Make mine the Metaverse

By Adam Tinworth

The Metaverse may well be the next wave of digital disruption. Act now, and you can avoid a handful of companies becoming its gatekeepers.

Thomas Webb: VR and the future of society

By Adam Tinworth

Technology is very close to magic, if you do it right. But who is the magician behind the curtain of today's technology?

Lessons from parallel digital worlds

By Adam Tinworth

The digital world is not a homogenous whole, but a series of parallel states, twisting ideas into new forms as they pass between them. And Instagram is becoming a very western version of a Chinese idea…

Digital’s easy scale has proven to be ruinously expensive

By Adam Tinworth

The digital unicorns have been enjoying the lucrative advantages of worldwide scale — without paying the price. But there are others costs, that might be even more expensive…

The downsides of scale

By Martin Recke

Scale is almost unlimited in the digital sphere, but its negative effects so far have been externalised. This needs to change.

We’re trapped in a toxic cycle of fragmentation and centralisation

By Adam Tinworth

Fragmentation is getting a really bad press, right now. There are some good reasons for that.

The Big Crunch of the digital universe

By Martin Recke

The digital world of today looks like a universe that is recollapsing into the black holes of Amazon, Facebook, and Google. From cosmology, we can only tell that this won’t end well.

Losing touch with reality

By Martin Recke

As reality is more and more shaped through digital products, we see more degrees of freedom than in the analogue past. Fake news, filter bubbles, and alternative facts are only the tip of the iceberg.

After the fall: as Facebook’s image collapses, what can we learn for the products we build next?

By Adam Tinworth

Facebook had a torrid week — and deservedly so. What can the next wave of digital products learn from its mistakes, to avoid falling into the same traps?

Will Facebook give Nick Clegg the power it needs to reinvigorate its public image?

By Adam Tinworth

The easiest way for Facebook to avoid regulation and legislative intervention would be to become the sort of company that doesn’t need it. That’s just not going to happen with the current Facebook power structure. Zuckerberg rules as an autocrat, with Sandberg as his enforcer.

What do we do about Facebook Portal’s privacy problem?

By Adam Tinworth

The delightful thing about NEXT18 was disappearing into a huddle of people genuinely trying to make a difference…

Who will fix Facebook first?

By Martin Recke

Facebook is simply ripe for some good old disruption, like MySpace was in the middle of the last decade.

Digital mindfulness is about human values as design goal

By Martin Recke

There is a playbook for the next Facebook, and whoever cracks this will reap huge rewards.

Is there a future for the online marketing industry?

By Martin Recke

Thinking about regulation as a possible fix for the digital woes our societies suffer from, the future viability of the online marketing industry quickly came into question, for a variety of reasons. In 2017, more than 60% of the worldwide online advertising revenue went into the pockets of only two companies.

How will the end of smartphones look like?

By Martin Recke

The fourth cycle of personal computation will be dominated by strong platforms that can tie lots of very different devices together with software and services. The winner will be whoever provides the superior user experience.

Do we want to be part of the problem or part of the solution?

By Martin Recke

For quite a while, we took for granted that we, of course, are part of the solution just by being digital, since digital was perceived to be good in itself, and hence digitisation equals progress. In 2018, it should be obvious that this is no longer the case.

Finding a digital fix for Facebook

By Adam Tinworth

If anything is in need of a digital fix right now, it's Facebook. Can the social network be remade in a more privacy-centric form? Or is the fix actually a replacement?

Yes, Facebook needs regulating. But let’s do it carefully, and do it right.

By Adam Tinworth

A new set of revelations about how the data Facebook collects on you has been used makes it more likely than ever that governments will act to regulate the company more directly. But can we get this right?

The AI-first world requires new products

By Martin Recke

It's not enough to simply add an Alexa skill to an existing product, like it wasn't enough to make your website responsive or launch a mobile app without changing anything else. AI-first means reimagining your product for a world driven by AI and voice interfaces.

Can Germany crack the problem of regulating Facebook?

By Adam Tinworth

Around the world, attention is turning to cracking down on the power of Facebook. But can gErman lead the way, without turning it into a tool of oppression?

Go on. Do that Facebook quiz. It’s probably harmless, right?

By Adam Tinworth

Memes and quizzes on Facebook are just harmless fun, surely? There's no way machine learning could be learning all sorts of things about you from them — is there?