO2 quantities by season and location of end consumer? E.g. a Summer cheese would make less CO2 because the cows don't need heating and eat grass, but if it was flown from France to Australia it would have a high CO2 quantity. Where would the labelling be done?\n\n
\n\n\n[^co2expenditure]: https://info.trendwatching.com/21-trends-for-2021\n\n\n[^fasionpricing]: https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/retail/our-insights/state-of-fashion\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Cashless biometric payments\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
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\n\n\nSince NFC payments—tap and go—became the norm, it has become increasingly unusual to actually make contact when you pay (i.e. insert or swipe). As this capacity has moved to phones people carry their wallets even less.\n\nYou know how iPhone’s Face ID can trigger Apple Pay’s contactless payments? Now imagine[^contactless] this technology being available in many retail settings, and in various implementations outside of the Apple ecosystem.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- If you don't need your wallet to pay now because it's on your phone, then if you don't need anything, will people leave the house without their phones? Or is there too much other value wrapped up in the phone to let it go?\n\n\n- This will need some very broad scale facial/fingerprint/iris recognition, will society value convenience over privacy again, or will this be the step too far?\n\n
\n\n\n[^contactless]: https://info.trendwatching.com/21-trends-for-2021\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Centralisation of web companies\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image11.png)\n
Amazon is now bigger than Walmart Quartz\n
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\n\n\nAmazon is now bigger than Walmart. The internet allows companies to centralise services. This is a long running trend; in 1850 your village would have a singer and someone who played an instrument for entertainment, but with the introduction of music recording the wealth from entertainment was concentrated into the very best entertainers. The same is happening to education and news providers.\n\nThis has also enabled the \"long tail\", catering to ever more specific groups of people, but the bulk of everyone's needs can be fulfilled by Amazon.\n\nWith increasing globalisation, more and more services will be provided by a centralised organisation, even if that organisation is coordinating others (e.g. Uber and AirBnB).\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Companies like Amazon and Ebay provide marketplace services to smaller companies; connecting them to consumers. What are the impacts of this?\n\n\n- Do we have all our eggs in one basket?\n\n\n- Do we (consumers) stand to gain from an arms race?\n\n\n- Politicians talk about \"breaking up big tech\". What effect would this have?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## China power shift\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
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\n\n\nChina’s status as an economic, political and cultural center will continue its meteoric rise. The US will continue its downward spiral. Chinese consumption patterns will set the tone[^chinaPDF] for the world.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Is it inevitable that China will take the USA's place as the leading global power?\n\n\n- Is there only room for one, or can China, the USA and Russia exist peacefully as equals?\n\n\n- China's culture is quite different to the USA's, what will that culture look like when it's overlaid onto the 'Americanised west'?\n\n
\n\n\n[^chinaPDF]: https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/mckinsey/featured%20insights/china/china%20still%20the%20worlds%20growth%20engine%20after%20covid%2019/mckinsey%20china%20consumer%20report%202021.pdf\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Climate migration\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
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\n\n\nClimate crises will increasingly force huge populations[^populationMigration] to relocate, causing strain over resource allocation, border issues, culture[^migrationCulture] and the overall safety of millions.\n\nClimate change in the past caused the collapse and migration of the Greenland colony, and was one of the reasons that the Germanic tribes moved on Rome, contributing to its collapse. In other words, this is not a new problem, and it's happened a lot before.\n\nThe moden world has much more structured mechanisms for dealing with refugees, but was overwhelmed by a relatively small crisis in Syria. If all the pacific islands become uninhabitable, or North Africa gets too hot, there will be a movement on a scale that will overwhelm the current system.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- How do we define crisis? Are people moving because \"the weather is better here\" or because there's a genuine need to get away from their origin?\n\n\n- If the climate is causing migration, people will be moving from uninhabitable to almost-uninhabitable areas. Will this trigger a cascade failure?\n\n\n- Can we get around this with technology? Texas's cold weather infrastructure totally failed in February 2021, what would happen if there was a major power cut in Dubai?\n\n
\n\n\n[^populationMigration]: https://intelligence.wundermanthompson.com/trend-reports/the-future-100-2021/\n\n\n[^migrationCulture]: https://www.accenture.com/us-en/insights/interactive/fjord-trends\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Compute power\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image20.png)\n
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\n\n\nThe number of transistors on a microchip has doubled every 18 months or so since transistors were invented. This was first spotted by Gordon Moore, and the phenomenon is named after him: Moore's Law[^9]. More transistors means more calculations can be done in a given time. That means that computers can do more of what we want, feel smoother and more responsive.\n\nNot only is each computer more powerful, but there are also more computers in the world. We all have computers in our pockets. There are giant data centres anywhere that a source of electricity or cooling can be found[^10]. Put simply, there is a massive amount of raw computing power in the world, and the rate of its increase is increasing[^11].\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Does more power unlock answers to new kinds of problem? Google search wouldn't be possible without a certain level of computer power. What new kinds of activity will be unlocked by more power?\n\n\n- More compute power needs more electrical power. Where will this electricity come from?\n\n\n- Does everyone have equal access to this compute power?\n\n\n- Will we ever have _enough_ computer power?\n\n
\n\n\n[^9]: [Wikipedia: Moore's law](https://www.google.com/url?q=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%2527s_law&sa=D&ust=1582431437877000)\n\n\n[^10]: Which is why there are so many data centres in Iceland.\n\n\n[^11]: Note that the graph has a log scale, that means that each line is an increase of 10 times, not of one unit!\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Concentration of functions into smart phones\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
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\n\n\nSince smart phones emerged by merging personal digital assistants (PDAs) and telephones, they've been capturing more functions. Now films and documentaries regularly contain smartphone footage. You can pay with your phone, and keep your driving licence, so they've usurped wallets. Most online shopping is done on a phone. They are all round music players and controllers for our smart homes.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What else could end up on a phone?\n\n\n- Is this concentration causing a single point of failure? If your phone goes flat away from home are you totally powerless? (No pun intended)\n\n\n- Does it even make sense to call it a phone any more?\n\n\n- What other form factors could it take? What's stopping this?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## \"Conservative\" policy dominance\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/220px-Political_Compass_purple_LibRight.svg.png)\n
What if parties on the right had control? Wikipedia\n
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\n\n\nMany countries have a system of government that is split between right and left wing factions. It's increasingly difficult to say what these factions generally represent, but they are often captured on the political compass.\n\nRight wing parties are usually characterised as being pro-business, and/or upholding traditional, often religious, values.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What if Fox News became the only source of news?\n\n\n- Most people take a view on what traditional values are good and should be kept, and are bad and should be thrown out. How do you draw this line yourself? Why do you think you hold these views?\n\n\n- What is the correct pace of progress? Should we be radical or conservative with our choices? Do you apply that to all issues?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Cost of domestic property\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image28.gif)\n
[^15] \n
\n
\n\n\nHousing is more expensive (in real terms) than ever. As a proportion of the money that people have to spend, we are spending more of it on housing.\n\nThis might be because there isn't enough supply of housing where people want to live. It might be because housing is a safe asset class.\n\nLow interest rates make it easier for those with wealth to buy more houses, and house values go up much faster than most other asset classes. Are we in a bubble?\n\nIf owning stops being attractive, wealth concentration will increase, but maybe a new _safe as x_ asset class will emerge for renters to spend their money on.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- How did we get to the position that we're in now?\n\n\n- What other explanations could there be for these trends that aren't the obvious ones?\n\n\n- What would reduce the pressure on the market?\n\n\n- Is expensive housing desirable?\n\n\n- Is the current model of how we live going to survive the rise in price?\n\n
\n\n\n[^15]: All these graphs are from: [The history of Australian property values](http://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2013/02/the-history-of-australian-property-values/) \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Cost of space travel\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image55.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nThe average cost of traditional launch methods is about $25,000/kg[^16] but the SpaceX Falcon 9 can get that down to $2,618/kg. The Falcon Heavy is expected to be able to launch 53,000 kg to Low Earth Orbit for $90 Million or US$2,350 per kg to LEO[^17]/[^wp-launchPrices].\n\nWith fully reusable launch vehicles the cost of a launch will drop to almost the cost of the fuel. As rockets are fuelled with hydrogen and oxygen, this can be made in bulk by electrolysing water, potentially with solar power. Expect the cost to launch to continue to drop.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What other mechanisms might we use to get things into space?\n\n\n- What will the price drop in space travel mean for society?\n\n\n- What limits the drop in cost of space travel?\n\n
\n\n\n[^16]: [Advanced Space Transportation Program: Paving the Highway to Space](https://www.nasa.gov/centers/marshall/news/background/facts/astp.html) \n\n\n[^17]: Quora: [What is cost of sending 1kg weight into space?](https://www.quora.com/Rockets-What-is-cost-of-sending-1-kg-weight-into-space)\n\n\n[^wp-launchPrices]: [Wikipedia Falcon_Heavy Launch_prices](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_Heavy#Launch_prices)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Cottagecore and Waldenponding\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nAs our daily activities become more screen based and virtual, there is a movement that embraces tradition. Some see it as a healing way to slow down, others see it as anachronistic LARPing.\n\nBread baking, clothes making and mending and wood carving are typical cottage core activities.\n\nWaldenponding is an explicit method of cutting one's self off from the social computer of email, Twitter and Instagram etc.[^vgr]\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Is there an ideal ratio of connected and disconnected? Why not stay connected all the time?[^vgr]\n\n\n- Many people are quite performative in their cottagecore/waldenponding, posting their bread to Instagram, or announcing that they're taking a digital detox. Is this a good thing, or a symptom of the problem?\n\n\n- Will there be something coming that replaces these trends? Another, higher/lower tech wellness trend?\n\n
\n\n\n[^vgr]: [Against Waldenponding](https://breakingsmart.substack.com/p/against-waldenponding)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Coworking and Cohousing\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nA significant proportion of effort in an office or a house is directed towards non-core activities. I.e. maintaining the photocopier or doing laundry.\n\nco-x offers a more highly serviced environment with the opportunity to mix with other, in theory, like-minded people.\n\nThose other people are the selling point and the major downside to this model. If you don't get on with your co-people then hell will be other people.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What coordination benefits are there from sharing? What can you do better in house?\n\n\n- The inducements to co housing and working are often quite expensive, and counteract the efficiency gains. Is this something that you'd go for?\n\n\n- The opportunities for increasing the service level are almost endless, how far can you imagine pushing it?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Crime/violence\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image18.png)\n
Australia is blue[^23], USA is red.[^22] \n
\n
\n\n\nGenerally, crime and violence seems to be declining overall[^24] [^25]. This may be because of better policing, or more surveillance. It could just be that we are generally richer, and therefore we feel less compelled to risk committing crimes to obtain what we don't have.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- How much crime went unreported in the past? Has this amount increased or decreased?\n\n\n- Has the Overton window moved to include new acts within the definition of _violence_?\n\n\n- Are we less violent because we have 'advanced' as a society, or because we are more afraid of getting caught?\n\n
\n\n\n[^22]: From Wikipedia: [Crime in the United States](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_the_United_States)\n\n\n[^23]: http://violentdeathproject.com/countries/australia\n\n\n[^24]: [The Better Angels of Our Nature](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Better_Angels_of_Our_Nature)\n\n\n[^25]: [for a nice interactive view of this phenomenon this article is good](http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/02/the-many-causes-of-americas-decline-in-crime/385364/)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Dark kitchens\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/dk.jfif)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nDark kitchens create meals exclusively for the online delivery market[^dk]. In the early pandemic many regular restaurants went dark only.\n\nDark kitchens have lower overheads, and can share a premises more easily, but they are at the whim of the delivery service for speed of delivery and the whim of the customer for presentation. This means that there will often be a significant overhead in packaging that can offset the savings from rent on the dining room.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- How much of eating out is about the convenience of not having to cook? Wash up?\n\n\n- This increases demand for chefs, but decreases demand for waiting staff, what will those people do?\n\n\n- Eating out is often a safe space for first dates, if the restaurant industry collapsed (or the low-mid price range did) what would that do to dating?\n\n
\n\n\n[^dk]: Dark kitchens create meals exclusively for the online delivery market - [ABC](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-04-13/the-dark-kitchens-of-food-delivery-apps/9642460)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Death of music genres\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nSpotify’s move toward mood-driven instead of genre-driven playlists has been successful to the point of suggesting that musical genres themselves will be increasingly outmoded[^outmodedGenres] in the coming years – or at least completely illegible.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n
\n\n\n[^outmodedGenres]: https://victrola.com/blogs/articles/music-industry-trends-to-look-for-in-2021\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Digital commutes and forced mindfulness\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nMicrosoft is introducing a “virtual commute” feature[^virtualCommute] intended “to create mental bookends for the remote workday”. It is also partnering with the meditation app Headspace to add a new “emotional check-in feature”.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n
\n\n\n[^virtualCommute]: https://info.trendwatching.com/21-trends-for-2021\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Discovery of extra-terrestrial beings\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image44.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nYou have one of the lucky-longshot cards!\n\nThere's a lot of scope with this card.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What would it mean to encounter an extra-terrestrial life form?\n\n\n- Would it be sentient? Would it just be bacterial?\n\n\n- Would it be friendly, aggressive, or maybe even just unconcerned about humans and other earth life?\n\n\n- Would they give us new technology?\n\n\n- Are there other ways to be alive? Think about slime moulds, trees, bees, the earth computer from Hitchhiker's Guide…\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Drone delivery\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image10.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nOn the surface, drone delivery is about pandering to rich people's whims. \"I want a \\[insert thing here\\] now! Minimalism has been described as a thing that only the rich can afford—everyone else needs to have backups![^min] That could change if drone delivery takes off in a big way. You needn't actually own anything because it could be delivered to you within a few minutes.\n\nThe resources needed for everyone to own a ukulele could be put into making a few really good ones with energy left over to make other things.\n\nDrones could also be used to deliver medicine and other essentials to places that don't have fixed infrastructure like roads or power for refrigeration. E.g. taking a shepherd's insulin to her on the side of a hill.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- How many of your belongings could you live without if just-in-time delivery was possible?\n\n\n- Can medical assistance be 'delivered'?\n\n\n- What things of yours would and wouldn't you share if a drone would pick it up and drop it off for you?\n\n\n- What other infrastructure does this make obsolete?\n\n\n- Could deliveries be made to apartment windows on high levels? How would the window need to change?\n\n
\n\n\n[^min]: [Minimalism: another boring product wealthy people can buy](https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/mar/04/minimalism-conspicuous-consumption-class) \\\"Minimalism is just another form of conspicuous consumption, a way of saying to the world: \"Look at me! Look at all of the things I have refused to buy!\\\" \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Drones\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image25.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nLet's define drones as a class of robots that are able to do a human's bidding with _some_ level of autonomy. That might just be the ability to hover level, or it might be full autonomy over an assassination mission.\n\nThere are drones deployed in military situations, drones do the vacuuming, drones do aerial filming. The list of things that drones can do is only limited by how far we can imagine at the moment.\n\nMost drones only have limited autonomy, but that is changing in military applications and will change in commercial and domestic ones too.\n\nWe can send drones to dangerous or inaccessible places. Wriggling into pipes to look for leaks, or flying over cliffs to count sea birds.\n\nDrones were used to attack the Saudi Aramco oil refinery; this was consumer tech, used in a military context.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What if drones get so small that we can't see them?\n\n\n- Could warfare become entirely autonomous?\n\n\n- What new types of jobs or applications might emerge for drones?\n\n\n- Will drones displace a significant part of the labour force?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Economic crash\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image19.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nSome event might lead to broad unemployment. In the great depression around 20% of people were unemployed for about 10 years. This was in an age of much lower female labour force participation so the real figure would have been much higher.\n\nIf this were to happen today we would be in much more trouble. We are far less able to grow our own food, and to make our own clothes.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- In the GFC the economy bounced back, but employment levels didn't. Would another recession be the way-in that full robot automation needs?\n\n\n- Our logistics systems, and homes are much more _just in time_. If you had no money coming in and no other support, how long could you survive on what you already have at home? Then what?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## End of the open-plan office\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nBesides being notoriously difficult for concentration and privacy, an airborne pandemic has lessened the appeal[^officeAppeal] of cramming big groups of people shoulder to shoulder in a single room.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n
\n\n\n[^officeAppeal]: https://www.fastcompany.com/90588717/top-tech-trends-2021-post-pandemic-predictions-ai-fintech-health\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Escape into fantasy worlds\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nPerhaps unsurprisingly, global uncertainty has led to a boom in escapism[^escapismBoom], and all signs point to this continuing strongly into the next decade. Fantasy can and will take various forms, including long-form immersive gaming experiences, ketamine’s recreational popularity and new acceptance as a clinical treatment, and increasing commercial emphasis on the worlds of young adult literature and its spin offs across media.\n\nThere has been an increase in people shutting themselves away, in Japanese, Hikikomori[^Hikikomori], but at the same time the traditionally reclusive activity of gaming has become increasingly social, with streaming and multiplayer worlds.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Virtual worlds could easily get interesting and immersive enough that people wouldn't want to go out into the world. Is that a bad thing?\n\n\n- What would you need to inject into virtual words to keep their inhabitants function members of the outside society? Is that necessary?\n\n\n- Virtual worlds don't need to be geographically bounded; would it ultimately break down the nation state?\n\n\n- what things need to be done in the real world?\n\n
\n\n\n[^escapismBoom]: https://www.foresightfactory.co/trends-report/\n\n\n[^Hikikomori]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hikikomori\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Facial recognition\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image12.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nComputers can now recognise faces almost as well as humans can. They are more susceptible to tricks like face paint or sunglasses than we are, but that's probably not going to take long to solve.\n\nStrong facial recognition will mean that security agencies can track you wherever you appear on a CCTV feed. It means that advertisers can personalise billboards to your particular buying habits.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- How might these ideas of surveillance influence other systems to become more intuitive?\n\n\n- Will fashion embrace it or resist facial recognition[^49]?\n\n\n- ![](/assets/20/game/images/image46.png)\n\n\n- What, other than faces, can be \"recognised\"?\n\n\n- Will the bans on facial recognition get more severe, or will they be lifted? Is there a middle ground?\n\n
\n\n\n[^49]: [Accessorize to a Crime](http://prostheticknowledge.tumblr.com/post/152518403686/accessorize-to-a-crime-research-from-carnegie) \"Research from Carnegie Mellon University can generate visual patterns onto glasses to either avoid facial recognition or 'impersonate' as someone else\" \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Full-filter reality\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nImmersive, photo realistic imagery in the form of Instagram-style filter layers will become widespread beyond just phones when applied via increasingly mature augmented reality systems[^filters], forcing people to question the relationship between the visual and the real, and potentially fragmenting consensus reality even further.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n
\n\n\n[^filters]: https://www.frogdesign.com/designmind/trends-2021?utm_campaign=USA_Trends%202021&utm_source=email&utm_medium=trends%202021%20email&utm_term=trends%202021%20email&utm_content=trends%202021%20email\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## GDP\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image36.png)\n
[^19] \n
\n
\n\n\nA lot of countries are getting richer. A few are getting poorer. A big slab of countries are staying the same.\n\nAlso, wealth distribution inside countries is changing.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What causes there to be three groups?\n\n\n- What do the countries in the three groups have in common? What do UAE, Brunei and Libya have in common?\n\n\n- What leverage are the countries that are getting richer able to use that the countries that are static don't have access to?\n\n\n- Is GDP even a useful measure? What would the world be like if we measured something else, or a range of things?\n\n
\n\n\n[^19]: [GDP per capita](https://goo.gl/xsYeYC) (constant 2000 US$)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Genetic medicine\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image34.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nMedicine has developed to a point where it is incredibly good at treating an imaginary, statistically normal person. Each variable that could be part of your health has a statistical range that is 'normal', perhaps subdivided by age, or sex, or race if you are lucky.\n\nGenetic medicine is focused on treating each patient as an individual[^47]. Those ranges would be hugely more specific. Based on your genetic markers you may need to keep your potassium levels between X1 and X2. This leads to much more preventative medicine being possible. This ultimately reduces the spending needed to achieve a given level of health and also makes it possible to increase general health for everyone.\n\nAll that statistical specificity unlocks a dystopian side. Health insurers can make much more accurate predictions about the true cost of insuring a person. This means that people at risk of the worst diseases will also find it the hardest to get health insurance.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Will this make us healthier?\n\n\n- Will we choose mates who are genetically different to us, or to try to reduce the likelihood of complications?\n\n\n- Will it lead to people being denied healthcare/insurance?\n\n
\n\n\n[^47]: I'm mainly talking about [personalised medicine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personalized_medicine) here:. Medicine that affects genes is another topic, big enough to justify its own card. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Global temperature\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image16.png)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nThis graph from NASA[^gt33] shows global temperature variation\n\n> \"The paleoclimate record combined with global models shows past ice ages as well as periods even warmer than today. But the paleoclimate record also reveals that the current climatic warming is occurring much more rapidly than past warming events.\"\n\nFuture temperature rises differ by the model used to predict them[^34] and by the way we act in the future[^35]. These will lead to sea level rise. Partially from melting ice, but also from the water in the oceans getting bigger from thermal expansion.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Who will warming be bad for?\n\n\n- Who will it be good for?\n\n\n- What will temperature increases trigger? And then what will those things trigger? and what will those things trigger? And so on.\n\n
\n\n\n[^gt33]: [How is Today's Warming Different from the Past?](http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/GlobalWarming/page3.php)\n\n\n[^gt34]: TODO: Not sure what this footnote was supposed to point to\n\n\n[^gt35]: TODO: Not sure what this footnote was supposed to point to\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Horse population\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image24.png)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nThe Horsepower was a measure of the work that one horse could do. The horse was the engine of most economies until the internal combustion engine displaced it. This was one of the first real examples of large scale disruption[^14].\n\nHorses were no longer a requirement, and people quickly moved over to engines to provide motive force. Horses stayed for recreational use, but in tiny numbers compared to their previous penetration.\n\nThis is interesting, but it's also a metaphor for a change from one entrenched technology to another. The disruption to the world can be huge.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Why did people prefer engines to horses?\n\n\n- What was the core function that the horse performed?\n\n\n- If you think of this as a pattern, what might replace the car?\n\n\n- What other historical technological revolutions fit the same pattern? What current technologies are vulnerable to it?\n\n
\n\n\n[^14]: With the printing press displacing scribes as the other that I can think of. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Indoor plant farming\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/indoorplant.jfif)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nPlants are green because they reflect the green part of the visual light spectrum; it turns out that plants need mainly pink light to photosynthesise. 1m of solar panels can generate more than 1m of pink light, so it's very resource efficient.\n\nThe plants are grown in racks, in a sealed warehouse. Each rack has lighting and a water supply with nutrients in it. Because the building is sealed, there's no need for pesticides because there are no pests. Because the plants are in racks, each square metre on the floor can produce tens of square metres of plants.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- If we do this, what will happen to the farming industry?\n\n\n- What would happen to all the land that is currently used to grow plants?\n\n\n- Not all plants can be grown like this. Plants that are tall are particularly unsuited, e.g. fruit and corn. How will our diets shift to reflect the price differences?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Internet coverage\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image38.png)\n
[^ic30] Data from\n
\n
\n\n\nIn the last quarter of a century the internet has changed the way the world operates. Access to the internet isn't ubiquitous. A large part of the world can't access what we take for granted. Projects like Facebook's internet.org[^ic31] and Google's Project Loon[^ic32] were trying to change that but their parent company's deemed them unprofitable.\n\nThose unconnected people stand to gain from internet access and are also a giant market. The countries at the bottom of this graph have little in the way of fixed infrastructure, so may leapfrog the countries at the top of the graph if satellite internet becomes the norm.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What could a society do if the penetration was 100%? Online democracy? Compete in a global job market?\n\n\n- What is preventing the last few % from being connected? Is it choice or something else?\n\n
\n\n\n[^ic30]: https://bit.ly/3Hxlzl3\n\n\n[^ic31]: [internet.org](https://internet.org/) was planning to make internet access available through solar powered planes.\n\n\n[^ic32]: [Loon](http://www.google.com/loon/) was planning to make internet access available through weather balloons.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Lab meat\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/labmeat.jfif)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nRuminants, like cows and sheep, emit a lot of greenhouse gasses. They are also sentient beings. Those are two pretty compelling reasons not to eat them. However, meat is a dense source of calories, protein and vitamins. If we can culture meat in a lab, then we can have all the upsides without any of the downsides.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Will we start to design meats that aren't copies of animals?\n\n\n- Will lab meat ever overcome the yuk factor?\n\n\n- What will happen to the meat industry? What about the animals that are already alive?\n\n\n- What will we do with all the spare land that is freed up?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Legalisation of drugs\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image2.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nThe Nutt report[^54] proposed a list of drugs in their order of harm to society. In this future, the discussion resurfaces and the Government decides that it needs consistent legislation.\n\nProposals to ban alcohol are quickly put down by the drinks industry, and so to provide consistent legislation, all drugs from position 5 and below are legalised.\n\n1. Heroin, 2. Cocaine, 3. Barbituates, 4. Street methadone, **5. Alcohol**, 6. Ketamine, 7. Benzodiazepines, 8. Amphetamine, 9. Tobacco, 10. Buprenorphine, 11. Cannabis, 12. Solvents, 13. 4-MTA, 14. LSD, 15. Methylphenidate, 16. Anabolic steroids, 17. GHB, 18. Ecstasy, 19. Alykl nitrites, 20. Khat\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What else should be legal/illegal? What are you basing that decision on?\n\n\n- What else could be legal or illegal in future?\n\n\n- Why aren't these already legal?\n\n
\n\n\n[^54]: [Drug harms in the UK: a multicriteria decision analysis](http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(10)61462-6/abstract) by Prof David J Nutt, FMedSci; Leslie A King, PhD; Lawrence D Phillips, PhD\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Live shopping\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nLive shopping[^liveShopping], already extremely popular in China, is like Instagram Live meets the Home Shopping Network – influencers show-and-tell products live on social media, which have particular discounts and promotions only while the feed is rolling. Forecasters predict this will become globally popular[^liveShoppingForecast] in the near term.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n
\n\n\n[^liveShopping]: https://www.singlegrain.com/web-trends/what-is-live-stream-shopping/\n\n\n[^liveShoppingForecast]: https://www.foresightfactory.co/trends-report\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Psychedelia\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nShrooms are the new weed, commercially speaking, as new firms and funds scramble to monetize[^psilocybin] psilocybin in advance of its extended clinical applications. Psychedelics as a class of drugs continue to be destigmatized, relative to other drugs. Forecasts see this reaching a new level of mainstream saturation in coming years.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n
\n\n\n[^psilocybin]: https://www.benzinga.com/markets/cannabis/21/01/19329903/7-psychedelic-trend-predictions-for-2021\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Micromobility\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/micromobility.jpg)\n
Micromobility is The Future of Vehicles\n
\n
\n\n\nMicromobility is the use of any vehicle under 500kg. This encompases everything from rollerskates to golf buggies, but generally is used to think about the range between kick scooters and ebikes.\n\nIt's often described as part of a city wide mobility strategy. If a city has a lot of electric scooters, then a 1km scoot to a bus stop isn't so bad.\n\nMost dockless schemes are private, and have met with very little success (bikes or scooters). Docked systems are usually run by cities and are less chaotic, but also less useful (the bikes aren't where you need them to be).\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- If you don't need to dive a car on a road, how would it change that road?\n\n\n- Will we ever stop putting dockless scooters into trees?\n\n\n- How far would you scoot to join an Uber Pool trip?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Non-sovereign currencies\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image9.png)\n
[^42] \n
\n
\n\n\nMoney developed as a special case of any unit of exchange. That could be sheep, cows and camels, or silver and gold. At some point someone made an object that stood in for the direct value of those objects and that became the money that we recognise today.\n\nMost money these days is backed by a national bank. Non-sovereign currency means that it isn't backed that way by a government. This could be Linden Dollars[^43] that are spent inside the game Second Life, but the first thing that most people think of is Bitcoin. Bitcoin is the most famous of a whole class of cryptocurrencies. Cryptocurrencies are 'mined' through cryptographic algorithms that control the production rate of the 'coins'.\n\nIf currency is decoupled from national borders and from governments it takes away one of the most powerful levers that governments have to affect their country. It results in a much 'purer' expression of market forces. The positive or negative effects of this are unknown.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- If nations don't control money, how will they generate trust?\n\n\n- What will it mean for taxation?\n\n\n- What does this mean for markets?\n\n\n- What will it mean for crime? Black and grey economies often operate on a cash only basis[^44].\n\n\n- How will we manage the volatility?\n\n
\n\n\n[^42]: Worth checking this out! [Frog: Mobile Money in Afghanistan](http://mobilemandate.frogdesign.com/programs/mobile-money-in-afghanistan.html)\n\n\n[^43]: There is an article about [the economy of second life](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Second_Life) and this is [an exchange that only deals in virtual currencies](https://www.virwox.com). Both are shut down now, but there were some wild stories from that era!\n\n\n[^44]: Something like 80% of €500 notes are believed to be used in money laundering! [The End of Money: Counterfeiters, Preachers, Techies, Dreamers--and the Coming Cashless Society](http://www.amazon.com/The-End-Money-Counterfeiters-Dreamers/dp/0306821478&sa=D&ust=1582431437884000)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Population growth rate\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image35.png)\n
[^1] \n
\n
\n\n\nThe world population is growing by 200,000 daily. Population increases are expected to level out globally between 2030 and 2100[^2], but that's an aggregate value. Some countries will still be growing fast whilst others will be shrinking (looking at you Japan).\n\nThere are a lot of factors to population growth. Better sanitation means fewer children die. Better access to education for women means that fewer children are born. People living longer means that people hang about for longer. Wars push people out of countries, prosperity pulls them in.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What job will all these new people do?\n\n\n- What will they eat?\n\n\n- Where will they live?\n\n\n- What factors will drive migration?\n\n\n- What limiting factors are there on Australian population growth? What could we do to remove those limitations?\n\n
\n\n\n[^1]: ABS data, high scenario.\n\n\n[^2]: Wikipedia: [World population](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Private internet\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image31.png)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nUntil the world wide web (www) became the dominant part of the internet there were lots of different ways that content could be shared. (Most of these still exist, but have comparable very small traffic.)\n\nThe internet is built out of open standards[^45]. The idea of a private internet is that a company with enough power will develop a rival information network with closed standards. The most likely candidates are Apple, Google and Facebook. For example, imagine that Apple developed a fast data-transfer protocol that you could only access from an apple device. They would go on to create a walled garden of content that only apple users could see.\n\nThis would impede the flow of information that the internet allows, but it may create a better experience for a subset of the population[^46].\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Who would gain from a private internet?\n\n\n- What would be bad about companies developing private protocols?\n\n\n- Would it be safer and more secure?\n\n
\n\n\n[^45]: [This talk is a really good source to understand the threats to the open internet](https://www.wired.com/2015/08/the-end-of-the-internet-dream/)\n\n\n[^46]: TODO: find what this footnote pointed to\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Asteroid mining\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image53.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nAsteroids are mainly made of nickel iron or frozen water. They also contain a lot of platinum group metals. They are easy to mine because they don't have big gravity wells that need to be overcome.\n\nWater is important to space travel because humans need to drink it, but unmanned missions need water too because it can be split into rocket fuel. Launching things into space is really expensive, so if it's possible to build spacecraft from things already in space it's much cheaper.\n\nThe availability of precious metals in asteroids could upset the world economy in the same way that the influx of silver from South America caused massive inflation in the 15th–17th century[^52].\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- If you hollow out an asteroid what could you do with it?\n\n\n- Platinum is used as a catalyst in chemical reactions. Making it a lot cheaper would make a lot of these applications more viable. What sorts of things could we do if the cost of platinum went down?\n\n\n- What could you do with a million tonnes of water in space?\n\n\n- Getting raw materials into space is expensive. What could you use the iron in an asteroid for?\n\n
\n\n\n[^52]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_revolution\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Quantum computers\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image40.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nQuantum computers are able to solve a particular type of problem incredibly fast. Unfortunately, that particular type of problem is the one that the world's encryption systems are based on.\n\nQuantum computers are currently a research curiosity, if they become a real world technology then all internet transactions will fail. (Unless credit card companies and banks take action before then to upgrade to quantum encryption.)\n\nFrom a more optimistic angle, once computer scientists work out how to phrase their problems in the way that quantum computers like, lots of\n\nvery hard problems become quite easy!\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- How much disruption would it cause if electronic money, and other encryption methods, stopped working?\n\n\n- If protein folding was solved, what would it mean for the pharma industry?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Radical life extension\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image5.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nThe first children to get to 150 years old have already been born. Radical life extension advocates think that it's possible to push that number much higher.\n\nTechnically nobody dies of old age. They die of diseases that old age makes us more susceptible to. Life extension advocates extending the useful period of one's life to make 90 the new 40.\n\nImmortal fictional characters often long for death, but usually because they are tired of their friends dying. If everyone lived a long time they would probably be pretty happy about it.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What would you do with another lifetime?\n\n\n- Which decade of your life would you like life extension to extend? Would you be in your 20s for 50 years? Teens? 40s?\n\n\n- If you could push your healthspan, at the cost of your lifespan, would you? (I.e. live in a 25 year old body until you are 60, then drop dead.)\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Return of the face lift\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/brazil-facelift.jpg)\n
Brazil\n
\n
\n\n\nMore invasive procedures such as surgical facelifts will regain popularity – people are tired of paying over and over for fillers[^faceFillers], which is more like a subscription model. Superusers say a surgical facelift is cheaper in the long run, and forecasts seem to be aligned with them, as the plastic surgery sector will continue to boom overall.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- beauty standards are variable, is doing something permanent a risk?\n\n\n- has the facelift got too much of a bad reputation from 80s stars who look bad in their old age?\n\n\n- How would this trend generalise to other things? The permanence is embraced in tattoos already?\n\n\n- how does this sit with trends towards body positivity?\n\n
\n\n\n[^faceFillers]: https://www.newbeauty.com/aesthetic-trends-2021\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Rewilding\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/Ice_age_fauna_of_northern_Spain.jpg)\n
Depiction of some mammals common in northern Eurasia during the late Pleistocene, by Mauricio AntĂłn. From left to right: wild horse, woolly mammoth, reindeer, cave lion and woolly rhinoceros. Pleistocene Park\n
\n
\n\n\nCities and suburbs are looking for places to downshift development and add urban greenery[^urbanGreenery] to compensate for rising CO2 emissions. Especially if carbon sequestration is eventually monetized, this could have an impact on land use overall, since owning undeveloped forest land would be profitable. This permaculture land ownership.\n\nProgress in ancient DNA recovery is leading some to suggest rewilding with currently extinct fauna[^plPark].\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Will this lead to a sharper distinction between urban and wild?\n\n\n- How will we interact with the apex predators (bears, wolves, etc.) that are needed for a functional ecosystem?\n\n\n- Will governments need to compulsory purchase the land from farmers, or will there be another way to incentivise rewilding? Maybe an emissions scheme, or fallow payments?\n\n
\n\n\n[^urbanGreenery]: https://www.mintel.com/global-consumer-trends\n\n\n[^plPark]: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/04/pleistocene-park/517779/\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Screens\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image49.png)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nScreens have become bigger and denser. 'Retina' screens mean that we can get up close and not see pixels. \"Don't get too close or you'll get square eyes\" doesn't apply anymore.\n\nBeing able to get close to a screen means that we can change the relationship with them. Touch screens mean that we can interact directly with images.\n\nWe're seeing flexible screens making a tentative step onto the market. Soon we might see screens that feel like they have a texture (buttons, roughness, etc.). We're also seeing screens in more places: on watches, as car dashboards, as billboards, inside VR headsets.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What other interface methods might supplant screens?\n\n\n- Will screens continue to get bigger and denser?\n\n\n- What will happen if screens stop being personal and are about shared experiences?\n\n\n- where else could we have screens?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Self driving cars\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image48.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nFrom a long shot dream in 2004[^37] driverless cars are now more of a _when_ than an if.\n\nHumans need a lot of tolerance to account for their imperfect driving skills. That means that the lanes need to be wider, cars need more impact protection, cars need to drive further apart.\n\nCars also represent freedom for a lot of people. Owning a car means that for a large proportion of the day each car is idle. When cars drive themselves it's unlikely that anyone will own a car. Cars will provide mobility. That means that parking will be eliminated, freeing up almost half of the current road network and many structures currently dedicated to parking.\n\nWhile not driving, people will be free to do other things. They could sleep, have meetings, eat, relax, etc.\n\n> \"To generations of Americans, owning a car represented freedom. To the next generation, not owning a car will represent freedom.\"[^38]\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Will this replace mass transit?\n\n\n- Current cars are styled to face forwards, and to be a little bit like racing cars. What will future cars be like?\n\n\n- What will this do to ownership models? Will it be transport as a service?\n\n\n- What effect will this have on moral standards (drink driving) or sexual freedom?\n\n
\n\n\n[^37]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARPA_Grand_Challenge\n\n\n[^38]: http://breakingsmart.com/a-new-soft-technology\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Single use plastic ban\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/pollutedbyplastic.jpeg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nSingle use plastic items are low capital cost, but have a significant environmental impact as they don't break down for centuries. This has had a particular effect on marine wildlife.\n\nSome jurisdictions have banned single use bags and drinking straws. Others have banned _all_ plastic, single use items.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Will this lead to people carrying more with them (steel straw, etc.), or will people move to eating-in more?\n\n\n- Does this trend affect anyone negatively? If there are no straws available, will disabled people be further disadvantaged? How do you feel about this?\n\n\n- How much further should this be taken? What else should be banned? What should _not_ be banned?\n\n\n- If plastic from one country damages the ocean wildlife from another country, what should the wronged country do?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Smart homes & internet of things\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image37.png)\n
[^53] \n
\n
\n\n\nLegislation is already in place that all white goods will have wireless communication built in. That means that a central controller in your house will be able to tell your air conditioning to ease off a couple of degrees to reduce peak electricity loading.\n\nThe dream of smart refrigerators ordering more milk as you run out is getting closer. There are lots of other issues that are less obvious and less friendly about every aspect of your life being instrumented. E.g. there have been lots of examples of smart home devices being hacked and used as spy cameras. Less frightening, but still annoying, a lot of smart devices stop working altogether if the parent company shuts down.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Would you let a power company decide when you boil the kettle if it saved you money?\n\n\n- Who would have access to data about your house? Who should?\n\n\n- Would you like to be able to turn off your iron if you left it on at home? How about your lights?\n\n\n- What if your smart lock company goes broke and you can't get into your house?\n\n\n- How does this impact the built environment?\n\n
\n\n\n[^53]: http://idisrupted.com/disrupted-electronics-internet-things-may-create-moores-law-steroids/\"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Tech platform exit\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nConsumer backlash against big tech has been heralded for years, but its widespread implementation finally seems likely. Mainstream awareness of the data power imbalance with big companies will make consumers happy to pay for things like search[^techOut], email and VPN instead of having companies use their data. Increasing attention to the power imbalances of this model will lead to the adoption of more niche services and platforms.\n\nTwitter is investigating making itself somewhat obsolete by moving their platform across to a distributed protocol (like email is). This might become the future, but it's uncertain how it could be monetised with platforms running as businesses, rather than as utilities.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Could you live without Facebook? Even Events and Messenger? What about Google?\n\n\n- Could the fragmentation caused by exiting the platforms be overcome? Would it be a modern day Babel experience?\n\n\n- what would fill the vacuum, how would it be different?\n\n\n- Google and Facebook have threatened to pull out of countries with policies that are opposed to their operational policies, e.g. Australia and China. Do we see an unevenly connected world?\n\n
\n\n\n[^techOut]: https://www.fastcompany.com/90588717/top-tech-trends-2021-post-pandemic-predictions-ai-fintech-health\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## The gig economy\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image26.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nMost people tend to work for one employer, and then they will move from project to project for the same employer. The Hollywood model means that you complete a project and then go back into the market for employment.\n\nIts a bit like being a freelancer or consultant. People in this system get regular price signals about their economic value. 'Stars' will be paid a lot, but if you aren't really in demand you may struggle to get a job.\n\nThese sorts of jobs offer very accessible employment, at the cost of long term precarity, i.e. very little stability in their financial situation.\n\nThis may erode certain employment benefits that have traditionally existed. It also allows really talented people to maximally realise their value.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Can humans be trusted to manage their own retirement funds, holiday allowance, etc?\n\n\n- Would you be able to process the price signals well enough to get the best out of life?\n\n\n- What will it mean for companies?[^55]\n\n\n- How does everyone employed as an individual 'contractor' improve or affect our economy, society, built environment?\n\n
\n\n\n[^55]: a16z Podcast: [Companies, Networks, Crowds](https://a16z.com/2017/06/28/machine-platform-crowd/) \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## TikTok/K-pop activism\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/KPOP_World_Festival.jpg)\n
Wikipedia\n
\n
\n\n\nApps and subcultures that consist of almost entirely young people are able to self-organise and do things that seem surprising and impossible to the older population that aren't involved. E.g. the overbooking of a Trump rally by K-pop fans.\n\nThe capacity for a group of under-enfranchised people to self-organise like this is new, and its power is not well understood.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- This is inherently global, the arab spring was similar, but had local effects, where could this go next?\n\n\n- Is this just gen Z using TikTok? Might we see a coup led by the Peppa Pig fan chat brigade?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Ubiquitous broadband\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image15.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nBroadband internet unlocks so much of our urban economy in the developed world but that is a small part of the earth's surface.\n\nWhat would access to broadband do for rural African farmers, or for Antarctic explorers?\n\nGoogle had project Loon, Facebook tried giant autonomous planes that act as repeater stations to the ground. SpaceX _is_ putting a network of toaster-sized internet-satellites into orbit and .\n\nIf everyone in the world has access to the same markets it would have a huge levelling effect. It might raise the incomes of the poorest, but it might well lower the incomes of the most well-off.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What can you do with fast internet that you can't with slow internet?\n\n\n- Could the world's best robotic surgeons operate on the cases that most needed their help, regardless of how close they were to a big hospital?\n\n\n- Could low income Indian children get educated by the best teachers?\n\n\n- Could Ethiopian graphic designers sell their expertise to Chilean wine producers?\n\n\n- What are the exponential potentials with this card?\n\n\n- If broadband is ubiquitous (e.g. available in national parks), will it be possible to get away from it? Is this a good thing? Is it a technology problem or a social problem?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Universal basic income (UBI)\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/ubi.png)\n
Simple graph showing what Universal Basic Income is doing for society u/canadaduane\n
\n
\n\n\nUBI is the idea that everyone in a society gets paid a stipend by the state. For example everyone gets $1000 every month, and any money you make on top of that (after tax) is yours.\n\nThere is a lot of discussion about what _universal_, _basic_ and _income_ actually mean in this context. Is _universal_: everyone inside the state's boundary, all citizens, all citizens over a certain age, all male landowning citizens? Is _basic_ enough to not starve, enough to have a living wage?\n\nIt's popular across the political spectrum, for different reasons. Small government advocates like it because it'll reduce reliance on the welfare state, big government advocates like it because it's a universal safety net.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What would you consider universal to mean? Basic? Income?\n\n\n- If you need more than the basic amount (e.g. disability allowance) will society look after you?\n\n\n- Would getting \"free money\" encourage people to not work?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Universal work from home policies\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
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\n\n\nRemote work due to Covid-19 has exposed the inadequacies of compulsory office attendance; now that people are working from home, it will never go back to the way it used to be[^wfh]; geographical requirements around talent acquisitions will loosen or expand beyond urban centers.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n
\n\n\n[^wfh]: https://www.mintel.com/global-consumer-trends\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Urbanisation\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image6.jpg)\n
Populations and urbanisation percentages by Hannah Ritchie and Max Roser, Our World in Data\n
\n
\n\n\nThe NSW _Department of Infrastructure Planning and Natural Resources_ estimates that 60% of the world's population will be living within cities by the year 2030 and about 91.1% of the Australian population will live in cities. They expected the population in the Sydney Region alone to grow by a net increase of 40,500 per year.\n\nThe forecast demand for new residential development to support Sydney's current population is 25,000 dwellings per year over the next ten years, with 25% of that growth located in Greenfield sites on the urban periphery and Greater Metropolitan Region corridors.\n\nWith the enlarging population and increasing urbanisation the demands on resources will contribute to further degradation of the Australian environment and Sydney's ever expanding urban sprawl.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Is it inevitable that the urbanisation trend will continue?\n\n\n- Can we bring traditionally rural activities into cities too?\n\n\n- What benefits could come from even greater urban density?\n\n\n- What mistakes are cities making right now that we might not make in the future?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Virtual reality\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image52.jpg)\n
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\n\n\nCurrent virtual reality gives us a glimpse of how we'll experience it in the future. There's a lot between us and fully believable, totally immersive virtual environments. As we solve more and more of those problems, VR will become more useful. Breaking out of gaming to be the standard method for video conferences, for virtual site tours and for shopping.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- If VR was perfect, would people still prefer the \"authentic experience\"[^50]\n\n\n- Do crimes committed in VR have moral status? Killing? Rape? [^51]\n\n\n- What could VR never simulate? Are you sure?\n\n\n- Is VR just a step on the road to AR, or do they have different applications?\n\n
\n\n\n[^50]: [What Sort Of People Should There Be?](https://notionparallax.github.io/people/)\n\n\n[^51]: [The Nether](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Nether)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Walking robots\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image14.jpg)\n
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\n\n\nLegs have lots of advantages over wheels. 2, 4 and more, legged robots are able to go places that wheeled and tracked vehicles can't[^40]. That means that we can send robots to map remote places, or to navigate places designed for humans. (Or other legged things!)\n\nMost of the current crop of robots have military origins, but they are also ideal of other types of hostile environments, like firefighting, rescue or space!\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What other sectors could these robots be used in?\n\n\n- Wheels need smooth surfaces, legs don't. Will we need fewer roads?\n\n\n- Does this have an outsized effect on humans' exceptional talent of mobility in difficult spaces? Will it affect employment?\n\n
\n\n\n[^40]: Or can't without causing substantial damage.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Wearable/implantable technology\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/Apple-Watch-ECG.jpg)\n
Apple watches have FDA approved ECG capabilities, but its usefulness is disputed 9 to 5 mac\n
\n
\n\n\nWe are in the first flush of the wearable technology boom[^41]. The quantified self[^qsm] that knowing your steps and heart rate allows for means that people can make more informed choices about their behaviour.\n\nWe are currently in a very naĂŻve period of this trend. The things we measure aren't the important things, they are the things that are easy to measure. The feedback we get is distracting and doesn't allow us to be more present in our lives. In the next generation of wearable, or even implantable, technology, we'll be able to use it to maximise our health and wellbeing, and to be far more present than we currently are.\n\nIn vet science, there are sensors that sit in a cow's stomach that can relay back to the farmer the health of each cow. Humans have pacemakers, but non-therapeutic implantables are almost unheard of[^miow].\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What else could you measure and what would be the best way to do it?\n\n\n- What would you do with that data?\n\n\n- Who else would like to know that information about you? What information would you worry about if it was leaked?\n\n
\n\n\n[^41]: Fifth, if you count clothes, shoes, spectacles and wrist watches as the first four.\"\n\n\n[^qsm]: [The Quantified Self](https://quantifiedself.com/) movement was founded by Kevin Kelly, and whilst niche at the time is now so mainstream that it's basically not talked about any more.\n\n\n[^miow]: See the [case of Meow-Ludo](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-03-16/opal-card-implant-man-pleads-guilty-transport-offences/9555608) who implanted an transport card into his hand\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Working hours\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image29.png)\n
[^wh26] \n
\n
\n\n\nManagers and professionals showed strong reductions in hours worked between 1996 and 2010 according to the ABS _Trends in Hours Worked_ report[^wh27].\n\nAlthough it might not feel like it to us, the trends seem pretty clear, assuming that some other force doesn't come into play in the future.\n\nThis doesn't cover people who work multiple jobs and/or work for themselves (which could be entrepreneurs, or it could be Uber drivers).\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- John Maynard Keynes thought that we'd be working a 15 hour week by now[^wh28]. Will that come in the future? Will this downward trend continue?\n\n\n- What else will affect working hours?\n\n\n- Working hours only capture work in paid employment. What other kinds of work are there and how much of them are we doing? (volunteering, housework, etc.)\n\n
\n\n\n[^wh26]: from [How Did Work-Life Balance in the U.S. Get So Awful?](https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/06/how-did-work-life-balance-in-the-us-get-so-awful/276336/). If we assume a 50 week year, Greece has gone from 54 hour weeks to 41; the Netherlands from 46 to 28!\n\n\n[^wh27]: https://www.abs.gov.au/articles/insights-hours-worked\n\n\n[^wh28]: [When John Maynard Keynes Predicted a 15-Hour Workweek “in a Hundred Year’s Time” (1930)](https://www.openculture.com/2020/06/when-john-maynard-keynes-predicted-a-15-hour-workweek-in-a-hundred-years-time-1930.html)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## XYZ as a service\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image47.png)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nAnything you can do or own yourself can probably be provided as a service[^service_xyz] to you. Gmail is the most obvious example: email as a service. People tend not to have a well at their house, they get water as a service.\n\nYou can get computing and storage as a service from AWS. X as a service also applies in the physical world. Uber and GoGet are examples of transport as a service.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What advantages are there for rolling your own? (This mean not using x as a service, but making a version of that service for yourself.)\n\n\n- What can't be turned into a service and why?\n\n\n- What will people do when they have a service for everything?\n\n\n- What do you own/do that could be provided as a service?\n\n
\n\n\n[^service_xyz]: [The World Of Everything-As-A-Service](http://techcrunch.com/2014/08/09/everything-as-a-service/), Tom Blomfield, Techcrunch\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Zoom fashion\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nFashion designers and retailers will create markedly different strategies[^zoomFashion] for fashion that appears on the upper body, ie above “the Zoom line” compared with the bottom half of the body, which isn’\t usually visible on screen.\n\nMany fashion houses have been embracing comfort and loungewear. Tracksuit bottoms have become the defacto cool weather bottoms of the pandemic.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Now that we've had a taste of comfort, will we go back?\n\n
\n\n\n[^zoomFashion]: https://www.wgsn.com/content/board_viewer/#/85986/en/page/1\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DfMA)\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/dfma.jpg)\n
An example of DfMA design refinement to improve assembly ease. Boothroyd, Geoffrey, Peter Dewhurst, and Winston A. Knight. Product Design for Manufacture and Assembly. 3rd ed. Manufacturing Engineering and Materials Processing 74. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 2011. p.83.\n
\n
\n\n\nDesign for Manufacture and Assembly (DfMA) is a product design approach that was developed in the manufacturing industries as a way of linking the design and production processes of product development. DfMA captures production data and makes it accessible to the design team in the form of design principles and guides, and metrics for design evaluation and improvement. The aim is to create designs that are efficient, fast, and cost effective to produce. DfMA advocates: modularity and standardisation of parts and processes; simplicity in design; connection interfaces that cannot be assembled incorrectly; part count reduction (as fewer parts as possible); and an emphasis on maintaining good visual and physical access to all connection points (think IKEA!).\n\nIn the last decade, the construction industry has turned its attention to DfMA as a potential solution to its productivity crisis. Although some of the DfMA design rules (and most of the DfMA metrics) used in manufacturing are not completely appropriate for use in the design of buildings, DfMA as a philosophy certainly is, especially when paired with prefabrication. The development of a construction-specific DfMA represents a shift towards data-informed design. The construction industry will need to increase the sophistication of its data collection methods during building production/construction phases so that an appropriate set of design guides and evaluation metrics can be developed.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- What kind of production data (in factories, in transit, on site) will be important to capture to inform design, and how might we do this?\n\n\n- How much standardisation (product and/or process) is it possible to achieve in the construction industry?\n\n\n- What does part count reduction mean at the scale of a building?\n\n\n- If buildings can be assembled as easily as IKEA furniture, what does that mean for the construction workforce?\n\n\n- If buildings can be assembled easily, they might also lend themselves to easy disassembly. How might this change the way we source new materials/components and design new buildings in the future?\n\n
\n\n\n[^FL]: CRC Press, 2011. Stoll, Henry W. “Design for Manufacture: An Overview.” Applied Mechanics Reviews 39, no. 9 (1986): 1356–64.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## life expectancy\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image43.png)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nLife expectancy continues to increase[^4] in contrast to Hobbes' idea of life, which was \"Nasty brutish and short\". We are comfortably on track to hit an average life expectancy of 100. There is a lot of variation in global life expectancy. That average of 100 means that there will be a global reduction in lifespan inequality, or that some nations will see huge lifespan increases. It's not uncommon to see claims that some children alive today will live to be 150[^5] or 200[^6]!\n\nLife expectancy is measured at different ages. These days, in 'developed' countries the difference between life expectancy at birth and at five years isn't substantially different. Some believe that prehistoric humans could expect to live into their mid fifties[^7] if they made it through childhood.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Will life expectancy rise equally all over the world?\n\n\n- Will people work for longer in their life?\n\n\n- Will people maintain a single career? Does their degree from 1990 have any validity in 2050?\n\n\n- Will there be a modern equivalent to coopers and farriers needing to find new careers during their lifetimes?\n\n
\n\n\n[^4]: https://goo.gl/0omR22\n\n\n[^5]: http://goo.gl/CCBPuv\n\n\n[^6]: http://ktwop.com/2012/12/27/the-first-200-year-old-human-has-already-been-born/\n\n\n[^7]: Hillard Kaplan, Kim Hill, Jane Lancaster, and A. Magdalena Hurtado (2000). [_A Theory of Human Life History Evolution: Diet, Intelligence and Longevity_ (PDF). Evolutionary Anthropology 9 (4): 156–185.](http://www.unm.edu/~hkaplan/KaplanHillLancasterHurtado_2000_LHEvolution.pdf)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Mass Timber Construction\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/massTimber.png)\n
A 350m tall timber tower proposed for Tokyo. Sumitomo Forestry\n
\n
\n\n\nMass timber construction refers to the use of engineered timber products such as cross-laminated timber (CLT) and glue-laminated timber (glulam) in the structure of a building. Engineered timber products are made by gluing layers of raw timber boards together into planar elements (CLT, used in floors and walls) or linear elements (glulam, used in columns and beams). This production method means that large timber building parts can be produced without cutting down old growth forest. Additionally, the properties of the building elements can be enhanced by using different types of timber (and even other materials) in the composition of layers.\n\nMass timber construction offers many benefits over typical concrete construction. First, timber sequesters carbon, meaning that the building becomes a carbon sink for the duration of its lifetime (as opposed to emitting carbon, as concrete manufacture does). Second, mass timber is much lighter than concrete, so it needs smaller foundations, and can often be used to add new floors to existing buildings. Third, mass timber changes the nature of the construction site, eliminating the need for formwork and wet trades, and significantly increasing the speed of construction (Brock Commons, an 18-storey mass timber project in Canada achieved a floor cycle time of 3 days). Some issues to consider when building with mass timber, include: forest certification, carbon miles in delivery (if CLT or glulam is not being manufactured locally), performance of the building under fire conditions, chainsaw attack!\n\nIn 2009 the first \"tall\" mass timber building—the 9-storey Stadthaus Murray Grove in London—triggered a global fascination with pushing mass timber to its limits. Since then, several buildings have held the record for tallest, only to inevitably have the title taken away. The current tallest, MjĂžstĂ„rnet in Norway, sits at 85m, however a Japanese company has proposed a 350m tall structure for Tokyo, and is currently conducting research towards making this happen in the very near future.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Often with technological change, initial roll-outs tend to mimic what has come before: the first cars looked like horse-less carriages, early steel skyscrapers were adorned with the fluting and ornaments of earlier 19th century buildings. Mass timber construction is a relatively new building typology, and as such, expectations are not yet set. Many current mass timber building designs adopt the language of contemporary reinforced concrete and steel construction, however an emphasis on sustainability is emerging. What innovative architectural typology might mass timber evolve into in the future?\n\n\n- If mass timber becomes the predominant construction technique in our cities, how will we sustainably manage the demand for raw timber?\n\n\n- Engineered timber products have not been around that long (glulam around 100 years, CLT around 35 years). We do not know how the products will degrade in 200, 300, 600 years' time. What kinds of monitoring/intervention mechanisms should be introduced to ensure the safety of inhabitants living in cities full of 350m tall timber skyscrapers?\n\n
\n\n\n[^FL]: CRC Press, 2011. Stoll, Henry W. “Design for Manufacture: An Overview.” Applied Mechanics Reviews 39, no. 9 (1986): 1356–64.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Private space exploration and asteroid mining\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image53.jpg)\n
\n
\n
\n\n\nAsteroids are mainly made of nickel iron or frozen water. They also contain a lot of platinum group metals. They are easy to mine because they don't have big gravity wells that need to be overcome.\n\nWater is important to space travel because humans need to drink it, but unmanned missions need water too because it can be split into rocket fuel. Launching things into space is really expensive, so if it's possible to build spacecraft from things already in space it's much cheaper.\n\nThe availability of precious metals in asteroids could upset the world economy in the same way that the influx of silver from South America caused massive inflation in the 15th–17th century[^silver].\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- If you hollow out an asteroid what could you do with it?\n\n\n- Platinum is used as a catalyst in chemical reactions. Making it a lot cheaper would make a lot of these applications more viable. What sorts of things could we do if the cost of platinum went down?\n\n\n- What could you do with a million tonnes of water in space?\n\n\n- Getting raw materials into space is expensive. What could you use the iron in an asteroid for?\n\n
\n\n\n[^silver]: [Wikipedia Price revolution](en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_revolution)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n\n## Smart homes & internet of things\n\n
\n![](https://notionparallax.co.uk/assets/20/game/images/image37.png)\n
This is an image of an xxx by YYY\n
\n
\n\n\nLegislation is already in place that all white goods will have wireless communication built in. That means that a central controller in your house will be able to tell your air conditioning to ease off a couple of degrees to reduce peak electricity loading.\n\nThe dream of smart refrigerators ordering more milk as you run out is getting closer. There are lots of other issues that are less obvious and less friendly about every aspect of your life being instrumented. E.g. there have been lots of examples of smart home devices being hacked and used as spy cameras. Less frightening, but still annoying, a lot of smart devices stop working altogether if the parent company shuts down.\n\n\n### Consider\n\n\n\n- Would you let a power company decide when you boil the kettle if it saved you money?\n\n\n- Who would have access to data about your house? Who should?\n\n\n- Would you like to be able to turn off your iron if you left it on at home? How about your lights?\n\n\n- What if your smart lock company goes broke and you can't get into your house?\n\n\n- How does this impact the built environment?\n\n
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n", "content_html": "

Updated: A Game About Possible Futures - the cards

\n\n\n
\n\n

5G/đ’©G

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\n

\"\"

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Wildly optimistic speeds, but in the rough orders of magnitude. Do Yourself A Favour – Don’t Get A 5G Phone Just Yet

\n
\n
\n\n

Each increase in G increases connectivity speed, and changes the types of things that you can do while connected to that network. 3G allowed full webpages rather than just WAP1.

\n\n

5G untethers broadband speeds from the geographical constraints of fibre optic or copper networks. Once there’s a 5G network in place, high tech applications can be set up with no digging, it also allows for easy reconfiguration of data rich robotics in warehouses.

\n\n

Conspiracy theorists think it’s a mind control mechanism.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

AGI fast take off

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
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Specific—or weak—AI is useful for things like image recognition, or playing chess. Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) is different because it can solve general problems.

\n\n

One of the problems that it is likely to want to solve is making itself more capable. In an AGI fast take off scenario, the AI will put all its effort into improving its ability. It may well start at dog level intelligence, and maybe over the next week or two it’ll get to chimp level intelligence. Within another day or so it’ll get to a stupid human, and within a minute or two will have become far smarter than the most intelligent human ever to live.

\n\n

This card gives you the choice of whether you want to assume that the AGI will try to kill us all, or if it’ll think of itself as a loving parent to us.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
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\n\n

AI Bias

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
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The PULSE algorithm takes pixelated faces and turns them into high-resolution images. However, it has a strong bias towards white faces. ∎ Obama -> white guy. The Verge

\n
\n
\n\n

Bias can be built into algorithms in several ways. The obvious one is through the datasets used to train the system. If a dataset has only cats, it will classify a dog as a cat. It can also be introduced through the hyperparameters (the setup variables of the system).

\n\n

Propublica2 showed widespread bias in sentencing based on an algorithm that baked in, amongst other things, geographical biases, e.g. if you live in a black neighbourhood, sentence more harshly.

\n\n

Many ML algorithms are considered “black boxes” so can’t be explained. There is a lot of work on trying to make that not the case.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
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AI creativity

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\"\"

\n
\n

Artificial intelligence: Google’s AlphaGo beats Go master Lee Se-dol Published12 March 2016 BBC

\n
\n
\n\n

Algorithms like alpha go have been displaying signs of non-human creativity, i.e. they’re doing things that their creators think are beyond the scope of their training.

\n\n

Other algorithms, like style transfer GANs, look creative, but are quite predictable. However they produce art-like outcomes which—it could be argued—is what most “creative” human “artists” do.

\n\n

Consider

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Advert free internet

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\"\"

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The dominant business model of the internet is making a service that people use, and then serving adverts to those people while they’re there. If you could opt out of those adverts there would need to be some other kind of value transfer to make the service worth running.

\n\n

Each time an ad is served (an impression), it costs the advertiser a tiny amount of money, more if it’s clicked. These sums would be dwarfed by transaction fees as an impression is in the order of $0.012 per impression and a transaction fee is somewhere between $0.03 and $0.30. So the payments would need to be aggregated by another party before being passed to the banks.

\n\n

Companies like Blendle3

\n\n

Consider

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Amazon Nations

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\"\"

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The relationship between enormous corporations whose resources increasingly dwarf actual countries and small countries in need of debt relief will lead to unusually baroque tax-evasion schemes and complex international monopoly issues4.

\n\n

Philip K Dick predicted this in Autofac5, and there’s precedent with the British and Dutch East India Companies, and Unilever in Nigeria6.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
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Architectural team size

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\"\"

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Life as an intern, Paris, 1935 (via Fondation le Corbusier)

\n
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Design Technology has long promised a world of increased productivity. BIM is supposed to decrease the amount of work that design teams do to get given outcome.

\n\n

However, scope of work is going up; soon teams may need to deliver an as built model to the client’s facility managers. How do these trends balance?

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
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Audio AR

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\"\"

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zombies, run!

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Most Augmented Reality (AR) is thought of as visual, but there are significant technical hurdles in image processing and rendering to overcome before it has widespread adoption. Audio AR is already available; if you use google maps’ walking directions through your headphones without looking at your phone then you’ve already tried it. (Many sports apps use audio cues to prompt performance too.)

\n\n

For it to be audio, only the output needs to be audio, the input can be anything, GPS, accelerometers, microphones, even cameras.

\n\n

\"Hey Siri, who’s that guy over there? Do I know him?\"

\n\n

See the Ender’s Game series for an audio AR, AI character.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
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\n\n

Battery density

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\"\"

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battery statistics battery university

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\n
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The ability to store energy and then release it later has been a constant human obsession. Mill ponds are there to turn water wheels when it isn’t raining and clocks run on weights and springs that release their energy slowly.

\n\n

Chemical batteries make that energy portable in a way that was previously inconceivable7.

\n\n

Tesla’s PowerWall batteries allow solar power to be used at night, and the same batteries that are inside the power wall are used in cars. These allow the power providers to load balance/peak shave so that they don’t need to turn on more power stations to handle peak loads.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
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Bee population crash

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Bee populations are declining.

\n\n

In recent winters, in Europe alone, bee losses up to 53% became a reality.

\n\n

Plants rely on insects like bees to reproduce. Plant reproduction is vital for our food supply. If the bees die, then we die too!

\n\n

This dramatic decline in bee populations is the result of multiple factors such as diseases and parasites, climate change and wider industrial agricultural practices.

\n\n

Consider

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Betting markets

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On Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, the Ask the audience option is almost always accurate. The problem is that if you don’t really know, then there’s no incentive to keep your mouth shut!

\n\n

Classical economists like markets because of their information aggregating capacity. People who know something are incentivised to share that information with the world through the market.

\n\n

Betting markets, or Prediction markets are the same, but for ideas and questions. E.g. there was a question: Will Greece declare a new national currency in 2015?8 The PredictIt market said that there was only a 14% chance that it would happen; it didn’t.

\n\n

These sorts of markets are generally very accurate, but have had negative press because they can be seen as “betting on terrorism” etc.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
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Big data analysis

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Big data analytics is the process of examining large data sets containing a variety of data types.

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BIG DATA: to uncover hidden patterns, unknown correlations, market trends, customer preferences and other useful business information. The analytical findings can lead to more effective marketing, new revenue opportunities, better customer service, improved operational efficiency, competitive advantages over rival organizations and other business benefits.9

\n
\n\n

The goal of analysis is for companies to make more informed decisions. They could use Web server logs and Internet clickstream data, social media content and social network activity reports, text from customer emails and survey responses, mobile-phone call detail records and machine data captured by sensors connected to the Internet of Things.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
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Breakdown of traditional education paths

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As the pandemic has interrupted schooling10 for millions, new relationships to online learning will continue to flourish, in addition to trends like unschooling, which will penetrate new demographics (beyond the fringe). The weight of student debt and continued class conflict will also draw people away from the traditional path of college education.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
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Broadband access inequality

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for live data11

\n
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This is important because access to the internet gives citizens knowledge and power.12 These numbers13 are mainly growing across the board with a few exceptions.

\n\n \n\n

Having access to the internet unlocks economic and trade goods, education, political information (that may contradict official sources) and generally raises quality of life.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
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Carbon labelling for consumer goods

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Like nutrition facts on food, listing carbon expenditures14 related to various products on their packaging or in marketing materials will become a norm. This could be used to justify higher prices15 for certain more “carbon-responsible” items.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
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Cashless biometric payments

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Since NFC payments—tap and go—became the norm, it has become increasingly unusual to actually make contact when you pay (i.e. insert or swipe). As this capacity has moved to phones people carry their wallets even less.

\n\n

You know how iPhone’s Face ID can trigger Apple Pay’s contactless payments? Now imagine16 this technology being available in many retail settings, and in various implementations outside of the Apple ecosystem.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
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\n\n

Centralisation of web companies

\n\n
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\n
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Amazon is now bigger than Walmart Quartz

\n
\n
\n\n

Amazon is now bigger than Walmart. The internet allows companies to centralise services. This is a long running trend; in 1850 your village would have a singer and someone who played an instrument for entertainment, but with the introduction of music recording the wealth from entertainment was concentrated into the very best entertainers. The same is happening to education and news providers.

\n\n

This has also enabled the “long tail”, catering to ever more specific groups of people, but the bulk of everyone’s needs can be fulfilled by Amazon.

\n\n

With increasing globalisation, more and more services will be provided by a centralised organisation, even if that organisation is coordinating others (e.g. Uber and AirBnB).

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

China power shift

\n\n
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\"\"

\n
\n

\n
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China’s status as an economic, political and cultural center will continue its meteoric rise. The US will continue its downward spiral. Chinese consumption patterns will set the tone17 for the world.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
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\n\n

Climate migration

\n\n
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\"\"

\n
\n

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Climate crises will increasingly force huge populations18 to relocate, causing strain over resource allocation, border issues, culture19 and the overall safety of millions.

\n\n

Climate change in the past caused the collapse and migration of the Greenland colony, and was one of the reasons that the Germanic tribes moved on Rome, contributing to its collapse. In other words, this is not a new problem, and it’s happened a lot before.

\n\n

The moden world has much more structured mechanisms for dealing with refugees, but was overwhelmed by a relatively small crisis in Syria. If all the pacific islands become uninhabitable, or North Africa gets too hot, there will be a movement on a scale that will overwhelm the current system.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n
\n\n

Compute power

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\n

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\n
\n

\n
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\n\n

The number of transistors on a microchip has doubled every 18 months or so since transistors were invented. This was first spotted by Gordon Moore, and the phenomenon is named after him: Moore’s Law20. More transistors means more calculations can be done in a given time. That means that computers can do more of what we want, feel smoother and more responsive.

\n\n

Not only is each computer more powerful, but there are also more computers in the world. We all have computers in our pockets. There are giant data centres anywhere that a source of electricity or cooling can be found21. Put simply, there is a massive amount of raw computing power in the world, and the rate of its increase is increasing22.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n

Concentration of functions into smart phones

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\n

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\n\n

Since smart phones emerged by merging personal digital assistants (PDAs) and telephones, they’ve been capturing more functions. Now films and documentaries regularly contain smartphone footage. You can pay with your phone, and keep your driving licence, so they’ve usurped wallets. Most online shopping is done on a phone. They are all round music players and controllers for our smart homes.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n

“Conservative” policy dominance

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\n

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\n
\n

What if parties on the right had control? Wikipedia

\n
\n
\n\n

Many countries have a system of government that is split between right and left wing factions. It’s increasingly difficult to say what these factions generally represent, but they are often captured on the political compass.

\n\n

Right wing parties are usually characterised as being pro-business, and/or upholding traditional, often religious, values.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n

Cost of domestic property

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23

\n
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\n\n

Housing is more expensive (in real terms) than ever. As a proportion of the money that people have to spend, we are spending more of it on housing.

\n\n

This might be because there isn’t enough supply of housing where people want to live. It might be because housing is a safe asset class.

\n\n

Low interest rates make it easier for those with wealth to buy more houses, and house values go up much faster than most other asset classes. Are we in a bubble?

\n\n

If owning stops being attractive, wealth concentration will increase, but maybe a new safe as x asset class will emerge for renters to spend their money on.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n
\n\n

Cost of space travel

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\n
\n

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The average cost of traditional launch methods is about $25,000/kg24 but the SpaceX Falcon 9 can get that down to $2,618/kg. The Falcon Heavy is expected to be able to launch 53,000 kg to Low Earth Orbit for $90 Million or US$2,350 per kg to LEO25/26.

\n\n

With fully reusable launch vehicles the cost of a launch will drop to almost the cost of the fuel. As rockets are fuelled with hydrogen and oxygen, this can be made in bulk by electrolysing water, potentially with solar power. Expect the cost to launch to continue to drop.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n

Cottagecore and Waldenponding

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\"\"

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\n

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\n\n

As our daily activities become more screen based and virtual, there is a movement that embraces tradition. Some see it as a healing way to slow down, others see it as anachronistic LARPing.

\n\n

Bread baking, clothes making and mending and wood carving are typical cottage core activities.

\n\n

Waldenponding is an explicit method of cutting one’s self off from the social computer of email, Twitter and Instagram etc.27

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n

Coworking and Cohousing

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\n
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A significant proportion of effort in an office or a house is directed towards non-core activities. I.e. maintaining the photocopier or doing laundry.

\n\n

co-x offers a more highly serviced environment with the opportunity to mix with other, in theory, like-minded people.

\n\n

Those other people are the selling point and the major downside to this model. If you don’t get on with your co-people then hell will be other people.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n

Crime/violence

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\"\"

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\n

Australia is blue28, USA is red.29

\n
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\n\n

Generally, crime and violence seems to be declining overall30 31. This may be because of better policing, or more surveillance. It could just be that we are generally richer, and therefore we feel less compelled to risk committing crimes to obtain what we don’t have.

\n\n

Consider

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Dark kitchens

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Dark kitchens create meals exclusively for the online delivery market32. In the early pandemic many regular restaurants went dark only.

\n\n

Dark kitchens have lower overheads, and can share a premises more easily, but they are at the whim of the delivery service for speed of delivery and the whim of the customer for presentation. This means that there will often be a significant overhead in packaging that can offset the savings from rent on the dining room.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n

Death of music genres

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\"\"

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\n

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\n\n

Spotify’s move toward mood-driven instead of genre-driven playlists has been successful to the point of suggesting that musical genres themselves will be increasingly outmoded33 in the coming years – or at least completely illegible.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n

Digital commutes and forced mindfulness

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\"\"

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\n

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\n\n

Microsoft is introducing a “virtual commute” feature34 intended “to create mental bookends for the remote workday”. It is also partnering with the meditation app Headspace to add a new “emotional check-in feature”.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n
\n\n

Discovery of extra-terrestrial beings

\n\n
\n

\"\"

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\n

\n
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\n\n

You have one of the lucky-longshot cards!

\n\n

There’s a lot of scope with this card.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n

Drone delivery

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\"\"

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\n\n

On the surface, drone delivery is about pandering to rich people’s whims. “I want a [insert thing here] now! Minimalism has been described as a thing that only the rich can afford—everyone else needs to have backups!35 That could change if drone delivery takes off in a big way. You needn’t actually own anything because it could be delivered to you within a few minutes.

\n\n

The resources needed for everyone to own a ukulele could be put into making a few really good ones with energy left over to make other things.

\n\n

Drones could also be used to deliver medicine and other essentials to places that don’t have fixed infrastructure like roads or power for refrigeration. E.g. taking a shepherd’s insulin to her on the side of a hill.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Drones

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\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Let’s define drones as a class of robots that are able to do a human’s bidding with some level of autonomy. That might just be the ability to hover level, or it might be full autonomy over an assassination mission.

\n\n

There are drones deployed in military situations, drones do the vacuuming, drones do aerial filming. The list of things that drones can do is only limited by how far we can imagine at the moment.

\n\n

Most drones only have limited autonomy, but that is changing in military applications and will change in commercial and domestic ones too.

\n\n

We can send drones to dangerous or inaccessible places. Wriggling into pipes to look for leaks, or flying over cliffs to count sea birds.

\n\n

Drones were used to attack the Saudi Aramco oil refinery; this was consumer tech, used in a military context.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Economic crash

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Some event might lead to broad unemployment. In the great depression around 20% of people were unemployed for about 10 years. This was in an age of much lower female labour force participation so the real figure would have been much higher.

\n\n

If this were to happen today we would be in much more trouble. We are far less able to grow our own food, and to make our own clothes.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n
\n\n

End of the open-plan office

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Besides being notoriously difficult for concentration and privacy, an airborne pandemic has lessened the appeal36 of cramming big groups of people shoulder to shoulder in a single room.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Escape into fantasy worlds

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Perhaps unsurprisingly, global uncertainty has led to a boom in escapism37, and all signs point to this continuing strongly into the next decade. Fantasy can and will take various forms, including long-form immersive gaming experiences, ketamine’s recreational popularity and new acceptance as a clinical treatment, and increasing commercial emphasis on the worlds of young adult literature and its spin offs across media.

\n\n

There has been an increase in people shutting themselves away, in Japanese, Hikikomori38, but at the same time the traditionally reclusive activity of gaming has become increasingly social, with streaming and multiplayer worlds.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Facial recognition

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Computers can now recognise faces almost as well as humans can. They are more susceptible to tricks like face paint or sunglasses than we are, but that’s probably not going to take long to solve.

\n\n

Strong facial recognition will mean that security agencies can track you wherever you appear on a CCTV feed. It means that advertisers can personalise billboards to your particular buying habits.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Full-filter reality

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
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\n\n

Immersive, photo realistic imagery in the form of Instagram-style filter layers will become widespread beyond just phones when applied via increasingly mature augmented reality systems40, forcing people to question the relationship between the visual and the real, and potentially fragmenting consensus reality even further.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n
\n\n
\n\n

GDP

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

41

\n
\n
\n\n

A lot of countries are getting richer. A few are getting poorer. A big slab of countries are staying the same.

\n\n

Also, wealth distribution inside countries is changing.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Genetic medicine

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Medicine has developed to a point where it is incredibly good at treating an imaginary, statistically normal person. Each variable that could be part of your health has a statistical range that is ‘normal’, perhaps subdivided by age, or sex, or race if you are lucky.

\n\n

Genetic medicine is focused on treating each patient as an individual42. Those ranges would be hugely more specific. Based on your genetic markers you may need to keep your potassium levels between X1 and X2. This leads to much more preventative medicine being possible. This ultimately reduces the spending needed to achieve a given level of health and also makes it possible to increase general health for everyone.

\n\n

All that statistical specificity unlocks a dystopian side. Health insurers can make much more accurate predictions about the true cost of insuring a person. This means that people at risk of the worst diseases will also find it the hardest to get health insurance.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Global temperature

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

This graph from NASA43 shows global temperature variation

\n\n
\n

“The paleoclimate record combined with global models shows past ice ages as well as periods even warmer than today. But the paleoclimate record also reveals that the current climatic warming is occurring much more rapidly than past warming events.”

\n
\n\n

Future temperature rises differ by the model used to predict them[^34] and by the way we act in the future[^35]. These will lead to sea level rise. Partially from melting ice, but also from the water in the oceans getting bigger from thermal expansion.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Horse population

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

The Horsepower was a measure of the work that one horse could do. The horse was the engine of most economies until the internal combustion engine displaced it. This was one of the first real examples of large scale disruption44.

\n\n

Horses were no longer a requirement, and people quickly moved over to engines to provide motive force. Horses stayed for recreational use, but in tiny numbers compared to their previous penetration.

\n\n

This is interesting, but it’s also a metaphor for a change from one entrenched technology to another. The disruption to the world can be huge.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Indoor plant farming

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Plants are green because they reflect the green part of the visual light spectrum; it turns out that plants need mainly pink light to photosynthesise. 1m of solar panels can generate more than 1m of pink light, so it’s very resource efficient.

\n\n

The plants are grown in racks, in a sealed warehouse. Each rack has lighting and a water supply with nutrients in it. Because the building is sealed, there’s no need for pesticides because there are no pests. Because the plants are in racks, each square metre on the floor can produce tens of square metres of plants.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n
\n\n

Internet coverage

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

45 Data from

\n
\n
\n\n

In the last quarter of a century the internet has changed the way the world operates. Access to the internet isn’t ubiquitous. A large part of the world can’t access what we take for granted. Projects like Facebook’s internet.org46 and Google’s Project Loon47 were trying to change that but their parent company’s deemed them unprofitable.

\n\n

Those unconnected people stand to gain from internet access and are also a giant market. The countries at the bottom of this graph have little in the way of fixed infrastructure, so may leapfrog the countries at the top of the graph if satellite internet becomes the norm.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Lab meat

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Ruminants, like cows and sheep, emit a lot of greenhouse gasses. They are also sentient beings. Those are two pretty compelling reasons not to eat them. However, meat is a dense source of calories, protein and vitamins. If we can culture meat in a lab, then we can have all the upsides without any of the downsides.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Legalisation of drugs

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

The Nutt report48 proposed a list of drugs in their order of harm to society. In this future, the discussion resurfaces and the Government decides that it needs consistent legislation.

\n\n

Proposals to ban alcohol are quickly put down by the drinks industry, and so to provide consistent legislation, all drugs from position 5 and below are legalised.

\n\n
    \n
  1. Heroin, 2. Cocaine, 3. Barbituates, 4. Street methadone, 5. Alcohol, 6. Ketamine, 7. Benzodiazepines, 8. Amphetamine, 9. Tobacco, 10. Buprenorphine, 11. Cannabis, 12. Solvents, 13. 4-MTA, 14. LSD, 15. Methylphenidate, 16. Anabolic steroids, 17. GHB, 18. Ecstasy, 19. Alykl nitrites, 20. Khat
    2. \n
\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Live shopping

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Live shopping49, already extremely popular in China, is like Instagram Live meets the Home Shopping Network – influencers show-and-tell products live on social media, which have particular discounts and promotions only while the feed is rolling. Forecasters predict this will become globally popular50 in the near term.

\n\n

Consider

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\n\n
\n\n

Psychedelia

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Shrooms are the new weed, commercially speaking, as new firms and funds scramble to monetize51 psilocybin in advance of its extended clinical applications. Psychedelics as a class of drugs continue to be destigmatized, relative to other drugs. Forecasts see this reaching a new level of mainstream saturation in coming years.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Micromobility

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

Micromobility is The Future of Vehicles

\n
\n
\n\n

Micromobility is the use of any vehicle under 500kg. This encompases everything from rollerskates to golf buggies, but generally is used to think about the range between kick scooters and ebikes.

\n\n

It’s often described as part of a city wide mobility strategy. If a city has a lot of electric scooters, then a 1km scoot to a bus stop isn’t so bad.

\n\n

Most dockless schemes are private, and have met with very little success (bikes or scooters). Docked systems are usually run by cities and are less chaotic, but also less useful (the bikes aren’t where you need them to be).

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Non-sovereign currencies

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

52

\n
\n
\n\n

Money developed as a special case of any unit of exchange. That could be sheep, cows and camels, or silver and gold. At some point someone made an object that stood in for the direct value of those objects and that became the money that we recognise today.

\n\n

Most money these days is backed by a national bank. Non-sovereign currency means that it isn’t backed that way by a government. This could be Linden Dollars53 that are spent inside the game Second Life, but the first thing that most people think of is Bitcoin. Bitcoin is the most famous of a whole class of cryptocurrencies. Cryptocurrencies are ‘mined’ through cryptographic algorithms that control the production rate of the ‘coins’.

\n\n

If currency is decoupled from national borders and from governments it takes away one of the most powerful levers that governments have to affect their country. It results in a much ‘purer’ expression of market forces. The positive or negative effects of this are unknown.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Population growth rate

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

55

\n
\n
\n\n

The world population is growing by 200,000 daily. Population increases are expected to level out globally between 2030 and 210056, but that’s an aggregate value. Some countries will still be growing fast whilst others will be shrinking (looking at you Japan).

\n\n

There are a lot of factors to population growth. Better sanitation means fewer children die. Better access to education for women means that fewer children are born. People living longer means that people hang about for longer. Wars push people out of countries, prosperity pulls them in.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Private internet

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Until the world wide web (www) became the dominant part of the internet there were lots of different ways that content could be shared. (Most of these still exist, but have comparable very small traffic.)

\n\n

The internet is built out of open standards57. The idea of a private internet is that a company with enough power will develop a rival information network with closed standards. The most likely candidates are Apple, Google and Facebook. For example, imagine that Apple developed a fast data-transfer protocol that you could only access from an apple device. They would go on to create a walled garden of content that only apple users could see.

\n\n

This would impede the flow of information that the internet allows, but it may create a better experience for a subset of the population58.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Asteroid mining

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Asteroids are mainly made of nickel iron or frozen water. They also contain a lot of platinum group metals. They are easy to mine because they don’t have big gravity wells that need to be overcome.

\n\n

Water is important to space travel because humans need to drink it, but unmanned missions need water too because it can be split into rocket fuel. Launching things into space is really expensive, so if it’s possible to build spacecraft from things already in space it’s much cheaper.

\n\n

The availability of precious metals in asteroids could upset the world economy in the same way that the influx of silver from South America caused massive inflation in the 15th–17th century59.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Quantum computers

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Quantum computers are able to solve a particular type of problem incredibly fast. Unfortunately, that particular type of problem is the one that the world’s encryption systems are based on.

\n\n

Quantum computers are currently a research curiosity, if they become a real world technology then all internet transactions will fail. (Unless credit card companies and banks take action before then to upgrade to quantum encryption.)

\n\n

From a more optimistic angle, once computer scientists work out how to phrase their problems in the way that quantum computers like, lots of

\n\n

very hard problems become quite easy!

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Radical life extension

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

The first children to get to 150 years old have already been born. Radical life extension advocates think that it’s possible to push that number much higher.

\n\n

Technically nobody dies of old age. They die of diseases that old age makes us more susceptible to. Life extension advocates extending the useful period of one’s life to make 90 the new 40.

\n\n

Immortal fictional characters often long for death, but usually because they are tired of their friends dying. If everyone lived a long time they would probably be pretty happy about it.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Return of the face lift

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

Brazil

\n
\n
\n\n

More invasive procedures such as surgical facelifts will regain popularity – people are tired of paying over and over for fillers60, which is more like a subscription model. Superusers say a surgical facelift is cheaper in the long run, and forecasts seem to be aligned with them, as the plastic surgery sector will continue to boom overall.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Rewilding

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

Depiction of some mammals common in northern Eurasia during the late Pleistocene, by Mauricio AntĂłn. From left to right: wild horse, woolly mammoth, reindeer, cave lion and woolly rhinoceros. Pleistocene Park

\n
\n
\n\n

Cities and suburbs are looking for places to downshift development and add urban greenery61 to compensate for rising CO2 emissions. Especially if carbon sequestration is eventually monetized, this could have an impact on land use overall, since owning undeveloped forest land would be profitable. This permaculture land ownership.

\n\n

Progress in ancient DNA recovery is leading some to suggest rewilding with currently extinct fauna62.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Screens

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Screens have become bigger and denser. ‘Retina’ screens mean that we can get up close and not see pixels. “Don’t get too close or you’ll get square eyes” doesn’t apply anymore.

\n\n

Being able to get close to a screen means that we can change the relationship with them. Touch screens mean that we can interact directly with images.

\n\n

We’re seeing flexible screens making a tentative step onto the market. Soon we might see screens that feel like they have a texture (buttons, roughness, etc.). We’re also seeing screens in more places: on watches, as car dashboards, as billboards, inside VR headsets.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Self driving cars

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

From a long shot dream in 200463 driverless cars are now more of a when than an if.

\n\n

Humans need a lot of tolerance to account for their imperfect driving skills. That means that the lanes need to be wider, cars need more impact protection, cars need to drive further apart.

\n\n

Cars also represent freedom for a lot of people. Owning a car means that for a large proportion of the day each car is idle. When cars drive themselves it’s unlikely that anyone will own a car. Cars will provide mobility. That means that parking will be eliminated, freeing up almost half of the current road network and many structures currently dedicated to parking.

\n\n

While not driving, people will be free to do other things. They could sleep, have meetings, eat, relax, etc.

\n\n
\n

“To generations of Americans, owning a car represented freedom. To the next generation, not owning a car will represent freedom.”64

\n
\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Single use plastic ban

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Single use plastic items are low capital cost, but have a significant environmental impact as they don’t break down for centuries. This has had a particular effect on marine wildlife.

\n\n

Some jurisdictions have banned single use bags and drinking straws. Others have banned all plastic, single use items.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Smart homes & internet of things

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

65

\n
\n
\n\n

Legislation is already in place that all white goods will have wireless communication built in. That means that a central controller in your house will be able to tell your air conditioning to ease off a couple of degrees to reduce peak electricity loading.

\n\n

The dream of smart refrigerators ordering more milk as you run out is getting closer. There are lots of other issues that are less obvious and less friendly about every aspect of your life being instrumented. E.g. there have been lots of examples of smart home devices being hacked and used as spy cameras. Less frightening, but still annoying, a lot of smart devices stop working altogether if the parent company shuts down.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Tech platform exit

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Consumer backlash against big tech has been heralded for years, but its widespread implementation finally seems likely. Mainstream awareness of the data power imbalance with big companies will make consumers happy to pay for things like search66, email and VPN instead of having companies use their data. Increasing attention to the power imbalances of this model will lead to the adoption of more niche services and platforms.

\n\n

Twitter is investigating making itself somewhat obsolete by moving their platform across to a distributed protocol (like email is). This might become the future, but it’s uncertain how it could be monetised with platforms running as businesses, rather than as utilities.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

The gig economy

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Most people tend to work for one employer, and then they will move from project to project for the same employer. The Hollywood model means that you complete a project and then go back into the market for employment.

\n\n

Its a bit like being a freelancer or consultant. People in this system get regular price signals about their economic value. ‘Stars’ will be paid a lot, but if you aren’t really in demand you may struggle to get a job.

\n\n

These sorts of jobs offer very accessible employment, at the cost of long term precarity, i.e. very little stability in their financial situation.

\n\n

This may erode certain employment benefits that have traditionally existed. It also allows really talented people to maximally realise their value.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

TikTok/K-pop activism

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

Wikipedia

\n
\n
\n\n

Apps and subcultures that consist of almost entirely young people are able to self-organise and do things that seem surprising and impossible to the older population that aren’t involved. E.g. the overbooking of a Trump rally by K-pop fans.

\n\n

The capacity for a group of under-enfranchised people to self-organise like this is new, and its power is not well understood.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Ubiquitous broadband

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Broadband internet unlocks so much of our urban economy in the developed world but that is a small part of the earth’s surface.

\n\n

What would access to broadband do for rural African farmers, or for Antarctic explorers?

\n\n

Google had project Loon, Facebook tried giant autonomous planes that act as repeater stations to the ground. SpaceX is putting a network of toaster-sized internet-satellites into orbit and .

\n\n

If everyone in the world has access to the same markets it would have a huge levelling effect. It might raise the incomes of the poorest, but it might well lower the incomes of the most well-off.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Universal basic income (UBI)

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

Simple graph showing what Universal Basic Income is doing for society u/canadaduane

\n
\n
\n\n

UBI is the idea that everyone in a society gets paid a stipend by the state. For example everyone gets $1000 every month, and any money you make on top of that (after tax) is yours.

\n\n

There is a lot of discussion about what universal, basic and income actually mean in this context. Is universal: everyone inside the state’s boundary, all citizens, all citizens over a certain age, all male landowning citizens? Is basic enough to not starve, enough to have a living wage?

\n\n

It’s popular across the political spectrum, for different reasons. Small government advocates like it because it’ll reduce reliance on the welfare state, big government advocates like it because it’s a universal safety net.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Universal work from home policies

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Remote work due to Covid-19 has exposed the inadequacies of compulsory office attendance; now that people are working from home, it will never go back to the way it used to be68; geographical requirements around talent acquisitions will loosen or expand beyond urban centers.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Urbanisation

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

Populations and urbanisation percentages by Hannah Ritchie and Max Roser, Our World in Data

\n
\n
\n\n

The NSW Department of Infrastructure Planning and Natural Resources estimates that 60% of the world’s population will be living within cities by the year 2030 and about 91.1% of the Australian population will live in cities. They expected the population in the Sydney Region alone to grow by a net increase of 40,500 per year.

\n\n

The forecast demand for new residential development to support Sydney’s current population is 25,000 dwellings per year over the next ten years, with 25% of that growth located in Greenfield sites on the urban periphery and Greater Metropolitan Region corridors.

\n\n

With the enlarging population and increasing urbanisation the demands on resources will contribute to further degradation of the Australian environment and Sydney’s ever expanding urban sprawl.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Virtual reality

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Current virtual reality gives us a glimpse of how we’ll experience it in the future. There’s a lot between us and fully believable, totally immersive virtual environments. As we solve more and more of those problems, VR will become more useful. Breaking out of gaming to be the standard method for video conferences, for virtual site tours and for shopping.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Walking robots

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Legs have lots of advantages over wheels. 2, 4 and more, legged robots are able to go places that wheeled and tracked vehicles can’t71. That means that we can send robots to map remote places, or to navigate places designed for humans. (Or other legged things!)

\n\n

Most of the current crop of robots have military origins, but they are also ideal of other types of hostile environments, like firefighting, rescue or space!

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Wearable/implantable technology

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

Apple watches have FDA approved ECG capabilities, but its usefulness is disputed 9 to 5 mac

\n
\n
\n\n

We are in the first flush of the wearable technology boom72. The quantified self73 that knowing your steps and heart rate allows for means that people can make more informed choices about their behaviour.

\n\n

We are currently in a very naïve period of this trend. The things we measure aren’t the important things, they are the things that are easy to measure. The feedback we get is distracting and doesn’t allow us to be more present in our lives. In the next generation of wearable, or even implantable, technology, we’ll be able to use it to maximise our health and wellbeing, and to be far more present than we currently are.

\n\n

In vet science, there are sensors that sit in a cow’s stomach that can relay back to the farmer the health of each cow. Humans have pacemakers, but non-therapeutic implantables are almost unheard of74.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Working hours

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

75

\n
\n
\n\n

Managers and professionals showed strong reductions in hours worked between 1996 and 2010 according to the ABS Trends in Hours Worked report76.

\n\n

Although it might not feel like it to us, the trends seem pretty clear, assuming that some other force doesn’t come into play in the future.

\n\n

This doesn’t cover people who work multiple jobs and/or work for themselves (which could be entrepreneurs, or it could be Uber drivers).

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

XYZ as a service

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Anything you can do or own yourself can probably be provided as a service78 to you. Gmail is the most obvious example: email as a service. People tend not to have a well at their house, they get water as a service.

\n\n

You can get computing and storage as a service from AWS. X as a service also applies in the physical world. Uber and GoGet are examples of transport as a service.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Zoom fashion

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Fashion designers and retailers will create markedly different strategies79 for fashion that appears on the upper body, ie above “the Zoom line” compared with the bottom half of the body, which isn’\t usually visible on screen.

\n\n

Many fashion houses have been embracing comfort and loungewear. Tracksuit bottoms have become the defacto cool weather bottoms of the pandemic.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

life expectancy

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Life expectancy continues to increase80 in contrast to Hobbes’ idea of life, which was “Nasty brutish and short”. We are comfortably on track to hit an average life expectancy of 100. There is a lot of variation in global life expectancy. That average of 100 means that there will be a global reduction in lifespan inequality, or that some nations will see huge lifespan increases. It’s not uncommon to see claims that some children alive today will live to be 15081 or 20082!

\n\n

Life expectancy is measured at different ages. These days, in ‘developed’ countries the difference between life expectancy at birth and at five years isn’t substantially different. Some believe that prehistoric humans could expect to live into their mid fifties83 if they made it through childhood.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DfMA)

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

An example of DfMA design refinement to improve assembly ease. Boothroyd, Geoffrey, Peter Dewhurst, and Winston A. Knight. Product Design for Manufacture and Assembly. 3rd ed. Manufacturing Engineering and Materials Processing 74. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 2011. p.83.

\n
\n
\n\n

Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DfMA) is a product design approach that was developed in the manufacturing industries as a way of linking the design and production processes of product development. DfMA captures production data and makes it accessible to the design team in the form of design principles and guides, and metrics for design evaluation and improvement. The aim is to create designs that are efficient, fast, and cost effective to produce. DfMA advocates: modularity and standardisation of parts and processes; simplicity in design; connection interfaces that cannot be assembled incorrectly; part count reduction (as fewer parts as possible); and an emphasis on maintaining good visual and physical access to all connection points (think IKEA!).

\n\n

In the last decade, the construction industry has turned its attention to DfMA as a potential solution to its productivity crisis. Although some of the DfMA design rules (and most of the DfMA metrics) used in manufacturing are not completely appropriate for use in the design of buildings, DfMA as a philosophy certainly is, especially when paired with prefabrication. The development of a construction-specific DfMA represents a shift towards data-informed design. The construction industry will need to increase the sophistication of its data collection methods during building production/construction phases so that an appropriate set of design guides and evaluation metrics can be developed.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Mass Timber Construction

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

A 350m tall timber tower proposed for Tokyo. Sumitomo Forestry

\n
\n
\n\n

Mass timber construction refers to the use of engineered timber products such as cross-laminated timber (CLT) and glue-laminated timber (glulam) in the structure of a building. Engineered timber products are made by gluing layers of raw timber boards together into planar elements (CLT, used in floors and walls) or linear elements (glulam, used in columns and beams). This production method means that large timber building parts can be produced without cutting down old growth forest. Additionally, the properties of the building elements can be enhanced by using different types of timber (and even other materials) in the composition of layers.

\n\n

Mass timber construction offers many benefits over typical concrete construction. First, timber sequesters carbon, meaning that the building becomes a carbon sink for the duration of its lifetime (as opposed to emitting carbon, as concrete manufacture does). Second, mass timber is much lighter than concrete, so it needs smaller foundations, and can often be used to add new floors to existing buildings. Third, mass timber changes the nature of the construction site, eliminating the need for formwork and wet trades, and significantly increasing the speed of construction (Brock Commons, an 18-storey mass timber project in Canada achieved a floor cycle time of 3 days). Some issues to consider when building with mass timber, include: forest certification, carbon miles in delivery (if CLT or glulam is not being manufactured locally), performance of the building under fire conditions, chainsaw attack!

\n\n

In 2009 the first “tall” mass timber building—the 9-storey Stadthaus Murray Grove in London—triggered a global fascination with pushing mass timber to its limits. Since then, several buildings have held the record for tallest, only to inevitably have the title taken away. The current tallest, MjĂžstĂ„rnet in Norway, sits at 85m, however a Japanese company has proposed a 350m tall structure for Tokyo, and is currently conducting research towards making this happen in the very near future.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Private space exploration and asteroid mining

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

\n
\n
\n\n

Asteroids are mainly made of nickel iron or frozen water. They also contain a lot of platinum group metals. They are easy to mine because they don’t have big gravity wells that need to be overcome.

\n\n

Water is important to space travel because humans need to drink it, but unmanned missions need water too because it can be split into rocket fuel. Launching things into space is really expensive, so if it’s possible to build spacecraft from things already in space it’s much cheaper.

\n\n

The availability of precious metals in asteroids could upset the world economy in the same way that the influx of silver from South America caused massive inflation in the 15th–17th century84.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n\n

Smart homes & internet of things

\n\n
\n

\"\"

\n
\n

This is an image of an xxx by YYY

\n
\n
\n\n

Legislation is already in place that all white goods will have wireless communication built in. That means that a central controller in your house will be able to tell your air conditioning to ease off a couple of degrees to reduce peak electricity loading.

\n\n

The dream of smart refrigerators ordering more milk as you run out is getting closer. There are lots of other issues that are less obvious and less friendly about every aspect of your life being instrumented. E.g. there have been lots of examples of smart home devices being hacked and used as spy cameras. Less frightening, but still annoying, a lot of smart devices stop working altogether if the parent company shuts down.

\n\n

Consider

\n\n \n\n
\n\n
\n
    \n
  1. \n

    Not the song, but Wireless Application Protocol ↩

    \n
    2. \n
  2. \n

    Machine Bias - There’s software used across the country to predict future criminals. And it’s biased against blacks. by Julia Angwin, Jeff Larson, Surya Mattu and Lauren Kirchner, ProPublica May 23, 2016 ↩

    \n
    3. \n
  3. \n

    Blendle is a Dutch online news platform that aggregates articles from a variety of newspapers and magazines and sells them on a pay-per-article basis. The key differences to similar websites are the participation by otherwise commercially unrelated news services in a single platform and the ability for registered users to easily pay a small price per article. ↩

    \n
    4. \n
  4. \n

    https://www.home.saxo/insights/news-and-research/thought-leadership/outrageous-predictions ↩

    \n
    5. \n
  5. \n

    “Autofac” is a 1955 science fiction short story by American writer Philip K. Dick that features one of the earliest treatments of self-replicating machines ↩

    \n
    6. \n
  6. \n

    How Nigeria transformed from a business into a country ↩

    \n
    7. \n
  7. \n

    Watch springs are the obvious precedent, but their energy density is tiny in comparison. ↩

    \n
    8. \n
  8. \n

    See an example prediction market ↩

    \n
    9. \n
  9. \n

    definition from here ↩

    \n
    10. \n
  10. \n

    https://www.mintel.com/global-consumer-trends ↩

    \n
    11. \n
  11. \n

    As far as I can tell this counts the number of connections, but doesn’t take into account how many people share that connection. The number is 40 for France, but there might be more than 2 people sharing each line. Which would mean more than 1 connection per person! Data via Google: World Development Indicators ↩

    \n
    12. \n
  12. \n

    Illustrated by how many totalitarian nations restrict access to the whole internet. ↩

    \n
    13. \n
  13. \n \n

    ↩

    \n
    14. \n
  14. \n

    https://info.trendwatching.com/21-trends-for-2021 ↩

    \n
    15. \n
  15. \n

    https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/retail/our-insights/state-of-fashion ↩

    \n
    16. \n
  16. \n

    https://info.trendwatching.com/21-trends-for-2021 ↩

    \n
    17. \n
  17. \n

    https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/mckinsey/featured%20insights/china/china%20still%20the%20worlds%20growth%20engine%20after%20covid%2019/mckinsey%20china%20consumer%20report%202021.pdf ↩

    \n
    18. \n
  18. \n

    https://intelligence.wundermanthompson.com/trend-reports/the-future-100-2021/ ↩

    \n
    19. \n
  19. \n

    https://www.accenture.com/us-en/insights/interactive/fjord-trends ↩

    \n
    20. \n
  20. \n

    Wikipedia: Moore’s law ↩

    \n
    21. \n
  21. \n

    Which is why there are so many data centres in Iceland. ↩

    \n
    22. \n
  22. \n

    Note that the graph has a log scale, that means that each line is an increase of 10 times, not of one unit! ↩

    \n
    23. \n
  23. \n

    All these graphs are from: The history of Australian property values ↩

    \n
    24. \n
  24. \n

    Advanced Space Transportation Program: Paving the Highway to Space ↩

    \n
    25. \n
  25. \n

    Quora: What is cost of sending 1kg weight into space? ↩

    \n
    26. \n
  26. \n

    Wikipedia Falcon_Heavy Launch_prices ↩

    \n
    27. \n
  27. \n

    Against Waldenponding ↩ ↩2

    \n
    28. \n
  28. \n

    http://violentdeathproject.com/countries/australia ↩

    \n
    29. \n
  29. \n

    From Wikipedia: Crime in the United States ↩

    \n
    30. \n
  30. \n

    The Better Angels of Our Nature ↩

    \n
    31. \n
  31. \n

    for a nice interactive view of this phenomenon this article is good ↩

    \n
    32. \n
  32. \n

    Dark kitchens create meals exclusively for the online delivery market - ABC ↩

    \n
    33. \n
  33. \n

    https://victrola.com/blogs/articles/music-industry-trends-to-look-for-in-2021 ↩

    \n
    34. \n
  34. \n

    https://info.trendwatching.com/21-trends-for-2021 ↩

    \n
    35. \n
  35. \n

    Minimalism: another boring product wealthy people can buy \"Minimalism is just another form of conspicuous consumption, a way of saying to the world: “Look at me! Look at all of the things I have refused to buy!\" ↩

    \n
    36. \n
  36. \n

    https://www.fastcompany.com/90588717/top-tech-trends-2021-post-pandemic-predictions-ai-fintech-health ↩

    \n
    37. \n
  37. \n

    https://www.foresightfactory.co/trends-report/ ↩

    \n
    38. \n
  38. \n

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hikikomori ↩

    \n
    39. \n
  39. \n

    Accessorize to a Crime “Research from Carnegie Mellon University can generate visual patterns onto glasses to either avoid facial recognition or ‘impersonate’ as someone else” ↩

    \n
    40. \n
  40. \n

    https://www.frogdesign.com/designmind/trends-2021?utm_campaign=USA_Trends%202021&utm_source=email&utm_medium=trends%202021%20email&utm_term=trends%202021%20email&utm_content=trends%202021%20email ↩

    \n
    41. \n
  41. \n

    GDP per capita (constant 2000 US$) ↩

    \n
    42. \n
  42. \n

    I’m mainly talking about personalised medicine here:. Medicine that affects genes is another topic, big enough to justify its own card. ↩

    \n
    43. \n
  43. \n

    How is Today’s Warming Different from the Past? ↩

    \n
    44. \n
  44. \n

    With the printing press displacing scribes as the other that I can think of. ↩

    \n
    45. \n
  45. \n

    https://bit.ly/3Hxlzl3 ↩

    \n
    46. \n
  46. \n

    internet.org was planning to make internet access available through solar powered planes. ↩

    \n
    47. \n
  47. \n

    Loon was planning to make internet access available through weather balloons. ↩

    \n
    48. \n
  48. \n

    Drug harms in the UK: a multicriteria decision analysis by Prof David J Nutt, FMedSci; Leslie A King, PhD; Lawrence D Phillips, PhD ↩

    \n
    49. \n
  49. \n

    https://www.singlegrain.com/web-trends/what-is-live-stream-shopping/ ↩

    \n
    50. \n
  50. \n

    https://www.foresightfactory.co/trends-report ↩

    \n
    51. \n
  51. \n

    https://www.benzinga.com/markets/cannabis/21/01/19329903/7-psychedelic-trend-predictions-for-2021 ↩

    \n
    52. \n
  52. \n

    Worth checking this out! Frog: Mobile Money in Afghanistan ↩

    \n
    53. \n
  53. \n

    There is an article about the economy of second life and this is an exchange that only deals in virtual currencies. Both are shut down now, but there were some wild stories from that era! ↩

    \n
    54. \n
  54. \n

    Something like 80% of €500 notes are believed to be used in money laundering! The End of Money: Counterfeiters, Preachers, Techies, Dreamers–and the Coming Cashless Society ↩

    \n
    55. \n
  55. \n

    ABS data, high scenario. ↩

    \n
    56. \n
  56. \n

    Wikipedia: World population ↩

    \n
    57. \n
  57. \n

    This talk is a really good source to understand the threats to the open internet ↩

    \n
    58. \n
  58. \n

    TODO: find what this footnote pointed to ↩

    \n
    59. \n
  59. \n

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_revolution ↩

    \n
    60. \n
  60. \n

    https://www.newbeauty.com/aesthetic-trends-2021 ↩

    \n
    61. \n
  61. \n

    https://www.mintel.com/global-consumer-trends ↩

    \n
    62. \n
  62. \n

    https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/04/pleistocene-park/517779/ ↩

    \n
    63. \n
  63. \n

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARPA_Grand_Challenge ↩

    \n
    64. \n
  64. \n

    http://breakingsmart.com/a-new-soft-technology ↩

    \n
    65. \n
  65. \n

    http://idisrupted.com/disrupted-electronics-internet-things-may-create-moores-law-steroids/” ↩

    \n
    66. \n
  66. \n

    https://www.fastcompany.com/90588717/top-tech-trends-2021-post-pandemic-predictions-ai-fintech-health ↩

    \n
    67. \n
  67. \n

    a16z Podcast: Companies, Networks, Crowds ↩

    \n
    68. \n
  68. \n

    https://www.mintel.com/global-consumer-trends ↩

    \n
    69. \n
  69. \n

    What Sort Of People Should There Be? ↩

    \n
    70. \n
  70. \n

    The Nether ↩

    \n
    71. \n
  71. \n

    Or can’t without causing substantial damage. ↩

    \n
    72. \n
  72. \n

    Fifth, if you count clothes, shoes, spectacles and wrist watches as the first four.” ↩

    \n
    73. \n
  73. \n

    The Quantified Self movement was founded by Kevin Kelly, and whilst niche at the time is now so mainstream that it’s basically not talked about any more. ↩

    \n
    74. \n
  74. \n

    See the case of Meow-Ludo who implanted an transport card into his hand ↩

    \n
    75. \n
  75. \n

    from How Did Work-Life Balance in the U.S. Get So Awful?. If we assume a 50 week year, Greece has gone from 54 hour weeks to 41; the Netherlands from 46 to 28! ↩

    \n
    76. \n
  76. \n

    https://www.abs.gov.au/articles/insights-hours-worked ↩

    \n
    77. \n
  77. \n

    When John Maynard Keynes Predicted a 15-Hour Workweek “in a Hundred Year’s Time” (1930) ↩

    \n
    78. \n
  78. \n

    The World Of Everything-As-A-Service, Tom Blomfield, Techcrunch ↩

    \n
    79. \n
  79. \n

    https://www.wgsn.com/content/board_viewer/#/85986/en/page/1 ↩

    \n
    80. \n
  80. \n

    https://goo.gl/0omR22 ↩

    \n
    81. \n
  81. \n

    http://goo.gl/CCBPuv ↩

    \n
    82. \n
  82. \n

    http://ktwop.com/2012/12/27/the-first-200-year-old-human-has-already-been-born/ ↩

    \n
    83. \n
  83. \n

    Hillard Kaplan, Kim Hill, Jane Lancaster, and A. Magdalena Hurtado (2000). A Theory of Human Life History Evolution: Diet, Intelligence and Longevity (PDF). Evolutionary Anthropology 9 (4): 156–185. ↩

    \n
    84. \n
  84. \n

    Wikipedia Price revolution ↩

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    85. \n
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