The Institute for the Future in Palo Alto decided to give a go at the future. How? A game of course. Superstruct is the world’s first massive multiplayer forecasting game. The game, launched in october 2008, was constructed and launched by Jane McGonigal.

By playing the game, people help The Institute for Future chronicle the world of 2019 – and imagine how the human kind might solve the problems we’ll all face together. It’s obviously needed as the horizon for survival in the game right now is 2042 according to this special report.

Jane is a pretty cool chick and an expert on applying game design and game theory to real work and real business. Among other credits MIT Technology Review named her one of the top 35 innovators changing the world through technology, for her role in pioneering the field of alternate reality gaming.

Think about it! What good could a gaming scenario do for the future of your business? Maybe that’s where you should put your money?

If you think this post is a little bit over the nerd hurdle, then at least have a look at the wonderful visualization of this future world made by Density Design. Creative Director Donato Ricci, Concept developer Gaia Scagnetti, Visualizer Mario Porpora, Artist Michele Graffieti and Designer Luca Masud set out to solve the complex task of bringing the 2019 vision created in the game to life. Their result can be downloaded from Flickr. And it’s uploaded in a great quality, so any company with an office space big enough should get it and redecorate their walls asap.

ps. One last tip on how to keep up with the future. The Institute for the Future runs a pretty nice blog on the subject.

För ungefär 11 år sedan gick jag in genom dörrarna på IHM business school för att stärka min kunskap inom strategisk marknadskommunikation. Året var 1998 och jag arbetade på Framtidsfabriken med koncept för kunder som Nike Europe, Vattenfall, Bredbandsbolaget, Expressen mm.

Ledda av Jonas Birgersson, mer känd för allmänheten som mannen i orange Helly Hansen fleece tyckte jag att vi hade bra koll på vilka trender som lurade runt hörnet. Nu 11 år senare vet jag att vi hade bra koll men helt fel uppfattning om hur fort trender verkligen slår igenom. Först idag kan jag säga att jag har någorlunda bra koll på vilka trender som lurar som hörnet och det beror mycket på att jag i mer än 15 år försökt mig på att förutspå dem och för varje år kommit ett steg närmre känslan för när och hur en trender.

När jag studerade på IHM träffade jag Göran Adlén. Under mina två år där hade vi honom då och då som lärare och sedan hade jag förmånen att få honom som examinator. Redan då delade jag och Göran stor passion för prylar, trender, teknologi och kommunikation. Vi har under åren sen dess sporadiskt hållit kontakt och stött på varandra här och där.

Nu 11 år senare är jag därför extra glad att få möjligheten att vara med när Göran sänder TrendTV. Det här nya programformatet som sänds på nätet har hunnit gå 6 avsnitt och i senaste programmet är jag med. Inför det programmet gjorde Göran en intervju med mig. Resultatet blev strålande tyckte man och därför publicerades även intervjun i sin helhet. Med Görans tillstånd har ni just intervjun här.

TrendTV är ett strålande exempel på den demokratisering vi ser av media tack vare teknologi och internet. Göran producerar tillsammans med Minnesota Communications ett strålande TV program (vi kan sluta kalla saker på nätet för webb TV) som ger dig som tittare koll på de senaste samhällstrenderna. För så får man nog kategorisera programmet.Göran är och har alltid varit expert på att plocka upp signaler inom olika områden och översätta vad det här betyder för dig som marknadsförare och kommunikatör.

Så, om du är marknadsförare/kommunikatör, hoppa vidare till TrendTV och se till att du får information om framtida program.

psst. Det här här nog inte det sista ni ser av mig och Göran Adlén tillsammans

Mark this weekend in your calendars. TEDx is coming to Sweden and it’s thanks to Teo Härén & Fredrik Härén and Henrik Ahlén who’ve been the driving forces behind getting TEDx here.

The first event is beeing held north of Stockholm with about 40 people attending the party and I’m honored to be one of them. Don’t worry – there will be new events following this one so get your but mouse over to the TEDx Stockholm website and show your interest.

This first event will be all about inspiration and I’m eagerly looking forward to be inspired by God knows who. I do know that homeboy Richard Gatarski has been given a 5 minute slot that he has turned into a crowd sourcing experiment on his blog and I of course think it’s a great idea.

Richard is asking us all to contribute with some sort of inspirational thing communication how to create the “best start in life for our children”.

As always I couldn’t keep my fingers out of the jam. 1 hour later I submitted this:

Now head over to Richard and submit yours!

The 1st of November 2007 I was invited as one of the speakers at Daytona Sessions Vol 1.. Martin and Rasmus, the founders of Daytona wanted me to speak about digital communication in 2012. Said and done – I pinpointed 8 things that would happen and change digital communication in 2012.

My predictions and status today were and is the following:

A younger generation taking on management roles establish digital communication as marketing tool nr1.
We’re not quite there. But stats are telling us we’re not more than 1 or 2 years away from this one.

1. No communication without social communication.
Check. Barack Obama put the last nail in the coffin here. After his successful presidential campaign and looking at the top 100 brands in social communication I think we all can agree this one is a home run.

2. We will consume advertising in front of the TV again.
Sony and Windows went public with their cooperation around building windows into the next generation flat screens. Rumours around apple shows that they’re not far behind. We’re not consuming yet – but we will…soon.

3. We will consume [digital] advertising in our cars.
Not long ago Blaupunkt announced their latest stereo. It’s a grey little beauty (what else) that can play almost every format there is. But on top of that it’s got a 3G and Wireless connection. Didn’t I tell you!

4. No communication without innovation and interaction.
Have a look at communication from leading brands like Nike, adidas, Burger King, Volkswagen, Apple, Mc Donalds etc etc. We are there.

4. Three new market leaders on the mobile phone market
Apple had been on the market a couple of weeks when I spoke at the last Daytona Sessions. They’re now nr 3 in the worlds when it comes to business phones. Google announced Android only a month or so after. Not quiet there yet. Microsoft…hmm…still chasing. Palm has appeared from nowhere again. What about Nokia, Sony, Motorola? Still boring. This one is well on it’s way but it’s a tough one.

5. E commerce strikes with full force
This is the one I’m scared about. People seem stuck by the fact that you can buy things in a regular store. However, I did exemplify the drive behind this being the mobile applications that would make you the stronger buyer. Here we’ve already seen several examples of applications for the iPhone that lets you compare prices in real time. Getting the best price is easier than ever.

6. Open source will be the engine behind digital communication
Business week published a list of the most influential people this year. 3 of the top 10 were heading Open Source projects. I must say this is now a no brainer.

7. Google will be challenged by Microsoft.
About a year after the last Daytona Sessions Microsoft announced that they were to implement Windows Live Search into Facebook. That’s more or less the exact screenshot I had in my presentation in november 2007. Apart from that Microsoft are coming on strong from all directions when it comes to digital advertising. This is a race that will be extremely interesting to follow and it will end before 2012.

8. Development will go faster than we think.
And it does. Even though we’re witnessing the scariest financial crisis ever, development of digital platforms an new open source innovation is turbo charged. I’ve seen more things the last 6 month come out of the market when it comes to tech innovations than I’ve seen the last 2 years. Speed, speed, speed – if you don’t got it – get it!

To sum up. My mission was to give a prediction about what the next 5 years will bring. Most of the things I prediction has already come true and the rest will probably be in place before 2012. The one thing that amazes me is how wrong I was in terms of when since I personally thought most things would come true in 3-4 years. Now they came true in 1-2 year instead. Prediction nr 10 is obviously the one that was the most right.

Now I’m going to head into Rival and enjoy a fantastic evening.

Thank you Daytona for putting on a show!

Who is heading your brand? Does he or she have an understanding for all, and I mean all, steps in the consumer interaction with your brand.

The new generation of consumers crave 4 things from their favorite brands. These 4 things was something we found in a global focus group study we did for one of the global brands I’ve worked with. Teens and youngsters between 15 and 25 years old were interviewed in leading style cities like New York, London, Rio de Janeiro, Paris, Stockholm, Bangkok, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Singapore, Beijing, Amsterdam, Berlin and even more cities that I cannot remember.

The 4 things were:

• Innovation
• Creative excellence
• Entertainment
• Interaction.

They crave it everywhere in every step of their contact with you brand.
Total integration equals success.

Hyper jump the process back and fourth
Most brands tend to start a brand platform project that ultimately leads to developing your brand first, then collateral’s, brand guidelines and finally they look at the products and services. New brands and super brands – they look at the brand heritage, what’s your story, where do you come from etc, but more important, where are they heading. Based on this knowledge they move over to the products and services and design these. The it’s time to move back to the rest.

You shouldn’t let a brand or brand guidebook lead your product development cause it’s usually stiff books filled with rules what NOT to do. When the first rule you have to learn about communication is WHAT rules can we brake!

Total integration demands total creativity
In order for your brand to achieve this level of integration that your target are asking for, you have to get a partner on board that can act as your creative style police through your entire process. The challenge for all modern brands is to stay in control or at least have someone from A to Z that make sure you do.

Let’s look at Apple.

Steve Jobs and his way of totally controlling Apple is probably the best example there is. What’s stunning with Apple is exactly the way they tend to value ever single step of consumer contacts as the most important part in the company. Nothing, and I mean nothing is left behind. Of course I don’t know their entire chain of customer contacts. But let’s look at one possible chain and how they’ve designed it.

My name is Bill. I’m looking for a new computer and I’ve heard about Apple. This might be my road from a non believer to a brand fanatic.

1. Traditional advertising

TV commercials

Apple vs PC has become an icon in the US when it comes to harass your competitors in open public. Apart from that it’s totally on brand in terms of tone of voice and simplicity.

Print

With the strong products Apple has, there’s usually no need to create a story beyond your own brand values and product. This is the ultimate example why communication and creativity should be a very integrated part of engineering. Most technology companies develop technology first and then comes the packaging and design. Apple integrates the two and on top of that, would never develop anything without having communication experts involved in the process.

With iTunes it’s different. This product is available on both Mac and PC.

You can also use iTunes to shop for new music even if you end up playing it on a another Mp3 player. This requires a different strategy.

2. PR & Events

No one can have missed the fact that the Apple company is quiet as a mouse. A couple times a year, Steve Jobs launches Apples latest products during the Mac World. The keynote he delivers on those days are followed by millions. Every day between is filled with rumors and ideas on what the next Mac World will bring. A great PR strategy that doesn’t only keep interest up but also keeps prices from falling. Due to the illness of Steve Jobs the future of the Macworld seems uncertain though.

3. Photography

Where ever I see an Apple product I’m stunned with the quality and ingenuity of the photography. Look at this image above – the balance and the creativity with a yet simple set up. That mirror effect that points towards the next lying down iTouch is just fabulous.

You seldom see a photo from Apple that doesn’t both show the product and communicate a functionality or a USP.

4. Online banners

Yet another area where Apple innovates.

These banners is not about teasing you to click instead Apple brings the humor from the TVC into banners in a very clever way.

5. Online campaign site

Why would you do a campaign site when you can turn your entire website into an emotional experience. I’d say Apples section where they talk about partners and other people who use their products serves as a great campaign area.

6. Partnerships

What do we love more than a great brand? Answer = Two great brands! Nike+ is the perfect example of this. It drives sales for both Apple and Nike but above all contributes to positioning them both as cool innovators.

Leading car brands all over the worlds has implemented support for the iPod in their latest car models. In this case I’m sure it benefits them more than Apple.

7. Website
The Apple website is definitely one of the best corporate websites in the world. It’s user friendly, well designed, great functionality, no loading times, non CMS templated design and on brand.

I just love how they’ve first and foremost have developed their site based on what consumers want and need.

Many of the pages looks more like a very nice printed magazine than a website.

This proves that someone at Apple understood that websites are not supposed to be built based on the specs of a content management system but instead the specs of your customer needs.

8. On- and offline store

Apple knows how to create a brand drama. Their latest store on Manhattan shows Apple never rests. And if you continue to look at more of their stores they’re continuously updating themselves. I wrote last year about the London experience.

The actual shopping experience is something else. I wrote about that a long time ago so I won’t repeat myself. But it’s like nothing else, I’ll promise you that.

When it comes to the online shopping experience. The Apple.com site is nicely integrated with their online store.

Once in the store, it’s all about usability and effectivness – just as it should be.

9. Packaging

I’ve bought quite many Apple products and every time I open the package it’s an experience. No brand, and I mean NO brand has the consistency Apple has had in innovating how they package their product.

What’s stunning is also the fact that lots of stuff inside that box you’re opening is directly integrated with software interfaces and computer materials. The experience to use a mac starts with carrying home the package.

10. Product

Do I need to say anything?

11. Inside the actual product

If you get your hands on a Mac that needs to be opened for any reason. Take the opportunity and do so. Cause these guys know that reputation starts from everywhere in the consumer chain – including the 0.1% who ever open a computer. Inside it’s incredible well designed and the G5 is even backlit inside!

12. Operative system
Awarded design. Usability is better than everything else on the market. It’s faster and yet more stabile and works both for Mac or PC.

The number of innovative solutions in the way you interact with software and the operative system are amazing.

13. Product & software interface

The total integration between softwares and the interface is great. But what’s even cooler is that some of the latest products like iWork even stretches outside the actual software.

iWork for example has a full screen editing mode where it actually seems like the latest Macbook Pro has been redesign to be integrated with that functionality.

14. Support
Crowd sourcing, find whatever you need, integration into every computer and software. Awarded – yes.

To sum up. The reason behind Apple success is of course innovation first and foremost. Without brains like Steve Jobs on board the company would be jack shit. But without Steve’s way of leading the brand – bringing on people like Lee Clow and more of the best creative brains in the industry, having them helping him controlling every bit of the brand from first contact to final kill – is the key to success.

Mike Loop with Apple says it best:

The core dilemma for talented designers in any field is this: If you strive for greatness in your design, you will meet resistance; if you strive to avoid resistance, you can’t do great design. Different is scary. Great design has to fight with the idea that many see “better” as meaning “more of the same”. The better your work and the higher your standards, the more you’ll have to fight against the urge to stay within the warm, safe confines of mediocrity.

Are you ready? Be prepared, cause you’ll step on a lot of toes. But the reward might be worth it cause you’ll end up with consumer like these.

A final word

Making a vision like this come alive means that a very small group has to control many steps. But on the other hand, being the best in the world has never been about doing as other people say, it’s always been about going your own way, towards your vision no matter what!

Branding today is about creating a brand platform, then dramatize it and start screaming to people – COME ON AND BUY MY PRODUCT. IT’S GREAT. Of course in a slightly creative and modest manner than that. But it very often about traditional advertising in classic media channels.

Branding of tomorrow is about knowing who you are, what your brand stands for and start experimenting with innovation, partnerships, entertainment and above all involving your potential audience as a part of your product development. And note – call them audience, cause the will pay to stay but leave if they don’t like the show.

It’s all about constantly innovating your brand and then making sure you know what people think of your work. Do they like it? Do they hate it. What do they miss, what would they do differently. Speak to them. Learn their language. Once you think you know the formula to success – erase your brain and start all over again. We do not want repetition from brands that lead we want the new stuff, the shit that makes us go wow!

The first step to keeping on top of your game is getting into the conversation. There’s no need to wait even if people aren’t talking about your brand just yet. Get in there and learn!

First step – automize your intelligence information
The key to becoming successful when becoming a brand conversationist is to know…yep, you guessed it, where people who talk about your brand are hanging. Put your ears to the rail and listen for. And remeber that most of these things you can output as a RSS feed into Google Reader or Netvibes. Built a dashboard!

1. Google alerts
2. Twingly blogsearch
3. Twingly microblog search
4. Get Satisfaction
5. Co-comment, Backtype, Intense debate
6. Google analytics
7. Have a mint
8. More statistics…you can never get to much!

The 59 services you can currently keep track of using Friendfeed.

Get into the discussion
Once you know where people are discussing your products, your brand or anything else related to your mission (cause you have one of those huh). These are the tools you should get accompanied with.

1. Twitter & tweetdeck
2. Bloggy
3. Brightkite
4. Jaiku (still not dead)
5. Messenger
6. Friendfeed
7. Co-comment, Backtype, Intense debate
8. And don’t forget to get into blogs and comment on subjects relevant to you!

Spread your digital presence
Getting into the conversation is not only about spying on others and then going after the buzz. Your digital presence – website, campaigns, digital events, groups…everything has to go beyond their own sphere and servers. In order to do this you’ve gotta start spreading your information socially. There’s tons of tools but a first must have are these.

1. The god of spreading content – SEO (Note, not paid search)
2. Ping.fm
3. RPC all content that you write to leading aggregators and mashups on your local market.
4. Send images to leading photo sites like Flickr and Picasa
5. Send videos to leading Video sites like YouTube, Blip, Vimeo and others (See earlier post on this)
6. Socially share things with Share This
7. Connect your RSS feeds to Twitter, Jaiku, Bloggy, Friendfeed and other social plattforms.
8. Constantly create playlists that are killer in your office and spread them on Last.FM and Spotify
9. Post book marks on Delicious
10. Pixelpipe
11. Tarpipe
12. Feedburner
13. Widgets
14. Facebook groups (and others)
15. Wikipedia if possible

And more and more and more and more. This goes on forever. But you’ve gotta be everywhere!

Last but not least! Create advertising and communication that matters to people. We want to have fun – as I said earlier this year. You’ve gotta be a clown!

Ok, that’s it for now. I’m aware that I’ve left a couple of question marks in the heads of you guys who don’t know what RPC, RSS etc is. But I don’t have the time to elaborate on that now. I’ll get back to it soon

In november 2007 I spoke at the Daytona Sessions. I was asked to predict 10 things that would have an impact on digital communication in 2012.

Nr 3 was “Advertising will move into the TV sofa again”. The trend forecast was based on the idea that both Microsoft and Apple will in one way or another integrate their operative systems into the TV before 2012. 

The Consumer Electronics Show kicked off yesterday. Opening speaker was Steve Ballmer who took the opportunity to announce that Microsoft will make the beta test version of its new Windows 7 operating system available to the public for download on Friday. Apart from that, Steve kept on coming back to where the future lies for Windows – three focus areas: TV, Computer and Mobile. Mr Ballmer then talked about how Windows would be shaped in the future to fit usage in the TV room.

So, nr 3 is in the bag!

I got word of the news through Swedish IDG.

In this recent study Forrester asked people in North America what information sources they trusted. Look at the 2 bottom bars. The least trusted source of information is a company blog and social networking initiatives from a company or brand.

Lately I’ve been talking a lot about how communication must shift from event based communication (launches, seasonal etc) to conversational ongoing brand communication. This study in my mind is a great proof of that. The strong brands of tomorrow really must change how they communicate their products and their brand.

Think about it. If you took your entire marketing budget (including media budget) and directed it all towards keeping conversations alive. Making sure you’re the talk of the town constantly. Stopping all paid marketing activities and instead focus on establishing and maintaining a dialogue with your target group. What would that do for your brand. Which TV channels would then talk about your product on prime time anyway. What blogs would follow your every move. How many viewers would you have on YouTube and other online channels. How would this support your sales force when they’re trying to get space on that tight shelf?

One thing is for sure. Your brand would be included in more emails from people I know, you would be rated higher on sites like Pricerunner and Compricer, Google would upgrade your SEO value, people would look for your products in the Yellow Pages, newspapers would write articles about you, your latest innovation would travel through social networks at the speed of light, radio channels would report on your success, the news anchor would speak about your product and somewhere in the end you might get more people to trust your company blog.

Of course I understand that you might still have to spend some dough on visibility, but the visibility of tomorrow is not about traditional media channels. Instead its about supporting your conversation on and offline. And this is something you shouldn’t pay your traditional media agency to do.

psst – Found the study through ReadWriteWeb.

Following my earlier post today I just gotta tell you about a gut feeling I have. It’s about positivism, happiness, being nice to one another, spreading the love.

For a couple of years now newspaper have reported more and more on peoples misery. TV channels has been all about putting 4 people on the line, voting two out of the game while laughing at them. MTV is about fights, violence, almost getting killed, people getting hurt. We’ve been through some horrible years in the world where people have been getting killed in wars, huge catastrophes, terrorism and plain evil deeds where people beat, rape and kill other people and even kids. On top of this it seems that the whole world have is facing a couple of years in the economical freezer.

The other day I started thinking about this and I was quite fed up with the whole thing. Then it hit me. We’re at the end of it all. People you talk to about this are all tired of the whole thing. It’s time for something good. Something to look forward to. Something that brings people together.

My prediction is that starting in 2009 we’ll see more of the positive things in life when it comes to communication. Lighter colors, beautiful music, fun stuff, a lightful tone of voice, touching communication, a smile on your face and a warm heart.

2009 will be the year when things starts to change. Let’s say hello instead of fuck off. If you think I’m wrong. Then have a look at this video featuring a little baby from Gotland Sweden. 63 million people can’t be wrong – we all want happiness.

One of my daily reads – the David Report Blog posted a short one on a new book called The Marketer Who Went Off Consumption by Gaurav Mishra. One of two cool things with the book is that it is a year-long blog-as-a-book experiment in why we choose to consume. Basically Guarav decided to go ‘off consumption’ for a year and then blog about the learnings while doing it.

The other cool thing with Guarav is his list that tells us how consumption will change:

- From brand-consciousness to background-consciousness.
- From synthetic to organic.
- From mass-produced to hand-crafted.
- From global to local.
- From short-term to sustainable.
- From fashionable to durable.
- From valuing things to valuing insights.
- From fitting in/ standing out to being.
- From buying more to buying less.
- From doing more to doing less.
- From multi-tasking to down-shifting.
- From buying to sharing/ exchanging.
- From owning to experiencing.
- From having to giving.

Bang on target!