Tag Archives: digital

Letting go – job polarisation and innovation in the digital economy

26 Jul

No-one doubts that small companies are great generators of new employment but new research has also highlighted the effects of ‘job polarisation’ where the growth is found in either ‘lovely or lousy’ jobs at the expense of ‘middle income’ roles.

In this review of ICF’s latest report by co-founder Robert Bell we ask why large companies find innovation so difficult and we suggest that major firms have a wider responsibility for investment that could balance the apparent reluctance of banks to lend to small businesses.

Read the full story here

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Assistive Technology

19 Jul

Six years on, but what has changed?

Revisiting a story from 2006 about ‘assistive technology’ we review progress with ‘speech to text’ and ‘sip & puff’ options for severely disabled people with spinal injuries.

So many things that we take for granted – like using a mouse and keyboard – are huge challenges for folk like Chris but can, at least in part, be resolved by ingenuity, innovation and determination.

But such a pity about the basic connectivity.

Read the full story here

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reflections on a rainy month

15 Jul

It isn’t just the inclement weather that has disheartened UK citizens this last month.

The realities of digital dependencies have been heightened by bank systems failures, banks’ ethical failures and bank-sponsored bike breakdowns.

But it’s not just in the banking sector that regulatory reform is in the air.

Dig into all the calls for infrastructure investment (mostly in the cause of economic growth) and you find at their root the need to tackle the ‘digital deficit’ – something whose very existence many would deny or not yet comprehend.

It all adds up to a need for a post-Olympic rethink of national policy priorities.

read the full story here.

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Quarterly Review and Index

28 Jun

Our editorial streams in the quarter April-June 2012  were dominated by coverage of the UN Sustainability Summit, (Rio+20) with considerable input from ‘Groupe Intellex Associate’ Marit Hendriks in Rio de Janeiro filming for NextGen TV.

Surprise hits, however, were the editorials on the ‘digital’ economy, New Economic Models and, from the archive, a heart-felt sermon on the iniquities of call centres, ‘ Please hold during the silence’.

The Quarterly Review includes references, acknowledgement, a chronological listing and a full alphabetical index of topics and people featured  in the last 3 months.

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Rio+20: Pressing for a Restart

26 Jun

In this final editorial from the UN Sustainability Summit in Rio we consider the disappointments felt by many participants but also celebrate the digital connectivity that has taken the messages from this event to all corners of the world.

In Marit Hendrik’s compilation of voices from Rio we hear from the UN leadership, from those concerned with their own country’s leadership deficit in environmental matters and those who really understand the need to re-engage with a digitally-empowered and well-connected next generation.

Full story here with video from Marit Hendriks for NextGen TV.

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Ria: a tribute to worldly-wise women of Rio+20

22 Jun

Ria in Spanish is the feminine of Rio and it seems only appropriate for our 4th report from Rio+20 to acknowledge the work of women around the world.

On a day when London and Brussels both experienced the power of dignified but determined voices we turn our Rio+20 spotlight on Tanya, Doris and Brittany – three voices with messages that lift us out of politics, resolutions and declarations and into the real world of getting on with finding solutions to everyday environmental problems.

In the rain forests of the Amazon or remote valleys in Switzerland or from the distant shores of New Zealand we feature three great examples of digital empowerment.

Politicians and the media may think the Rio+20 sustainability text is ‘insipid’ but life goes on and the present powers will be held to account by the next generation.

Full story here with videos by Marit Hendriks for NextGenTV.

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Rio+20: the reality of Digital Engagement

20 Jun

From an aerial view of the beach in Rio de Janeiro to Argyll & Bute in the Scottish Highlands by way of Brighton & Hove (and Nick Clegg, Aung San Suu Kyi, the EU delegation led by Denmark, ‘the hairy cornflake’ and Ellen MacArthur) we bring you our second report from the UN’s Sustainability Summit and a message about ‘the problem solving capabilities of networks‘.

All that plus Paragraph 65 of the Rio+20 draft final text that world leaders are expected to affirm this week.

Full story here with additional reporting from Marit Hendriks in Rio for NextGen TV.

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Rio+20: digital realities dawning

19 Jun

As thousands of delegates throng the conference halls of the UN Rio+20 Summit and work late into the night to try and reach a sustainable consensus, voices of reason are highlighting the national and global deficits in digital infrastructure.

In this first of our reports from Rio we bring together thoughts from the European Commission, the ITU, Boston Consulting Group, BT and the guy from Aberdeenshire who just got on with it and founded Mashable.com .  Additional reporting from Marit Hendriks of NextGenTV.

Full story here

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A digital Wake Up call

17 Jun

Whoever gets around to documenting the history of digital transformation should not overlook the small and seemingly insignificant moments that make the pennies drop.

One of these hit the headlines this week.  It was not some great scientific breakthrough, some amazing innovation in clinical practice, or the discovery of new sources of energy.  Nor was it an outbreak of peace in troubled places or a rush by world leaders to sign up to new commitments at the UN Rio+20 summit.

It wasn’t even another report on people empowerment expressed in YouTube videos from conflict areas.

This week’s commotion was the sound of scales falling from the eyes of everyday folk as they realised what digital citizenship was all about.

A nine year old student used her blog to review the quality of her school meals and raise money for the children of Malawi – and it caused havoc in the minds of local government officials.

It’s another a small step in wider awareness of the economy’s digital transformation that, when history is written, should not be forgotten.

Full story here

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Please hold during the silence

6 Jun

Having recently survived a series of bruising encounters of the Call Centre kind the editor is reminded that he has been writing this stuff for far too long.

He is also moved to wonder about progress and to share with readers a short note first published in 2004.

Back then the object of this writer’s ire was a phone company and today it’s a digitally different outfit – but at least the 2004 battle gifted us the headline ‘Please hold during the silence’.

With slightly better integration between departmentalised helpers, today’s call centre designers may lack poetry in their utterances but they are as addicted as ever to ‘the long button-pushing trail a-winding. . . . ‘

From the Group Intellex archive, ‘Hang on in there’ was written during one of those silences whilst waiting for a help-desk connection – and in those moments of reflection, when nothing more could be said or tweeted or text’d or posted, it sounded like a good rule for life.

Full story here

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