Rohit Bhargava's Blog, page 76

How An “Anger Room” Can Help You Manage Your Rage

The world is angry and people are holding on to plenty of rage … so it’s perhaps no surprise that “Anger Rooms” are taking off. The reason why is perfectly summed up in this quote from the founder of one of them: “I think that part of what’s going on here is that breaking stuff gives people back their edge. Imagine getting fired. It sucks. It’s defeating. Or you got dumped, or you didn’t get into the college you wanted, or imagine whatever it is that makes you feel weak. This is a place where...

Esports Could Be An Olympic Sport By 2024

After years of pushback, some people think that esports may be on the verge of recognition as a “real” sport – courtesy of the International Olympic Committee. While a final ruling won’t come until 2019, the IOC is considering adding esports as a way to entice younger viewers to the Olympics. It wouldn’t be the first time sports were added as “exhibitions” in order to appeal to a different demographic … the same thing happened around BMX Biking which is now a full-fledged Olympic sport. And e...

Can Artificial Intelligence Help Measure Food By Its Ingredients?

We already have Artificial Intelligence using features like facial recognition to personalize experiences for us, but this story about “AI Gastronomy” looks forward to a future where we might be able to reverse engineer many things about food simply from relying on AI to recognize and measure ingredients. This could allow us to “scan” the nutritional benefits of a particular meal, better track our health and even eventually have food automatically prepared for us that meets our specific dieta...

The NuturePod Offers A Scary Prediction Of Future Parenting

Sometimes art is the best way to shine a lens on how our culture may be changing for better … or worse, as is the case with a hypothetical near-future product called the “NuturePod” created by artist and experimental futurist Stuart Candy. The installation on exhibit at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Antwerp, Belgium envisions a “programmable para-parenting pod” that offers automated parenting care for your infant at the touch of a button. It’s a tantalizing and scary vision of what the fu...

Writer Of Str@nge% Password Guidelines Finally Admits He Was Wrong

If you ever wanted someone to blame for having to change your password every 90 days – last week the world found out who that person is. Former National Institute of Standards and Technology manager Bill Burr recently admitted to the WSJ that his 2003 password guidelines were unnecessarily harsh. The new guidelines suggest removing the 90-day password refresh requirement and the requirement for special characters. Instead, it suggests to use a phrase of words that doesn’t make any sense, but...

How Brands and Small Town America Are Cashing In On The Eclipse

As the highly anticipated solar eclipse approaches, there are plenty of towns and brands finding creative ways to cash in. Chiquita created a humorous video about the impending “Banana Sun,” there are “eclipse chasing” flights selling for $10,000 and Krispy Kreme even created an “eclipse donut.” This article takes a deeper look at the windfall that seems to be approaching small town America as it gets ready for what promises to be a gridlock of people traveling to destinations along the proje...

How To Separate Macro Trends From Micro Trends

The team at WGSN produces some great trend insights primarily in for the fashion sector and recently launched their “Anatomy of a Trend” white paper which is worth a download. One element that was particularly interesting was their distinction between macro and micro trends and how they think about trends in general. As a fellow trend curator, I suspect you’ll enjoy reading about the process they use and what lessons that might have for your own work and insights.

Read the full story on WGSN...

What If Smart Home Devices Sold What They Know About You?

If your smart robot vacuum cleaner created a map of your home in the process of cleaning it, that data could provide new insights to help tailor smart home products to your specific living conditions. That’s the bold assertion of Colin Angle, chief executive of Roomba maker iRobot Corp. It does raise some clear privacy concerns over whether consumers will want to share that sort of data – but the potential upside (as this article explores) is very lucrative.

Read the full story on Reuters >

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Diamonds Are Still Forever. Especially If They Are Lab Grown

One of the side effects of social awareness among millennials is how many young brides are coming to embrace lab grown diamonds as equally beautiful but more ethically sourced alternatives to “blood” diamonds. It doesn’t hurt that the Gemological Institute of America qualifies these synthetic diamonds as “real diamonds” – but the significant discount may be the most important reason why these new man-made diamonds could take a real piece of the $80 billion diamond industry, and change the way...

IKEA Creates 72 Regional Versions Of Its Iconic Catalog … Here’s Why

This week IKEA will release its new 2018 catalog, and this timely piece looks at how a small internal army of hundreds of photographers, art directors, copywriters, proofreaders, prop masters, carpenters, photo retouchers, programmers and CGI specialists make the catalog globally relevant. From zooming in on kitchen photos (because Chinese kitchens are smaller than American ones) to changing the food that appears on tables to match regional palates, the catalog is a case study in making conte...