Signals of Change

Search Engine versus Decision Engine SoC399

This SoC examines recent departures from Google's search-engine design—chiefly by Microsoft and the computing-innovations firm Wolfram Research—to address some of the dissatisfactions that can enter into the experience of searching the Web.

Recessionary Reach SoC400

The effects of the current recession will be long lasting and pervasive, but not all will be solely negative. Companies that focus on decreased consumer spending only miss out on the recession's greater influence on health care, education, public administration, and many other areas. Companies that can proactively plan to take advantage of both positive and negative outcomes will be in the best position to navigate in a postrecession era.

Micropower SoC401

Energy-harvesting concepts are not right for every situation. However, as the efficiency and standardization of energy-harvesting technologies increase, a tiny source of power will become a frequent choice, and the total generated energy may become substantial.

Empowering the Healthy Consumer SoC402

New players and emerging initiatives from outside the health-care industry are driving new health-care strategies by bringing more options to consumers, improving quality and variety of health-related information, choices, and alternatives.

Consumer Applications of SaaS SoC403

The emergence of software as a service as an application-distribution model among consumer applications signifies a shift in business models. Web-based application and service companies will become not only portals or destinations on the Internet but also the interface to their personal information and generated content and media.

Time-Based Services SoC404

The use of temporal information for applications has been surprisingly absent from the digital landscape. Although benefits of such applications are not as instantly obvious as the concept of location-based services, the applications are likely to provide another dimension to digital devices in recognizing context, if not intention.

Insights

An Update on Privacy Issues D09-2604

A plethora of new privacy challenges are emerging through the proliferation of new and the diffusion of existing digital technologies. Fascinating yet scary implications emerge from recording and storing our every move and comment. New data-collection technologies, storage capabilities, analytical tools, and resulting applications will enable business models, services, and products that drive a wide range of benefits for consumers, thereby opening completely new business opportunities. Recent developments indicate that evolving privacy issues are accelerating and broadening in terms of their effect on various aspects of business, government, and social environments. This study builds on the changes that former Signals of Change note, but it provides a more comprehensive look at emerging dynamics and potential effects on laws and regulations, social-media technologies, business models, advertisers, and consumers. Author: Aster Peng. 8 pages.

Scan™ Meeting Digest: 23 September 2009 Meeting D09-2605

This document is a digest of the Scan™ abstract clusters that participants in the 23 September 2009 Scan meeting identified. The digest includes a description of the Scan process for people who have never attended a Scan meeting, a list of the clusters that meeting participants identified, and a one-page description of each cluster's premise and supporting abstracts. The document has active links that allow the reader to access the supporting abstracts for each cluster in Scan's online abstract database. The document also has links to previously published Scan documents relating to the particular cluster. Clusters of abstracts for this September meeting include topics related to retirement and continuing work life, three-dimensional Web and cell-phone-camera–enabled applications, medical advances and pharmaceutical developments, smart-grid applications and environmental considerations, creative business models, and innovation sources. Compiler: Aster Peng. 38 pages.

Calendar

Scan™ Abstract Meetings

Scan abstract meetings (in which SRIC-BI [now SBI] staff participate in a free-form discussion of current Scan abstracts) are open for client observation/participation in Menlo Park on:

• 20 January 2010 at 9:00 am
• 17 March 2010 at 9:00 am
• 19 May 2010 at 9:00 am
• 7 July 2010 at 9:00 am
• 1 September 2010 at 9:00 am
• 3 November 2010 at 9:00 am.

Scan also sponsors occasional Scan abstract meetings in Croydon, Tokyo, and Washington, D.C. Contact your SRIC-BI (now SBI) marketing representative to schedule participation in any of the Scan abstract meetings.