Humans are prey

In chapter five of the book “The Forturne Seller” by William A. Sherden, the author discusses the human race as not only being predators but prey as well. The author foresees humanity becoming prey to microorganisms. This painted picture of a possible future by this author is very realistic. We only need to look at recent events that involve the swine flu and bird flu that show how vulnerable we are as a race. These recent events have caused deaths and they have also shown how quickly a virus or disease can spread across this planet. The irony in this situation is that technology is a gift and a curse. For example, advances in technology allow us to produce large volumes of an antidote within a short period of time. On the other hand, technology will be the cause for a wide spread epidemic. Trains, planes, and boats will be the vessel for carrying the infected humans from point A to point B. This potential future has already taken place in the past with plagues that have wiped out villages and towns. It has also taken place with recent events as well. The only difference with this prediction is that it is predicting a virus or disease on a massive human extinction level. In the end, humans need to eat and viruses and diseases need a host to infect (that would be us).

Social Brainstorming

XMind is a web 2.0 tool that focuses on project management, collaboration, brainstorming, and mapping. This tool is very useful with a corporate environment, because it takes project management to the next level. Not only are you tracking deadlines, task, and resources, but you are also tracking input, collaboration, and ideas that may contribute to the project you working on or another one.

1) Idea sharing: XMind allows you to share your ideas with others. This feature is a great one, because individuals do not necessarily have to be a resource on the project to contribute. For example, if your organization's senior management is having a discussion about implementing a new process, employees would be able to contribute to the discussion by sharing their ideas via this tool.

2) Mapping / Brainstorming: Another important feature of this tool is mapping or brainstorming. Users can have a discussion among themselves and brainstorm. This brainstorming session will build a map that will look like a bunch of clouds that represents ideas. This feature will be able contribute to strategic discussions, because it will allow individuals to throw random solutions at the wall and then they will be able to see what sticks.

2009 Horizon Report

The Personal Web is a technology that can be looked at in the two parts. In the Horizon Report they talk about The Personal Web as a way of organizing online content. Currently, this technology exists. Google has apps that allows you to combine blogs, emails, and news. The second part of The Personal Web that does not exist now is the ability to organize personal and sensitive information. For example, there does not seem to be an application that allows you to centralize your credit scores, bank accounts, investment accounts, and bills all in one place. I believe this technology is probably 3 years away. There are some sights such as www.mint.com that pulls in your bank information, but it does not allow you to interact with your account. The technology part of this Personal Web application will probably be easy, but the buy-in will be the most difficult part. Getting people to trust the web and a application that houses all of their personal information, such as social security number, address, and date of birth all in one place will be tricky.


A trend that not only affects technology, but also the economy is globalization. The 2009 Horizon Report looks at globalization as a way of doing business, communicating, accessing information, and interacting with others. Overnight, the world as a whole has adopted globalization as the way of the future. For example, businesses such as KFC and McDonalds receive a good percentage of their profits from overseas. Technology jobs and outsourced to what we call “the offshore team” and the communication with this offshore team is as transparent as if you were communicating with your fellow employee in the office next to you. Video games have also adopted the globalization culture into their technology. So, when a kid is playing Madden or NBA Live they have the option of playing their friend down the road from their house or playing with a random individual from Africa, Asia, or Europe. The 2009 Horizon Report called this a trend, but maybe its more of an adoption of culture shift and change.

Our environment and what we are doing to it

http://www.ted.com/talks/al_gore_warns_on_latest_climate_trends.html

1) Al Gore talks about how the polar caps are melting and what that is doing to the environment. There are more droughts and more fires because of this change in our environment.

2) Al Gore also shows two sides of the argument in this video as well. He shows how the coal companies are brushing off the talks of climate change as something that is minor. On the other hand, he shows the side of people and some businesses who are actually doing something about the climate change and the new approaches they are taking to save the environment and our planet.

Watching this video makes you wonder how important a dollar really is. Is making a dollar so important, that the destruction of your own backyard is secondary or in some cases it doesn't even matter? Some people say I love my kids and my family and I want to leave them a better world, but I wonder how true that statement is sometimes. If certain people really cared about their kids and their families they would take the extra step to make sure our world is livable for them in the future as it was livable for themselves growing up. How much information do people need to make a sound and reasonable decision about global warming? It amazes me that executives can take reports and data from their database systems and trust that information when it comes to making key business decisions, but when it comes to global warming some people fill the information is inaccurate or non-sufficient. Is it the information that is being supplied or is it the way of life and how the call for change will impact that way of life that is the real concern?

Data, databases, datawarehouses, and personal-data

In today's world data is needed to make sound business and personal decisions. The important thing to note about data is that it is only as valuable as the manner or method in which it is housed, verified, and presented. For example, if your bank posted the same transaction twice to your account you would think you had less money than what you actually did. The data that is used to make a decision is just as important (if not more important) than the decision that is based off of that data. In the end, always be suspicious and scrutinize data as you would your own personal decisions.