9 posts categorized "Future of Money"
October 11, 2011
July 25, 2011
Futurist Conversations: The Future of Money (Ross Dawson & Gerd Leonhard Video)
Ross Dawson and me recently met in Sydney (where I spoke at the Google ThinkTravel event, on The Consumer of Tomorrow) to do some videos together. The first episode is now live on Youtube, on the Future of Money. I think this turned out quite well and provides some interesting brain-teasers. You?
Ross has a good summary of what we discussed:
* The world of money is opening out in a big way today
* Facebook credits are becoming an important alternative currency
* Cash will phase out for digital payments
* The rise of Bitcoin is important in shifting transactions out of the purvey of governments
* In many developing countries mobile phones are becoming the predominant banking platform
* Micro-payments for content could work through social media and dominant platforms such as China’s QQ
* These could flow into crowdfunding for creative endeavors
* Behaviorally we are some way from micro-payments working well
* Money will inevitably shift to the cloud
And don't forget to follow @rossdawson on Twitter!
February 09, 2011
New video: my talk at MidemNet Academy 2011 on Innovation: music industry learnings from other industries
This is a good one - loads of information in here, and pretty well recorded. More details and PDF with all slides, here. Enjoy and spread the word. Subscribe to my video RSS feed, here, if you want (download all videos directly to iTunes, watch on your iPod etc).
July 05, 2010
The Future of Business in the Open Economy (video of my presentation at the Fundacao Dom Cabral, Brazil)
This is a rather lengthy (but worth it, I hope:) 90 minute+ video of my June 23, 2010 presentation on "New Insights: The
Future of Business - trends, future scenarios and key insights" at the
Fundacao Dom Cabral (FDC) in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. The PDF with the slides can be downloaded via this link (30MB PDF); as usual all material is
creative-commons-licensed (attribution required / non-commercial). Topics include: broadband culture and mobility, social media, the link
economy, the culture of participation, open economy paradigms, cloud
computing futures, the network vs the networked, selling 2.0, privacy
and much more. You can download the FDC's STC program description here.
Here is the official event description: "The pace of change is constantly accelerating, everywhere and across most industries, whether it's in technology, communications, marketing, media, manufacturing, services or consumer goods. Disruption is becoming the norm rather than the exception. B2B relationships are deeply effected, as well, with new and often challenging standards of openness, transparency, collaboration and inter-connectivity quickly emerging. The future is likely to require hyper-collaboration rather than (just) competition, non-linear thinking, crowd-sourced innovation, and circular business model innovation"
Enjoy and spread the word!
May 23, 2010
Complete video and audio from my appearance on Roda Viva / TV Cultura (Brazil), April 2010
This is the complete, 75-minute video of my appearance on Brazil's most popular talk show on Public TV, called Roda Viva (on the TV Cultura channel). I was delighted to be invited to the show, and really enjoyed being 'grilled' by the super-smart journalists and Brazilian media experts in the studio. We could have talked forever! The show was originally broadcast on April 26 (on Brazilian TV as well as online, see the Twitter buzz here) but unfortunately the webcast did not work very well so this is the first time I have seen the video, myself, and thanks to Roda Viva / TV Cultura I am delighted to be able to share this recording with you, as well.
More information about the show is here. Duda Groisman made some great photos during the recording of this show, embedded below. Related activities on this trip include: my presentation for NBS Brazil "The Future of Communications and Business", and my presentation at Fundacao Dom Cabral (one of Brazil's best business schools) on "The Open Network Economy". Please note: the video is half Portuguese (the questions) and half English (my replies)
April 24, 2010
A must watch: full-length video of my talk on the Future of Communications and Social Media at NBS Brazil
Here is a real must-watch: a 90 minutes tour-de-force on pretty much anything you'd ever want to know on the Future of Communications, Marketing, Advertising, and (Social) Media. This presentation (and the event that was put on by the NBS agency who have also graciously provided this video recording) got a lot of attention in Sao Paulo and in the Brazilian media, so give it a whirl.
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Future of Communication and Social Media: Gerd Leonhard at NBS Sao Paulo
View more presentations from Gerd Leonhard.
March 05, 2010
Announcing the payment model for my new iPhone & Android mobile apps: pay what you think it's worth
2 weeks ago, I launched my free iPhone app, followed by the Android version just a few days ago, powered by MobileRoadie in LA. Now that I am very close to the first 1000 downloads I wanted to share how I intend to 'charge' for the apps and the exclusive content that I plan to make available there. So here it goes.
As you may have noticed, almost all of my content is free, including this blog's full RSS feed, 65+ slideshows, 100+ videos, most of my books & PDFs, and, for now, the new iPhone and Android mobile apps. I make a living with speaking engagements, keynotes, think-tank events and seminars, advisory work, CEO coaching sessions, and various other, mostly fun things; and I am indeed very privileged to really enjoy my work and make a living at the same time (an usual combination, I hear).
I want to continue to provide you with lots of great and free content even though many (if not most) people have suggested that I should start charging upfront for my content. However, instead of going down the road of requiring you to 'pay before you get' my content, i.e. to pay for my apps via iTunes or the Android Market I have decided to deploy my own version of the often-cited 'Radiohead Model' (borrowed from the group's (in-)famous approach to selling their music for 'whatever you think it's worth'), i.e. you will continue to receive a lot of stuff for free but yes, you can indeed make a payment if you like what I do. And I would be delighted if you do.
So here, below, are 4 ways to return the favor, help me pay for my iPhone apps and to otherwise monetize (terrible word but appropriate):
1) You can go to my Lulu bookstore and either buy a dead-tree i.e. printed, packaged and shupped version of my books, such as Music 2.0 for $17.75 or Friction is Fiction for a whopping $60.40 (sorry for the price but it's a lot of pages, 4c, the cheaper b/w version is here), or any of the PDFs ranging from $2.50 to $7.50 (even if you already have it... that's OK, too).
2) You can go to Amazon and order my 'old' and first book "The Future of Music"which is still a great book (co-written with Dave Kusek); just keep in mind that since this book is owned and marketed by a publisher (Berklee Press) it is not really the most direct way to ship a few $ directly to me;) - but still very much appreciated. The audio version is here, btw. The self-published, Lulu-powered "Friction is Fiction" book mentioned above is also available via Amazon so I'd prefer you to buy that first, or ... just get both.
3) If you want to 'pay with attention' and give me some social capital rather than real money, that's OK, too (I shall ask my landlord to accept facebook points, soon, as well - seriously;).
To this end, I would suggest these mechanisms:
- A nice, juicy blog post about my work, my presentations or my videos, or books
- A series of tweets, or retweets
- A nice review of my books (Amazon or Lulu) or iPhone / Android apps (Apple App store is good)
- Nice comments on my slideshows or videos (incl. my Youtube channel)
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December 05, 2009
Announcing my new book on Lulu: "Friction is Fiction" - write a review and get the free PDF!
I have been very busy compiling my best essays, blog posts and other writings from the past 3 years, and have finally uploaded the most recent version to Lulu (my favorite print-on-demand book store). The new book is now called 'Friction is Fiction' and is available in 3 versions: 1) 158 pages, 6x9 inches / U.S. trade format, full-color, for $60.40, here (yes, it's quite pricey because of the cost of printing 4-color, on-demand) 2) the same dead-tree version, but in black & white only, for $19.98, here (much cheaper but a lot less cool;) 3) as a PDF, for a token price of $7.50, here.
I would be delighted if you would consider buying whatever works best for you - what better Christmas present could you possibly think of! Please note that this book will be updated every 3 months, to include my latest writings. If you want to share the book page please just send people to www.frictionisfiction.com - thanks.
As to giving away the free PDF, here is the deal: you can contact me anytime (via email, Facebook or Twitter) to request a free copy of the PDF if you just don't want to (or can't) spend the $7.50, and I will send you the download link. In return, what I ask from you is to pay me with attention, i.e. to write a review on Lulu, a blog-post, or a tweet about my book, with a link (all 3 is best;). Deal?
As to the title: I used to simply call this compilation 'The Best of Media Futurist' but while looking through all those posts - and spending a lot more time revising them - I found an important thread that goes through almost all of it and which therefore has become the new title: Friction is Fiction. So what does that mean? It means that if you are currently basing your success on maintaining or even constructing hurdles, difficulties or other bottlenecks somewhere in the system - i.e. if there is something that impedes the flow of information, or a transaction or purchase so that a higher price point or some other form of control over the can be obtained - then you are very likely to face diminishing revenues in the next few years. Building obstacles for users (fka consumers) used to work just fine but... no longer. Building walls is the fastest road to suicide in the digital economy.
The web has been utterly ruthless about finding these glaring points of friction, such as paying for eMail (remember that?), paying a ton of money for long-distance phone calls (remember those pre-skype days?), or consumers not having any access to travel booking systems, flight information or seating. These hurdles are being removed, one-by-one, and those 'people formerly known as consumers' are getting more powerful every single day. Banking on friction to increase your revenues has become like throwing matches into the river and asking it to stop - it's useless.
Friction was, of course, the main money-maker in the media, entertainment and content business, for a long time: certain CDs were only available in certain stores at certain times in certain countries, DVDs with those movies you really wanted were only available in certain countries and within certain 'windows', books had to be printed and shipped, and ring-tones could only be purchased from your operator. Basically, at every turn the consumer encountered have-to's and must's which essentially allowed a substantial level of control by the media and content companies - and thus, higher prices. In many cases, the more friction the higher the price you could ask for.
No longer. Read the book!
Related: my blog-book "The End of Control": download the first 6 chapters here. Also: My Music 2.0 book is available via Lulu, here
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November 23, 2009
Brilliant video: Douglas Rushkoff at Web2.0: radical abundance and how we get past "free"
His message: we need to change the operating system of MONEY. Watch this and think.
Peer-2-Peer value exchange - here we come.
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