Does Uncle Sam Really Want You?

Uncle Sam doesn’t really want a gangly 18-year-old soldier to stand guard outside the gate of a military base, rather he wants a wide-area motion imagery (WAMI) system that provides surveillance, reconnaissance, and intelligence-gathering using specialized software and camera systems to detect and track hundreds of people and vehicles all at the same time over a city-sized area.  

Uncle Sam doesn’t really want a blurry eyed, half asleep and distracted human pilot flying in circles trying to find camouflaged bad guys on the ground, rather he wants a multispectral system, that can see things invisible to human eyes, consisting of four high-definition cameras covering five spectral bands; a three-color diode pump laser designator and rangefinder; laser spot search and track capability; automated sensor and laser bore sight alignment; three-mode target tracker., and MTS sensors that offers multiple fields of view, electronic zoom, and multimode video tracking.

The Future of University Recruitment, Retention and Reimagining

If universities know what makes a good university student, then shouldn't they be sharing those details and helping to prepare more students in advance?  Why are universities mostly hands-off until application deadlines approach - when it's already too late to have an impact?  

I propose that limited spaces for on-campus students, plus a surplus in demand has kept universities from innovating and improving their recruitment processes.  It's time for a change.  Forbes reports, "For spring 2021, undergraduate enrollment dropped by 4.5% compared with 2020, according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. Community colleges experienced the steepest decline: Enrollment was down 9.5% this spring compared to the prior year, and it was down 9.5% in fall 2020, too.  Even before the pandemic the trends were pointing to lower enrollments.  These trends will have significant impacts on universities' priorities and future business models.

Universities have long complained about the poor quality of students coming out of high school, yet they have done little if anything to improve the quality.  As global competition increases from more online options and non-traditional players, universities must think differently about recruitment and outcomes.

Fewer enrollments now and in the future mean increased competition for new students.  Isn't it about time colleges started to seek competitive advantages by reaching out to potential student/customers earlier in order to assist them in getting better prepared for higher education? 

Now that we have survived and learned from our pandemic experiences, we understand how to provide digital education.  Once the digital transformation work and infrastructures are in place, extending online classes, programs and personalized educational experiences to potential future students doesn't cost that much.  These can be extended as a way to increase the number of students who want to enroll, plus it helps the university identify the best potential students early and enhances a university's brand value.  

What is certain, is that the way universities have operated for centuries is no longer adequate for surviving the future.  In the future, the ecosystems of higher education must reach out and embrace potential students much earlier, focus on improving student retention through personalized and automated help, and include all graduates and former students in lifelong learning relationships.

************************************************************************

Kevin Benedict

Partner | Futurist at TCS

View my profile on LinkedIn

Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict

Join the Linkedin Group Digital Intelligence

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

The Future, Complexity and Human Thinking

Don't let me drive a motorized vehicle after writing a long article.  In fact, don't let me drive any vehicle motorized or not.  My brain is often deep down a rabbit hole pondering data, crafting logical arguments, analyzing research findings, storytelling, wordsmithing etc, and any remaining brain cycles are not enough to drive safely. If my brain capacity can be nearly consumed while just sitting at a desk, think about the brain cycles consumed by pilots flying modern fighter jets in combat!

Modern fighter pilots have a plethora of onboard sensors that collect and stream massive volumes of data every second. The object of so many sensors is to give our pilots more information at a faster rate in order to achieve competitive advantages over adversaries. Too much information, however, is debilitating.  That is the reason the task of flying will increasingly be handed over to robotic, AI-powered pilots, so humans can use their limited brain capacity to focus on assignments with a slower tempo - like accomplishing the overall mission.

In order for jet fighter pilots to understand all the data pouring in, special helmets and UXs were designed to dumb down and slow down the need for human analysis.  Even with simplified user interfaces, pilots reported they struggled with information overload.   That is why the role of future military pilots is quickly evolving away from flying aircraft to operating flying command and control centers.

The massive rivers of data that keeps an aircraft flying has reached the level where humans are incapable of processing it fast enough to be successful.  In fact the F-35 is said to be unflyable without AI.  We now have reached the human thinking version of the sound barrier.  To push through and beyond it we will need AI augmentation to expand and extend our mental processing power. 

The Future of Human Experiences (HX)

I have a confession.  Although my family would have been considered working poor (my dad worked odd jobs in construction, sawmills and factories), I was able to attend a university, pay my tuition by working on a dairy farm and graduate.  This ultimately opened doors to membership among the "elite" by way of a college degree and a job with a living wage.  

It is easy to forget the struggles of one's past when life has moved on.  It's easy to assume our personal experiences are representative of most.  My recent research, however, has revealed this to be untrue.  In many parts of America, there are macro and micro-economic forces and trends that are negatively impacting life opportunities, careers, hope and the quality of the human experience.

When a customer complains of bad customer service, how should the business respond?  Apologize, empathize and ensure it doesn't happen again.  If businesses ignore these complaints they will quickly suffer the results.  It's not too dissimilar when it comes to leading and/or governing constituents.  Citizens also have experiences on a spectrum of good to bad.  These human experiences make up a person's quality of life and are critically important to them.  

Businesses cannot thrive, if their customers aren't thriving.  Countries can't thrive, if their citizens are not thriving.  What follows is a look at the human experience from the perspective of the less educated and underemployed workers in America.

First, we cannot begin to understand the minds and actions of large numbers of American workers without first understanding there are two different Americas, one made up of a less educated or under-employed workforce suffering through deindustrialization, economic pain, reduced opportunities and community decay, while the other consists of highly educated, advantaged and elite individuals experiencing rapid wage increases and fortuitous and abundant career opportunities. 

For many Americans, deindustrialization has reduced the quality of their human experience.  Many experience delayed and strained marriages, broken and delayed families, poor physical and mental health, addictions, diminished local economies, and even a reduced sense of worth, status, purpose and hope.  What is causing these declines in fortune?  Let’s take a look at deindustrialization, technological innovations and some additional variables that have worked symbiotically to create these unfortunate human experiences.

Purpose Led Future

The future is not unexpected.  Yesterday’s future arrived today.  It’s an inevitable pattern.  I have been reading a lot about inevitability lately.  Last week I listened to Bill Gates and Rashida Jones on the Ask Big Questions podcast.  In this podcast Bill Gates shared that we have already damaged the earth and the negative consequences are inevitable.  

In my work over the past few months, I have written a series of articles under the title of The Future of Information, Truth and Influence.  Many of the articles address the negative and unanticipated consequences of social media on our society.  Many authors of the research I have been studying seem to have a fatalistic view.  We have let the genie out of the bottle and there is no going back.  It’s inevitable. 

Echo Chambers Involving Old and New Media

Twitter has been widely credited with influencing the 2016 US presidential election.  Not because lot's of voters read tweets, but because lot's of journalists do.  Many of these journalists work for traditional media, which includes TV, radio, newspapers, newsletters, etc.  The sheer volume of controversial tweets generated ensured that journalists looked no further than Twitter for topics to cover.  This kept the spotlight on those who understood how both traditional and social media works, and were skilled at exploiting it.

Journalists and their editors understand that controversy and outrage are good for business. CBS's executive Les Moonves was quoted in 2016 as saying, "the Trump phenomenon may not be good for America, but it's damn good for CBS." And by now we all know that social media algorithms thrive on engagement, and there is no better tool for engagement than tweeting outrageous things.  The cacophony of controversy fueled both traditional media's and new medias' business models.  A win for all media - if not necessarily for democracy.

The Vulnerable Targets of Social Engineering and Mind Manipulation

It is disturbing to learn that if social engineers identify you as older, prone to conspiracy theories, low-informed and/or less educated, working poor or black, they will target and bombard you with nonstop disinformation on social media at a level much higher than others.  Why?  To answer that question let's review the rules and strategies social engineers follow to bend the minds of the most vulnerable:

1. Research has shown that less-informed and less-educated voters are more likely to believe falsehoods.
2. Social engineers have found it is easy to mislead older people and those prone to conspiracy theories.  
3. Those that already have a bent toward conspiracy theories are most inclined to spread unverified rumors.
4. Social engineers understand that the most vulnerable to mind manipulation are the lower-middle class, working poor, elderly and blacks. These groups are driven by the insecurity of their place in society and in the economy. They’re easiest to influence by sharing stories that others are out to trick them and the world is out to get them. 

How Social Engineering Works on Our Brains

Social engineering has proven it is possible to know the societal or 'systematic' determinants of human 'behavior' in a way that permits them to be manipulated and controlled from afar. 

Our minds are vulnerable.  The weaknesses in our thinking and decision-making processes are well documented.  When these vulnerabilities and weaknesses are exposed to professionals with nefarious intent who are trained in social engineering techniques bad things happen.  Social media and messaging platforms both enable scaled access to and profit from these vulnerabilities.  They expose the brains of billions (Facebook has over 2.7 billion users) to these techniques by selling and promoting access to our innermost feelings and emotions. 

It is critical that we as humans, neighbors and communities understand how social engineering techniques work on our brains and our societies.  We must recognize these methodologies so we can defend against them.  We need to identify them and call them out.  We must warn others. We must legislate against these techniques and hold social media and messaging platforms accountable.

Social media apps and platforms are used by our children, the elderly and everyone in between.  These platforms give direct access to our brains.  They support mind manipulation at scale.  What follows is an extensive, although incomplete list of the strategies, tools and techniques of social engineering I have gleaned from literally hundreds or articles, academic papers and reports.  I have organized them into six categories: Amplify and Promote, Constraining, Emotions and Motivations, Mind Manipulation, Personal Information and Strategies and Tactics.

Disinformation is Both Expensive and Deadly

The Covid-19 pandemic ambushed businesses and global economies.  Since the pandemic took hold in the U.S. in March 2020, job loss has been one of the most significant consequences. The U.S. has recently reached a total of 60 million unemployment claims, while loss to the US GDP is estimated to be around $7.6 trillion.  

In addition, a recent survey conducted by the Federal Reserve Bank revealed that 9 million small firms in the US are at risk of closing for good in 2021 as a result of the pandemic.  The International Monetary Fund estimated the total cost to the global economy from Covid-19 will ultimately top $28 trillion in lost output (the time frame was years 2020-2025).  

Social Engineering Escapes the War Zone

The phrase social engineering splashed into the public's view as a result of actions from a cluster of companies whose services focused on influencing and manipulating people's thinking.  The history of these companies is complex, but seems to have all started with Strategic Communication Laboratories, which became SCL Ltd, then it became SCL Group, which then created a subsidiary called Behavioral Dynamics Institute (BDI) and another subsidiary infamously known as Cambridge Analytica, a company that was intimately involved in influencing US voters during the 2016 elections.  Cambridge Analytica stated at the time that their expertise was in "behavior change," "military influence campaigns," "psychographic segmentation" and other types of mind-manipulation.

SCL Group's services focused on psychological operations (psyops), which is a strategy to alter people's minds through the use of rumours, disinformation, bots, fictitious accounts and fake news.  The BDI subsidiary claimed they had several leading psychologists and strategists on staff that developed tools to better understand audiences and to shape their behaviors.  They claimed they had invested over $25 million USD in developing scientific approaches for "influencing target audiences." They provided services such as delivering training in counter-Russian propaganda in Eastern Europe funded by the Government of Canada, as well as conducting research on target audience analysis which has influenced counter-insurgency doctrine. 

Fooled by Psychographic Profiles and Social Engineering

In the 1960s psychographic researchers began studying how to understand consumers and their behaviors at a deeper level based on personality traits, emotional triggers, interests, needs, values and attitudes, etc.  A few decades later these findings were dusted off and combined with neuromarketing (the measurement of physiological and neural signals to gain insight into customers' motivations, preferences, and decision) to study how various advertisements and political messages impacted people with different psychological or psychographic profiles.  

The data for a large number of psychographic profiles was infamously collected from personality quizzes, surveys and games on Facebook and other social media platforms without the knowledge of the user, or as claimed - the platforms themselves.  All of this data was eventually combined with social engineering strategies and methods, and a military tactic called “information operations” by political strategists for the purpose of  influencing large populations.

SAP's Vaccine Collaboration Hub - An Interview with Michael Byczkowski, GVP and Head of Healthcare for SAP

Our guest this week is SAP's GVP and Head of Healthcare Industry, Michael Byczkowski. We take a deep dive into healthcare trends pre-pandemic, and then explore how the pandemic has changed priorities globally. We explore SAP's Vaccine Collaboration Hub and other technologies and solution they have introduced to help support the global fight against the Covid-19 pandemic. We end by looking into the future and how our experiences this last year may change the face of healthcare forever.  Enjoy!

************************************************************************

Kevin Benedict

Partner | Futurist | Leadership Strategies at TCS

View my profile on LinkedIn

Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict

Join the Linkedin Group Digital Intelligence

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Social Engineering - Mind Manipulation at Scale

Social engineering poses potential threats to human rights, markets and democracies. These concerns are based on the notion that humans are a product of their environment and the information they consume.

The average person in the US spends approximately 3 hours each day consuming data from their device screens.  That totals about a month and a half of screen time each year.  We are influenced by that time, and it changes our thinking and behaviors.  Is our time investment making us better or worse as humans, parents, employees, leaders, mentors, friends, etc?  Are we being influenced to become the kind of person we want to be?

Our addictive dependence upon the internet and the information therein is the revolutionary development of our time. Today, we have approximately 26 to 50 billion devices connected to the internet. For every PC or handset connected to the internet, 5 to 10 other devices will be sold with their own internet connection. These devices are both collecting data on us, and pushing information/disinformation to us. The applications, platforms and the messages we receive from them are not random. They are purposeful and managed by organizations intent on influencing us. Often these influencing efforts are invisible or overlooked by us. The influence strategies and campaigns being directed at us are called social engineering - the focus of this article.

Esperanto's Missing Ecosystem - Bringing Order to Sustainability Chaos

Esperanto is not worth learning to many because there aren't many speakers. Without an influx of speakers, it's just a toy language for nerds. 

In 1887 the Polish ophthalmologist L. L. Zamenhof developed a language he called Esperanto.  He first described the language in the book The International Language, which he published in five different languages.  Why? No one could read Esperanto.  In 2021 it is still mostly the case.

When a person ponders learning a second language they often consider the number of speakers it has.  They associate value with numbers.  In the case of Esperanto it still has less than 2,000 native speakers.  With such a small group of speakers it is mostly an interesting academic topic today, but not very practical as a language for everyday use or business.  It needs an ecosystem of participants all actively using it to make it grow and thrive.

5G and the Future Impact with Ericsson's Expert Rob Tiffany

This is Part 2 of my interview with Rob Tiffany, VP & Head of IoT Strategy at Ericsson.  He walks us through his views on the future impact of 5G on consumers and industries.  

Watch Part 1 of this interview here.

************************************************************************

Kevin Benedict

Partner | Futurist | Leadership Strategies at TCS

View my profile on LinkedIn

Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict

Join the Linkedin Group Digital Intelligence

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Ecosystem Strategies Dominate the Future - Cowboys or Not

In the rural west of the United States, it is common to meet people with libertarian political views - leave me alone and I will leave you alone.  It’s a cowboy type ethos of being independent and self-sufficient.  That’s one reason it’s so hard to get them to be compliant with social distancing and mask wearing.  They seem to struggle with sacrificing some independence for a common community good. 

Although these perspectives may serve rural cowboys well, working alone is not helpful when a business is trying to operate in an environment with emerging and competing ecosystems, which are organizations working together for their mutual benefit.  Ecosystem business strategies change the operating conditions and rules of business.  In order to survive and thrive in business today, a basic understanding of ecosystem business strategies is required.  In addition, the ability to cooperate and play nice with others in order to develop a shared and mutually beneficial value chain is critical.

When I was the CEO of an start-up mobile technology company 19 years ago, it was before Apple had mobile devices, iTunes and the Apple App Store.  It was before Google had developed Android and Google Play.  Our mobile software solutions had to be downloaded directly from our servers and individually loaded on every mobile device.  We had to spend massive amounts of time developing standardized ways of supporting and servicing our own customers.  Today all of these processes are standardized within giant ecosystems and all the ecosystem participants share in the value that was created.

5G and the New World with Ericsson Expert Rob Tiffany

5G expert Rob Tiffany joins me for a deep dive discussion on the impact of 5G on businesses.  If you don't already know Rob, he is an author, innovator, inventor, submariner, philanthropist, programmer, foodie, grunge music fan and VP and Head of IoT Strategy at Ericsson.

************************************************************************

Kevin Benedict

Partner | Futurist | Leadership Strategies at TCS

View my profile on LinkedIn

Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict

Join the Linkedin Group Digital Intelligence

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Conspiracy Theories and Their Impact on Employment Opportunities

A question has been lingering in the back of my mind of late.  Does a belief in and the sharing of conspiracy theories have any potential impacts on employment opportunities and/or career advancement?  This week I finally carved out some time to do research.  I found more research than I expected on this topic and my findings follow. 

I have shared many of the excerpts from my research with their associated links to their sources below.  Much of my research was found on PubMed.gov, a research site from the National Library of Medicine's National Center for Biotechnology Information.

• The current research suggests that conspiracy theories may have potentially damaging and widespread consequences for intergroup relations.  © 2019 The Authors. British Journal of Psychology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of British Psychological Society.  https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30868563/
• Conspiracy theories are consequential as they have a real impact on people's health, relationships, and safety; They are emotional given that negative emotions and not rational deliberations cause conspiracy beliefs; They are social as conspiracy beliefs are closely associated with psychological motivations underlying intergroup conflict.  https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30555188/
• Research suggests that conspiracy theories are associated with political apathy, support for non-normative political action, climate denial, vaccine refusal, prejudice, crime, violence, disengagement in the workplace, and reluctance to adhere to COVID-19 recommendations.  https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33612140/
• Belief in conspiracy theories about the workplace are associated with increased turnover intentions and decreased organizational commitment and job satisfaction. The current studies therefore demonstrate the potentially adverse consequences of conspiracy theorizing for the workplace. We argue that managers and employees should be careful not to dismiss conspiracy theorizing as harmless rumour or gossip. © 2016, The British Psychological Society - https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27488243/
• In May-June of 2017, the organization Leadership IQ surveyed 3,272 leaders and professionals in the USA and found that: 59% are concerned about ‘fake news’ in the workplace.  24% rising to the level of ‘very concerned'.  64% are concerned about ‘alternative facts’ in the workplace.  27% rising to the level of ‘very concerned’
• Higher faith in intuition, uncertainty avoidance, impulsivity, generic conspiracy beliefs, religiosity, and right-wing ideology, and a lower level of cognitive reflection were associated with a higher level of belief in COVID-19 conspiracy theories.  https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32837129/

Ideas as Competitive Advantages

Recently an executive referred to our TCS Future of Business team as an idea factory.  I took that as a huge compliment.  No invention, good deed or successful company has ever been created without ideas.  Ideas can form nations.  Ideas can send astronauts to the Moon and robots to Mars.  Ideas can accelerate the development of life saving vaccines.

Last year I met with a room full of executives and one of the first things one of them asked was, "What new ideas are you bringing to the table?"  I loved that question!

In evolutionary biology competition is often described as survival of the fittest.  Today, however, competition often revolves around ideas, and the best ideas win.

While human biology evolves so slowly we don’t notice, ideas evolve so quickly, we can’t keep up. Idea evolution is like biological evolution on steroids. ~ Futurist Gerd Leonhard

If good ideas are the secret to success, then it is important we know their definition.  A good idea is a "thought about a virtuous course of action.".  Where do we get good ideas?  My TCS colleague and renowned futurist Frank Diana recently wrote that, "We all now have access (via the internet) to the collective intelligence of society, and we are therefore exposed to more ideas than ever."  Good ideas do not even need to be completely new to have value.  Frank often speaks of the value of "combinatorial" technologies.  Unique combinations of existing technologies that offer value in new ways.

The Current and Future State of Eldercare

If we are lucky enough to live long enough, we will all likely end up managing elder care for someone or experiencing it ourselves.  It is a very challenging area that seems to always be underfunded.  How can emerging technologies help?  In this insightful interview with TCS elder care expert Ved Sen we discuss these issues and more.

Remember to subscribe to be notified of new articles and interviews.

************************************************************************

Kevin Benedict

Partner | Futurist | Leadership Strategies at TCS

View my profile on LinkedIn

Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict

Join the Linkedin Group Digital Intelligence

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Robots that Create Jobs and Construct Apartment Buildings

An Idaho company, Autovol Volumetric Modular, is building apartments inside a Nampa, Idaho factory and shipping the modular components to the San Jose, CA area for installation.  In a 400,000 square foot manufacturing space they are maximizing the use of robots and automation to do the heavy lifting and to ensure precision manufacturing.  The value according to CEO Rick Murdock, is saving 20% on costs and 40% on time.  "We’ll build it here (in Idaho), ship it and save the project about $100 a square foot.”

What a great story!  Idaho, known worldwide for their farming of "famous potatoes," is innovating and shipping their finished products to Silicon Valley, and none too soon.  The oldest archaeological evidence of house construction is estimated to be around 1.8 million years old.  It's about time for innovation! 

How do they designate what work the humans do, and what work the robots do?  Robots are used to build walls, floors and ceilings and to assemble the modules, while the humans install wiring, plumbing and fixtures, perform inspections and write the software programs that control the robots.

By innovating with the use of automation and robots, Autovol Volumetric Modular anticipates having over 300 employees in Idaho by next year.  This is an example of robots helping to create jobs - not taking them away.

************************************************************************

Kevin Benedict

Partner | Futurist | Leadership Strategies at TCS

View my profile on LinkedIn

Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict

Join the Linkedin Group Digital Intelligence

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

The Role and Future of Information with Futurist Alex Whittington

In this deep dive discussion with the brilliant thinker and futurist Alex Whittington, we explore the topics of data monetization, social media, facts, information/disinformation and the future of data driven economic models.  I hope you enjoy!  

To watch or listen to more of these interviews with insightful futurist, business and technology leaders please remember to follow us or subscribe!

Did you remember to follow or subscribe?

************************************************************************

Kevin Benedict

Partner | Futurist | Leadership Strategies at TCS

View my profile on LinkedIn

Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict

Join the Linkedin Group Digital Intelligence

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Information and Flash Mob Tactics - Plus Paul Revere's Speed

Recently anti-mask and anti-testing activist, using mobile phones, video and social media platforms, called for a flash mob style protest at the Legacy Salmon Creek Medical Center emergency room in Vancouver, Washington.  They were protesting against the hospital's requirements that patients be tested for Covid-19 upon entering the hospital.

The anti-maskers that organized the 15-20 person flash mob protest stated their goal was to be able to "push a button on their mobile phone" and send information that would summon 10 activists in 10 minutes, 100 in 100 minutes and 1,000 in 1,000 minutes."  A speed they hoped would be fast enough to surprise the targets of their protest.

That got me thinking about information and "summoning" speed.   I wondered how long it took the American colonists to distribute information and summon their militia to meet the British in Lexington, Massachusetts on April 19, 1775?  

Here is what my research found.  Paul Revere's 12.5 mile ride on a horseback to warn the colonists that the British were coming took approximately one hour.  Paul arrived in Lexington about 12:30 AM on April 19.  

Once the colonist received the warning information that the "British were coming!" they got dressed, grabbed their weapons and ran, walked or rode their horses to meet the British in Lexington.  The "shot heard around the world" was fired just after dawn in Lexington.  Based on these records it appears it took around 6 hours to distribute information and summon 500 colonial militia to confront the British.

One of the anti-maskers stated goals was the ability to summon 1,000 protesters in 1,000 minutes (16 hours). With today's social media, internet and mobile devices is that a stretch goal? In about 6 hours the American colonists had gathered approximately 500 militia, and the information was distributed on horseback. 

At least in this instance, it appears Paul Revere's team and their horses beat the "summoning" speed goals of today's anti-maskers.  Paul's team was able to carry information out and summon more people at a faster rate.

I recognize this certainly will not always be the case, but that doesn't stop us from enjoying this bit of silly trivia.

Don't forget to subscribe or follow me if you want more silly trivia, plus not so silly discussions on the future.

 

************************************************************************

Kevin Benedict

Partner | Futurist | Leadership Strategies at TCS

View my profile on LinkedIn

Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict

Join the Linkedin Group Digital Intelligence

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Rethinking Universities - Thoughts from Four Experts

In this episode, we talk with four experts, from three different countries, on how universities' business models, purpose and paradigms might need to be re-thought in the future.  Our experts are:

• Renee Altier, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Business Education and Careers at Wiley
• Greg Morrisett, Dean and Vice Provost at Cornell Tech
• Mark Bramwell, CIO at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford
• Susan McCahan, Vice Provost, Innovations in Undergraduate Education and Vice Provost, Academic Programs at University of Toronto

************************************************************************

Kevin Benedict

Partner | Futurist | Leadership Strategies at TCS

View my profile on LinkedIn

Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict

Join the Linkedin Group Digital Intelligence

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.