In this issue: PLANTING FISH IN THE DESERT MEDICAL TATTOOS DO LOW-CALORIE FOODS MAKE PEOPLE FAT? And much, much more... ------------------------------------------------------------ ____ ____ ___ _____ ____ ______ ______ * / __ )/ __ \/ | / _/ | / / |/ / | / _/ / / __ / /_/ / /| | / // |/ / /|_/ / /| | / // / / /_/ / _ _/ ___ |_/ // /| / / / / ___ |_/ // /___ /_____/_/ |_/_/ |_/___/_/ |_/_/ /_/_/ |_/___/_____/ *Feeding hungry minds since 2004 ------------------------------------------------------------ Brainmail email issue 54 - August 2009 ------------------------------------------------------------ Brainmail is a free monthly (usually) newsletter dedicated to current and future trends, statistics and other nuggets of information. To subscribe, or unsubscribe, to the world's best cerebral snackfood visit http://brainmail.nowandnext.com/ Tell the whole world about brainmail - forward this to zillions of friends. ------------------------------------------------------------ > Planting fish in the desert Farming fish in an arid area might sound like a really silly idea but perhaps not. According to Prof Avigad Vonshak, a director of the Jacob Blaustein Institute for Desert Research, growing a kilogram of wheat in an arid region requires 750 litres of water, compared to just 10 litres for a kilogram of fish. The reason, of course, is that the fish don't drink the water, whereas plants do. Ref: Business Spectator (Aus) > Internet prediction You can't predict the future but you can Google it. A paper by Hal Varian, a Professor of Economics at the University of California at Berkeley (and Google's Chief Economist) has noted that the frequency of search is a good real-time indicator of future behaviour. For example, if people start searching for flu symptoms in a specific region this usually indicates an imminent outbreak. Similarly, a drop in the number of searches for SUV vehicles might mean that the bottom has just fallen out of the SUV market. Interesting don't you think? Ref: The Economist (UK) > Vinyl revival Vinyl records are supposed to be dead, right? Surely vinyl was fatally wounded by CDs and digital downloads have just finished vinyl off? Wrong. Vinyl records (and record shops) are doing quite nicely thank you and in the future it's quite likely that the recorded music market will be split between downloads and vinyl, with CDs being the extinct technology. How come? The answer is that people want things they can touch and vinyl records are more 'touchy feely' than CDs. Furthermore, vinyl is, in a sense, the most authentic form of fandom. In other words, it's about the object, not just the music. Ref: The Australian (Aus) > Cyberwars Is cyberspace the next frontier for the intelligence community? Scientists and strategists from within the military establishment have been pondering whether it is possible to bring a nation to its knees using silicon instead of soldiers for many years. In particular, is it possible for a nation's critical infrastructure to be devastated by an unexpected cyber-strike - a digital Pearl Harbour if you like? There certainly seems to be a lot of chatter about this possibility at the moment, although some observers have noted that this might have more to do with a funding war between government agencies than anything else. Ref: Economist (UK) > Medical tattoos Scientists in the US are developing a glucose-sensitive ink that changes colour according to blood sugar levels. Uses? Tattoos that visibly change colour, thereby reducing the need for needles to manually monitor sugar levels, is one application. Ref: Cosmos (Aus) > Behavioural analytics Here's a problem. How can human operatives possibly monitor every single CCTV camera in real time? They obviously can't, which is where Video Analytics comes in. A company called BRS Labs has developed software that reasons much like the human brain. The result is what's been called a cognitive learning engine - an automated computer vision system that can reason whether or not visual data (i.e. video footage) is indicative of future criminal or terrorist intent. The system is autonomous in that it does not require human input once installed. Ref: net-security.org (thanks Matt) > Electronic tracking of children A company is selling a digital watch with hidden GPS and satellite tracking technology to allow parents to monitor their child's whereabouts. The watch, which costs around GBP 150, also sends out an alert if it is forcibly removed. So the line between tagging an innocent child and a dangerous criminal is where exactly? Ref: Daily Telegraph (UK) > Email patterns Can email use be used to predict an impending disaster? According to a study by the Florida Institute of Technology (US) the answer is a definitive maybe. The study, which looked at email use at Enron in 2001, found that the largest changes in email use occurred moments before the crisis. The critical indicator is the growth of email cliques - small groups that exchange information and where every member to is direct contact. Explanation? When the crunch gets close people have a strong need to talk to people they can trust. Ref: The Times (UK) > Word detective: Virtual water Virtual water is an idea developed by Tony Allan of King's College London. According to Wikipedia: "Virtual water (also known as embedded water, embodied water, or hidden water) refers, in the context of trade, to the water used in the production of a good or service." Expect the water labelling (a label showing the amount of water used to create a product or service) of goods and services to become commonplace in the not too distant future. Ref: Wikipedia.org > The power of positive thinking We have been encouraged to think positively about ourselves ever since Norman Vincent wrote The Power of Positive Thinking way back in 1952. However, new research suggests that such thinking (and books) might be doing some people more harm that good. A study by Joanne Wood at the University of Waterloo (Canada) has found that positive self-statements made by people with low self-esteem causes negative moods. In short, positive thinking can accelerate, or accentuate, negative thoughts in people that do not have naturally high self-confidence. Ref: Psychological Science (US) > Corporate prediction markets Prediction markets aren't exactly new but the number of large organizations now using web tools to create internal prediction markets is. For example, the purchasing group at Hewlett-Packard (HP) has used internal prediction markets to forecast the cost of computer memory chips in the future. This has proven so successful that HP is now offering the service to their clients under the acronym 'Brain' - Behaviourally Robust Aggregation of Information in Networks. Ref: New York Times (US) > Do low-calorie foods make people fat? A study by Susan Swithers and Terry Davidson at Purdue University (US) suggests that consuming foods containing low-calorie sweeteners might be making people fat. The reason for this could be that the brain equates sweetness with calories, so the brain automatically restricts consumption. Substituting an artificial sweetener causes a disruption in this connection. Sounds logical but my gut just isn't buying it. Ref: The Economist (UK) ------------------------------------------------------------ : FAST FACTS 20% of UK teachers think that the cane (corporal punishment) should be re-introduced in UK schools in order to restore classroom order. Ref: Times Education Supplement (UK) The English language version of Wikipedia lost 49,000 volunteer contributors during QTR 1 2009. Ref: Daily Mail (UK) The number of female bank robbers in the US increased by 25% since 2002. Ref: CNN (US) 20% of 26-year-olds in the US live with their parents. In 1990 the figure was 11%. Ref: Mark Bauerlein, The Dumbest Generation In Italy, in 2007, there were 574,215 official limousines to ferry around 180,000 elected politicians. Ref: London Review of Books (UK) 90% of Chinese do not possess health insurance or a retirement fund. Ref: Jacques Attali, a Brief History of the Future In 1985, Chinese people ate roughly 20kg of meat per head. In 2009 this figure is expected to hit 50kg per head. Ref: The Economist (UK) 2,500 languages face extinction globally according to UNESCO. Ref: UNESCO The average length of stay in Australian hospitals was 3.3 days in 2006. In 1986 this figure was 6.5 days. Ref: Australian Bureau of Statistics (Aus) 37,000 state employees in Alabama (US) will have to pay an extra $25 a month in health insurance in 2011 because their weight is now considered a health risk. Ref: New Scientist (US) 33% of people that entered university in the UK in 1998 are still earning less than GBP 15,000 year. Ref: The Guardian (UK) In the 1950s the fertility rate in South Korea was 4.5%. It is now 1.5%. Ref: Jacques Attali, A Brief History of the Future 8% of workers in the UK dread going to work because they can't stand their co-workers. Ref: Daily Mail (UK) In 2008, 23,000 children died in workplace accidents. Ref: Jacques Attali, A Brief History of the Future 53% of births in London are to immigrant mothers. The highest percentage (68%) is in Kensington & Chelsea. Ref: Newsweek (US) About 14.5% of men in the US are 6 feet tall or above. For CEOs of Fortune 500 Companies the percentage is 58%. Ref: Malcolm Gladwell, Blink. ------------------------------------------------------------ : BOOK OF THE MONTH "Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive" by Jared Diamond (2005) ------------------------------------------------------------ : WEB SIGHT OF THE MONTH A piece of music that has been playing for 9 years, 328 days, 18 hours and 2,3,4,5,6,7... seconds (roughly): http://longplayer.org/ ------------------------------------------------------------ : QUOTE OF THE MONTH "Computer agents don't get bored or embarrassed" - Nick Jennings, from the University of Southampton (UK) who has invented a program that can haggle on behalf of customers. Ref: New Scientist (UK) ------------------------------------------------------------ : STILL HUNGRY? You might not know this, but brainmail is put together using all the leftover bits from the What's Next trends report. So if this snack-sized newsletter is leaving you a bit hungry, go to www.nowandnext.com for something more substantial (and that's free too). ---------------------------------------------------- : LOOKING FOR AN INSIGHTFUL AND ENTERTAINING SPEAKER? If you are considering a futurist speaker for your next event ask your speaker agency about Richard Watson or contact him direct via www.nowandnext.com. Richard is the creator of brainmail (along with help from Phil, Matt and occasionally Corrina). Richard's recent speaker clients have included IBM, McDonald's, Coca-Cola, Samsung, CSIRO, The Welsh Government Assembly and Procter and Gamble. ----------------------------------------------------- : SMALL PRINT The material appearing in brainmail is sourced from a variety of reliable publications worldwide. However, brainmail cannot guarantee the truthfulness of stories and a degree of commonsense should be applied before quoting or using any of this material in a commercial context. If something appears to be too good to be true it probably is.