No cash needed at this cafe. Students pay the tab with their personal data

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At Shiru Cafe in Providence, R.I., students “pay” for coffee, but not with money.

Shiru Cafe looks like a regular coffee shop. Inside, machines whir, baristas dispense caffeine and customers hammer away on laptops. But all of the customers are students, and there’s a reason for that. At Shiru Cafe, no college ID means no caffeine.

“We definitely have some people that walk in off the street that are a little confused and a little taken aback when we can’t sell them any coffee,” said Sarah Ferris, assistant manager at the Shiru Cafe branch in Providence, R.I., located near Brown University.

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We’re on the Brink of a New Era of Innovation. Will You Survive It?

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It’s better to prepare than adapt because, by the time you see the need to adapt, it may already be too late

One of the most interesting things I discuss in my book Mapping Innovation is what I call the new era of innovation, which will create profoundly new technologies, classes of data and business models. It is likely to be the most important shift we’ve seen in at least 50 years and perhaps in a century.

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The vaule of information is declining in our networked society

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According to a recent paper published in the Portuguese academic journal, OBS, the single most striking element explaining the difficulty in the discovery and implementation of new business models for the media in the digital age, is the declining value of information in the networked society.   Continue reading… “The vaule of information is declining in our networked society”

Top 10 questions the Pew Research Center has tackled in the past 10 years

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The Pew Research Center was established by The Pew Charitable Trusts ten years ago to bring together several of Pew’s information initiatives. The new organization had a unique mission to offer nonpartisan, non-advocacy information to decision-makers and the public. The Center has amassed a large body of work over the past decade. For their tenth anniversary, here’s a look back at some of our most important findings.

 

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How our brains put the present in the past by rewriting our memories

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Our brains edit our memories with new information by updating our past memories.

Try thinking about your fifth birthday when your mom was carrying the cake. Can you remember what her face looked like? You are not alone if you have a hard time imagining the way she looked then rather than how she looks now.

 

 

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The Quantified Self, the Great College Killer

Futurist Thomas Frey: Who are you as an individual?

As part of a family, you are measured by your domestic life and the relatives closest to you. As a prospective employee, you are evaluated by your skills, talents, and knowledge. As part of a community, you are gauged by the kind of relationships you build and maintain. As an athlete you are assessed by your physical strengths, your reaction times, and your determination.

 

 

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10 tech-enabled business trends for the decade ahead

The technology-enabled business trends will not only be a boon for consumers but also stimulate growth.

McKinsey & Company described ten information technology three years ago that enabled business trends that were profoundly altering the business landscape. Since then, the pace of technology change, innovation, and business adoption has been stunning. Consider that the world’s stock of data is now doubling every 20 months; the number of Internet-connected devices has reached 12 billion; and payments by mobile phone are hurtling toward the $1 trillion mark.

 

 

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U.S. is the most data hungry country according to Twitter’s Transparency Report

“These growing inquiries can have a serious chilling effect on free expression – and real privacy implications.”

The Government wants more of your data, but copyright holders are getting slightly less active in requesting tweettakedowns. The social/news/media network published its second Twitter Transparency Report today in conjunction with #DataPrivacyDay. Twitter’s goal is to be open about revealing how many government requests it gets for user information and DMCA copyright takedowns. Its first Transparency Report was published seven months ago, in July.

 

 

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The fallacy of big data and why we need even bigger data

The value of data is only as good as the information and insights we can get from it. The information and insights will help us make better decisions and give us a competitive edge. The promise of big data is that one could glean lots of information and gain many valuable insights. However, people often don’t realize that data and information are not the same. Even if you are able to extract information from your big data, not all of it will be insightful and valuable.

 

 

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Discover the Hidden Patterns of Tomorrow with Futurist Thomas Frey
Unlock Your Potential, Ignite Your Success.

By delving into the futuring techniques of Futurist Thomas Frey, you’ll embark on an enlightening journey.

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