Predicting the future is a fascination for many – some may want to be assured of their personal accomplishments, but businesses also want to be prepared for what’s ahead. Working with futurists can bring companies significant competitive edge, allowing them to organize, hire, produce for consumer wants and needs in the next decade.
Looking over the World Future Society’s latest outlook report, I would like to call out a few predictions that might affect the tech and communication industries:
1- Computers will store memory using light, rather than electrons. This will increase their storage capacity by 1,000%. (Think, we’ll be able to process information faster, save and transfer more electronically. More entertainment will shift online, we’ll store less paper.)
2- Health-related gaming will be used to train caregivers and health workers. Some patients will even be able to treat themselves. (Check out great work already done by Games for Health and Health Games Research.)
3-Identity theft and other online crimes will increase.
4-Social roles will continue to transfer online, unchanged. More girls will become victims of cyberbullying.
5- The Internet will become more factually reliable and more transparent. (There is actually research on how crowd-sourcing on wikis during disasters or catastrophic events yields accurate information.)
So, it looks like we’ll get more and better information at a faster rate, but the fallacies of human nature will remain.
Idil has devised marketing and communication strategies for Fortune 500 companies and non-profit organizations for 20 years. She is the author of 'Implementing Word of Mouth Marketing: Online Strategies to Identify Influencers, Craft Stories and Draw Customers' (Wiley, 2010), as well as numerous industry briefs and articles on online communications.
Idil has been a public speaker on word-of-mouth marketing, women and ethnic minorities’ use of digital communications, and e-CRM. She has been widely quoted in trade journals and newspapers such as CNet news, CBS Market Watch, San Jose Mercury News, Chicago Sun Times, Harvard Business Review, the Financial Times and the New York Times. In 2010, she was selected ‘Digital Communicator of the Year’ by PRNews.
Idil is currently VP of Media Analytics at Nielsen, working with public sector, technology and telecom clients, gauging their advertising and brand communication effectiveness. She also serves on the Ad Council’s Research Committee.
Previously, she was a VP of Client Development at NM Incite – a Nielsen / McKinsey company, identifying and amplifying business opportunities in social media for clients. Prior to her roles at Nielsen, Cakim was a Senior Vice President in the global PR agency Golin’s digital practice and a Director of Burson-Marsteller’s think tank—the Knowledge Development group.
A native of Istanbul, she holds an M.A. in Communication from the Annenberg School at University of Pennsylvania and a B.A. in Sociology from Bryn Mawr College.
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