Peter Cochrane is one of our most far-sighted visionaries, and brings brilliant clarity and focus to our understanding of ourselves and our technologies, and of how profoundly each is transforming the other." -Douglas Adams, Author, The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy In Uncommon Sense, Peter Cochrane's follow up to the radical 108 Tips for Time Traveller, Peter explains how very simple analysis allows the prediction of such debacles as the 3G auction and the subsequent collapse of an industry, whilst simple-minded thinking is dangerous in the context of a world that is predominantly chaotic and out of control. People balked when Peter suggested a wholesale move to eWorking, the rise of email and text messaging, and the dotcom regime mirroring the boom and bust cycle of the industrial revolution. His predictions of the use and growth of mobile devices and communication, or use of chip implants for humans to replace ID cards, passports, and medical records, or iris scanners and fingerprint readers - were all seen as unlikely. Today they are a reality. How then will the world react to his predictions as set out in Uncommon Sense of a networked world of distributed ignorance and sharing overcoming an old world of concentrated skill and control? To everything becoming 'Napsterised' in every dimension, where storage and processing power cost nothing, and become connected without the help of the old network companies? A world where individuals create their own networks, where laws of copyright and resale, and old business models have to be changed as giant industries are dragged kicking and screaming out of the 19th Century and into the 21st? Peter Cochrane poses and answers questions, suggests solutions, and raises red flags on issues that need to be addressed. Tables, diagrams, pictures and illustrations generously support all of the text, with the most difficult aspects illustrated by simulations and other material on a CD and links to a web site with an ongoing expansion of the themes addressed.
[...]... strip club in January The star comes onto the stage to perform the dance of the 99 rabbit skins, but by the time she gets to the last one, the audience are so cold they don’t care any more and just want to go home Car salesmen don’t start with the concept of transport, the invention of the wheel, the detail of the internal combustion engine and traction control They get the customer in the car and demonstrate... demonstrate the acceleration, the road holding and the hi-fi In short, they impress the heck out of the customer and if they should ask a question, then they show them the engine compartment and other features When was the last time you looked under the hood of a car you were purchasing, or indeed took the back off a TV, or the lid off the top of a washing machine before you decided to buy? Who cares? They... the business casualty rate increase Those in charge of industry who continue with their linear thinking and limited perspective will continue making wrong decisions This is both dangerous and increasingly serious Building a facsimile of a company, with a government, regulator and competition, to play an n-dimensional game of chess is the basic element missing Here, thousands of moves can be tried and... relax in the knowledge that I can continue working and thinking irrespective of the quality of the remaining presenters As it turns out the next presenters in the series are younger and with a higher energy level, have great content augmented by excellent presentation material and, most importantly, have an engaging style and delivery To gauge the audience impact I keep going to the back of the room for. ..Standby This is a book that expresses the unique view of Peter Cochrane who has watched, and been intimately engaged in, the technology roll -out over the landscape of society for decades As an observer and commentator he has a great deal to say about the good, the bad and the ugly of the ever-increasing waves of technology deployment Peter is anything but shy He is refreshingly frank and honest,... on the planet And whilst the base technology is incredibly powerful, time and again I see people reading the words that are already on their slides, failing to get to the punchline quickly, and delving into far too much irrelevant detail just because it is possible They also seem to have lost the ability to adapt and step out of the A–Z sequence, and more often than not, it is about as interesting... for a coffee to scan the room activity None of the screens are closed down, but there is less keyboard and mouse activity and it looks as though a larger percentage of imaginations have been captured Along with the rest of the audience I keep listening and working with an enhanced attention span focused on these new speakers and their material The availability of the materials online also affords the. .. fast-moving, IT-dominated world with no pictures, animation and interaction, would see most of what I wish to communicate lost in a sea of inadequate words It would be like a philosopher or theologian explaining the meaning of life – a complete waste of time So, from the outset it was agreed that I could include more pictures than words and relate the whole to my active and growing Web site – www.cochrane.org.uk... futility of personal filing systems on a PC, and control freak managers From a more global point of view, Peter makes the case that if we are to make any progress in solving the world s critical problems, we must apply our advanced computer modelling capability to quantify the interaction between the variables, and predict the impact of these variables on the outcomes He argues that the problems and their interactions... clarity and thinking of my early teachers I systematically failed one class after another and gained almost nothing of worth from my schooling spanning the years 5–15, barring a mechanistic way of solving set problems with known answers Much later in my teens I encountered teachers, lecturers and professors with an ability to get down to my ignorance level, able to see my difficulty, and find analogies and . after another and gained almost nothing of worth from my schooling spanning the years 5–15, barring a mechanistic way of solving set problems with known answers. Much. quantify the interac- tion between the variables, and predict the impact of these variables on the outcomes. He argues that the problems and their interactions