Institute For The Future

Investigating the Social Good Summit

Scanning the horizon for emerging trends during UN Week.

Artifact from the Future: Energy Wants To Be Free

UN teams up with the Global Pirate Party to create IP free disaster relief kits.

Artifact from the Future: Microbial Weather Map

“Mirror, mirror on the wall, which neighborhood is healthiest of all?”

Artifact from the Future: Reputation Statement

Small contributions add up to real value. You get points for contributing to wikis, podcasting, sharing your photos. Your monthly statement is as good...

Digital Music's New Freemium Model

You know when you fall madly in love with a super local musician? Their sound just captures your spirit to a tee. You love it when you go to a local...

Wyrd Con, Where Futures Come Alive

Walk into the Hilton Costa Mesa in Los Angeles on the weekend of Wyrd Con, and you would never know from the cool and elegant lobby that down in the...

Four #Innovate2038 Official Awards Announced!

The four #Innovate2038 official awards are now live! Find out if you're a finalist or a winner, and see the game's winning leaderboard. The game ended...

Making is a Way of Experiencing

Prototyping systems of all kind at the World Maker Faire.

Robin Hood “Parasite Algorithm”

I’m fascinated to learn of a new “asset management cooperative” coming out of Finland—Robin Hood Minor Asset Management....

The Globalization of Paola Monzillo

During a recent visit to Montevideo, Uruguay, I was struck by an underground exhibit at the SUBTE gallery of sculptures, collage,drawing, painting and...

Not a Form but a Philosophy of Our Time - Part 4

View the Millennial Trains Project as an artifact from the future—a small piece of an education system designed for a globalized world, preparing...

Marina Gorbis on Socialstructing the Future

Marina Gorbis' new book, The Nature of the Future: Dispatches from the Socialstructed World, offers an inspiring portrayal of how new technologies are...

"25 of the Smartest Women on Twitter"

Fast Company recently released a list of 25 of the Smartest Women on Twitter to highlight new and influential voices amidst the already-known or...

Not a Form but a Philosophy of Our Time - Part 3

In a world where the physicist's atoms appear more real than the qualitative face of the world, brain scans more important than the true depths of the...

Next-gen Witnessing

How Can We Enhance Human Rights Activism Using ‘Co-presence For Good’?...

Not a Form but a Philosophy of Our Time - Part 2

With no wifi on the train during the longer stretches of travel, we unplugged from the aether of constant connectivity to sit face-to-face and reflect...

Not a Form but a Philosophy of Our Time - Part 1

This August, the Millennial Trains Project packed 24 Millennials into vintage train cars and embarked on a journey through America that operated on...

Invisible Nature Book Release

After following the out-of-the-box thinking of environmental scholar Ken Worthy for over a decade, I'm glad to report that readers the world over can...

Block by Block Creativity

Last year, for the first time in nine decades, the population of major cities grew faster than their suburbs. If this tidal shift in population...

Smart Government and Big, Open Data: The Trickle-Up Effect

As we grow numb to the daily headlines decrying the unimaginable scope of data being collected from Internet companies by the National Security...

Where Science Meets Fashion

If you're in Australia, you'll probably see me down there this month! Sadly, not in person, but you can find me in the latest issue of Frankie which...

A Short Vision from the Coming Age of Networked Matter

"Lich House," by Warren Ellis, is a story from An Aura of Familiarity: Visions from the Coming Age of Networked Matter—a collection of six original...

A look into the Future: Citizens, Communities and Open Data

In May, my colleague Bradley Kreit presented a keynote, A look into the Future: Citizens, Communities and Open Data, for the Healthy Communities Data...

A Short Vision of the Future by Bruce Sterling

"From Beyond the Coming Age of Networked Matter," by Bruce Sterling, is a story from An Aura of Familiarity: Visions from the Coming Age of Networked...