What's Emerging January 2024
Welcome to our first newsletter for 2024
Welcome to our first newsletter for the year.
We hope that you all had a great Christmas/New Year/Summer (Winter) break and that you are all primed for a great year.
In the next few weeks Paul will be presenting and facilitating at a board and management retreat for the YMCA in Geelong, working on the strategy consultation process with RSL Victoria, and working with a Melbourne Council. He will also continue in his role of venture philanthropy organisation Social Venture Partners Melbourne that is conducting a wide range strategy review in March (stand by for news from that).
If you are interested in talking to us about any of our strategy approaches, foresight approaches, workshops, or conference presentations for next year, please Contact Us.
The Emergent Futures Team
In case you missed it. The most popular link from the last edition was one of our business tips:
Top Six Time Wasters To Avoid Throughout the Workday
Time wasters are all the hurdles that get in the way of our main objectives. Anything that diverts your attention from important tasks, disrupts your schedule, or prevents you from achieving your goals is a time waster. Time, once gone, is irretrievable. Yet, we can’t stop ourselves from wasting time. Reflect for a moment: how much time do you unknowingly waste on things that serve no purpose? Paul: we all do these things...…. Read More
What are we Writing About?
Due to the summer break and the last two client engagements being confidential presentations we have nothing in this section this edition.
What’s Emerging
DJI FlyCart 30
A drone with amazing delivery capabilities.
Australia records highest number of syphilis cases in 10 year period, report says
A report from the Kirby Institute, titled HIV, Viral Hepatitis and Sexually Transmissible Infections in Australia, found there were 93,777 cases of chlamydia, 32,877 cases of gonorrhoea and 6,036 cases of syphilis in Australia last year............…..Read More
Nuclear power on the moon: Rolls-Royce unveils reactor mockup
The company hopes to have a demo device ready for a moon trip in 2029.............……. Read more
AI can already diagnose depression better than a doctor and tell you which treatment is best
Despite its frequency, depression is difficult to diagnose. So hard, in fact, that general practitioners accurately detect depression in less than half of cases.....……. Read More
US startup ditches towers for pyramid-mounted turbines that dance with wind
TOW's founders have taken a simple approach to solve a major challenge facing the wind industry. The company argues that for every ton of weight that needs to be installed above the water, four tons of weight need to be installed underneath if the single central tower needs to be maintained upright......…..Read more
The first results from the world’s biggest basic income experiment
GiveDirectly has been conducting the world’s largest test of basic income: It is giving around 6,000 people in rural Kenya a little more than $20 a month, every month, starting in 2016 and going until 2028. Tens of thousands more people are getting shorter-term or differently structured payments........…..Read more
Urine-powered nanobots shrink bladder cancer tumors in mice by 90%
Powered by urea, a waste substance found in urine, nanobots propel themselves to and penetrate the tumor to deliver their onboard radioactive treatment. After one dose, tumors in mouse models shrank by almost 90%.....….. Read more
Bluewhite rakes in $39M for robots-as-a-service that can be retrofitted to drive any tractor
Israeli startup called Bluewhite has picked up $39 million in funding to advance autonomous robots that can be retrofitted to any tractor to operate it autonomously, which in turn are sold not as one-off products but as part of a bigger service play — robots-as-a-service.……. Read more
Australia's mortality rate is more than 6pc higher than expected, new Australian Bureau of Statistics report reveals
"COVID-19 associated deaths were still a key contributor to excess mortality in Australia in 2023," the report said......…..Read more
Bollards and ‘superblocks’: how Europe’s cities are turning on the car
In Paris, Barcelona and Brussels, authorities are adopting varied approaches to the task of reducing congestion and pollution..........….. Read more
How online misinformation exploits ‘information voids’ — and what to do about it
In 2024’s super election year, providers of online search engines and their users need to be especially aware of how online misinformation can seem all too credible............….….Read more
Bird flu wipes out over 95% of southern elephant seal pups in 'catastrophic' mass death
Over 17,000 southern elephant seal pups were found dead on Argentina's Valdés Peninsula in a horrific mass die off attributed to the deadly H5N1 avian influenza virus....….…Read more.
GreenLight Biosciences Secures EPA Registration for New Bioinsecticide, Calantha, Historic Step Towards A Safer and More Sustainable Food System
An industry first, the registration of Calantha, an innovative bioinsecticide based on RNA, represents an historic stride forward in diversifying options for farmers and reducing reliance on conventional chemical pesticides, which can harm both the environment and human health. Following the federal and state approvals, the company has now successfully sold and shipped its first order....… Read more.
New material found by AI could reduce lithium use in batteries
A brand new substance, which could reduce lithium use in batteries, has been discovered using artificial intelligence (AI) and supercomputing. The findings were made by Microsoft and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), which is part of the US Department of Energy. Scientists say the material could potentially reduce lithium use by up to 70%. Since its discovery the new material has been used to power a lightbulb....……...… Read more.
Business and Other Tips
The Surprising Power of Questions
Asking questions is a uniquely powerful tool for unlocking value in organizations: It spurs learning and the exchange of ideas, it fuels innovation and performance improvement, it builds rapport and trust among team members...…..read more
Here’s why you should (almost) never use a pie chart for your data
Once we have more than two categories, pie charts can easily misrepresent percentages and become hard to read....…. Read More
This new iPhone app fuses AI with web search, saving you time and energy
Arc Search offers several cool tricks to help you with your web queries on iOS. But one tool in particular shines above the rest. Paul: also works on the iPad although it seems set up of the iPhone. have only had it for a few hours but looks interesting……Read More
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