Last week I spoke at a conference in Madrid called “No Money”. It was hosted by Spain’s leading newspaper El Pais and was literally about the transition to a cashless society. Foregoing cash in the near future is no far-fetched idea since entire countries are starting to consider getting rid of it. A senior vice…
The challenges younger generations face today can at times feel overwhelming. Often the source of responsibility is pointed at older generations who are presumed responsible for the mess younger people now have to deal with. I believe “blameworthiness” is an undercurrent that contaminates, rather than enlighten our ability to understand the dynamic of age cohorts sharing the contemporary at different phases of their lives. Instead…
It’s hard to believe that we have finally entered the second half of the second decade of the new millennium. So much has changed only in the past 5 years: cloud computing and mobile are mainstream, 3D printers can be bought at the local office supplier and Uber is a verb. (When a noun becomes a…
Picture, picture, smile for the picture Pose with your brother, won’t you be a good sister? Everyone thinks that we’re perfect Please don’t let them look through the curtains. In her debut single “Dollhouse” last year, Generation Z artist and idol Melaine Martinez plays a little girl’s doll who ends every chilling refrain with: “I see…
Are you seeing and hearing more ads for healthy and sustainable foods these days? The food industry is going through rapid transformations these days and “big food” and fast food companies are desperately trying to shed their reputations for being just quick, cheap and easy. While traditional fast food restaurants are struggling to keep their market share,…
It’s probably no surprise that “after the millennials” has been one of my key search terms for a while. I first started researching this generation in their infancy in the early 2000s, at a time when very little had yet been written about them. Covering this topic felt very much like entering a land where no man or woman has ever been. Then…
One of the obligatory yearly conferences a professional futurist should attend is the one set up by World Future Society. I feel particularly obliged to attend since I am representing the Central Texas Chapter of the WFS in Austin as vice president. But alas, I haven’t attended since being a student in 2002 when I…
Last week I was standing dumbfounded at the CVS’ greeting card isle trying to look for a Father’s Day card for my husband. None of us are very conventional, and the typical pre-authored Hallmark card has rarely satisfied my somewhat snooty European taste. Somehow Hallmark seems to be in competition with ToysRUs’ gender segregated pink and blue isles, a puzzling…
I recently came across an article in Aeon called “Against Generations“, which is one of the harshest, yet most eloquent critiques of generational research I have read. Author Rebecca Onion disagrees with the epistemological justification for segmenting people based on age cohort, and (rightly) contends that much of the research is arbitrary and the categories…
Resilience, not abstinence, may help teens battle online risk | Penn State University. Generation Z or the Homeland generation are glued to their devices and will live in a world where the internet will merge with the real world. This means that also the dangers of the online world will be superimposed onto reality. We can’t…
