Here is a fake video, produced by the American SCi-Fi network, about a “transformer” car that we will not have to park because it can becomes as small as change. Is this a farfetched dream or a new goal for science?

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Let’s put it like this: if this were real, Mary Poppins would no longer be extraordinary.

In today’s video, a Jeep is “decomposed” like a transformer vehicle until it becomes the size of a piece of chewing gum. The tiny car is then placed inside of the driver’s purse as she walks away. It reminds me of the scene from Disney’s Mary Poppins when she begins pulling large objects, such as a lamp, out of her leather bag.

Yes, plants, clothes hangers…there was room for everything in that bag of hers. But what about an automobile? According to today’s video, although the video itself is fake, it could be entirely possible.

More Info:

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nt_rLnE5HpY

The Lilypad, designed by French architect Vincent Callebaut, is a city at sea, inspired by the houseboats and water lilies from the Amazon region. Each Lilypad city, accommodating about 50 thousand people, could someday be the self-sufficient home for displaced people in the future.

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MoreInfo:

• http://vincent.callebaut.org

In both the United States and Russia, high-end clothing for children is becoming a new and expensive trend many call kiddie couture. Major fashion designers have created new clothing lines for children, and parents are spending thousands of dollars on clothing for their fashion-forward kids. Boutiques and salons that cater to children are springing up everywhere, and some parents are treating their young children as designer accessories. Is this phenomenon excessive, or just a sign of the times?

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More Info:

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4EAPUjXCPI

Engineers from the University of California at Berkeley, and the University of Michigan have developed the first wireless flying-insect cyborg. Using electrodes that are connected to the insect’s optic lobes and flight muscles, these bugs could be the newest form of undercover agent.

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Imagine walking down the street, and seeing a tiny black beetle buzzing along. Would you ever fathom that perhaps this miniscule creature is the end result of thousands of hours of research and development?

The first unmanned remote controlled airplane was flown in 1916. Decades later, hundreds of tiny remote controlled planes made their way into mass production. Tiny helicopters were created as well, sending enthusiasts into a frenzy. Now, technology has created the possibility of flying a living, breathing creature.

Hirotaka Sato and Michel M. Maharbiz, at the University of California at Berkeley, and researchers at the Boyce Thompson Institute, at the University of Michigan, are using cutting edge technology to manipulate the movements of a wide range of insects, from beetles to dragon flies. By connecting electrodes to the insect’s optic lobes, the flight muscles can be controlled by a remote. The result is almost like driving a toy airplane, thus transforming these creatures into undercover bugs of the future. Insects are a seemingly perfect undercover agent, as they are inexpensive, unassuming, and versatile. A beetle, for example, can carry objects (such as a miniature camera) that are much heavier than their own body weight.

What does this mean for the future of our privacy? These controllable insects could very well change our defense mechanisms, as well as create new forms of investigation.

More Info:

• http://www.darpa.mil/MTO/Programs/himems/index.html
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMjJFQTZKtw

The new age of the web has arrived. And it will not go unnoticed. Web 2.0 is radically changing the way that enterprises, managers, and professionals are using the internet for their own businesses, and the new challenges are universal and important. Here are ten tips to prepare everyone for the new era of the net.

Web 2.0 (otherwise known as the Internet 2.0), is neither specific software nor a registered brand, but instead stands for the web applications that facilitate interactive information sharing, user-centered design, and collaboration on the World Wide Web. The term is normally associated with Dale Dougherty, vice-president of O’Reilly Media; it became official during the O’Reilly Media Web 2.0 Conference in 2004. The term itself refers to an attitude towards the sharing of information, and the cumulative changes of web usage. This revolutionary approach is based on the Web as a sort of platform. The problem that remains is the fact that neither Dale Dougherty nor Tim O’Reilly (the President of O’Reilly Media) has formulated a specific definition of Web 2.0. Web 2.0 represents the evolution of the World Wide Web, from a series of static sites to a global environment in which online software, multimedia applications, and large band connection offer a wider array of information and a tighter interaction between the users. In this scenario, the absence of a single definition has contributed to an international debate (which still exists) about the term Web 2.0. From the analyses of the statements ranging from Tim O’Reilly to Wikipedia and various posts, I believe that the characteristics of Web 2.0 can be summarized in the following ten tips to better understand the Web 2.0:

1. The Web is a platform. We have gone from installable software on our PC, to software-services that are accessible online. All data and software is now available online.
2. The Web is functionality. The Web aids in the transfer of information and services from websites.
3. The Web is simple. It facilitates the access and usage of web services using user-friendly interfaces.
4. The Web is light. The models of development, the processes, and the models of business become light. The lightness is associated with the ability to share of information and services with ease, and made possible through the implementation of intuitive modular elements.
5. The Web is social. People create the Web, “populate the Web”, by socializing and gradually moving members from the physical world to the online world.
6. The Web is flow. The users are seen as co-developers, while Web 2.0 remains in “perpetual beta”, where it remains at the beta development stage for an indefinite period of time.
7. The Web is flexible. The software is on a more advanced level because it enables access to previously unavailable digital content. This idea is similar to the Long Tail concept, which focuses on the less popular content that couldn’t previously be accessed.
8. The Web is mixable. The expansion of codes in order to modify web applications (like Google does with its Google Maps application) allows individuals who are not necessarily computer professionals to mix different applications in order to create new ones. Web 2.0 gets its power through this “mashup” capability.
9. The Web is participatory. Web 2.0 has adopted a structure of participation that encourages users to enhance the application while they use it, instead of keeping it rigid and controlled.
10. The Web is in our hands. Its increased organization and characterization of information emphasizes its user-friendly interaction through deep linking. Thanks to phenomena such as social tagging, information is always more and more easily available.

It is important to think smart and read smart. Helen Walters, the editor of BusinessWeek, has already done half of the work for us, by outlining the 19 best innovation and design books written in 2009. Our top 10 list highlights the best of the best in innovation and design thinking.

What do contemporary T-shirt graphics, Brooklyn-based design companies, and animated short films have in common? For one thing, they’ve each grabbed the attention of Helen Walters, editor of Innovation and Design at BusinessWeek Magazine. Helen has used each of these diverse topics to illustrate the ability innovative design techniques have to change the world around us.

Recently, Helen has shifted her focus from producing original work to publicizing and critiquing the work of others. Her survey of the 19 best innovation and design books written in 2009 is a helpful guide for anyone looking to become more informed on this year’s innovation innovations, for lack of a better phrase. 10 of these books stood out to us as especially interesting or unique:

1. Change by Design by Tim Brown – a persuasive argument for the necessity of maintaining a well-functioning design department to succeed in tomorrow’s business climate.
2. The Design of Business: Why Design Thinking is the Next Competitive Advantage by Roger Martin – a practically applicable guide to creating and maintaining a quality design department written by one of the most respected people in the field.
3. A Fine Line: How Design Strategies are Shaping the Future of Business by Hartmut Esslinger – Frog Design’s founder’s personal entertaining and informative anecdotes of his time spent at companies including Apple, Disney, and SAP.
4. Design-Driven Innovation: Changing the Rules of Competition by Radically Innovating What Things Mean by Roberto Verganti – a revolutionary look at the field that focuses on companies’ ability to manipulate markets by using innovative design to alter customer expectations.
5. I Miss My Pencil by Martin Bone and Kara Johnson – an exercise in innovative design itself, this uniquely formatted book emphasizes the non-traditional aspects of the field in a very interesting and accessible manner
6. Discovery-Driven Growth: A Breakthrough Process to Reduce Risk and Seize Opportunity by Rita Gunther McGrath and Ian C. MacMillan – an executive’s handy-book to implementing innovative designs without creating excessive risk written by professors from Columbia and Wharton.
7. The Age of the Unthinkable, Why the New World Constantly Surprises Us and What We Can Do About It by Joshua Cooper Ramo – a survey of disruptive innovation as it has manifested itself in the business community and the world at large, emphasizing its inevitability and potential to be positive.
8. Innovation Tournaments: Creating and Selecting Exceptional Opportunities by Christian Terwiesch and Karl Ulrich – two Wharton professors’ academic look at the way innovation can be encouraged and managed through the use of certain business practices.
9. Clever: Leading Your Smartest, Most Creative People by Rob Goffee and Gareth Jones – a persuasion piece arguing that brilliant, difficult people are going to be the primary source of innovative and economic growth in tomorrow’s economy.
10. Glimmer: How Design Can Transform Your Life and Maybe Even the World by Warren Berger – a look at individuals that the author sees as important to changing the field of innovative design, and consequently the world, that pays special attention to designer Bruce Mao

More Info:

• http://images.businessweek.com/ss/09/12/1216_best_design_innovation_books/1.htm
• http://www.helenwalters.com

Companies and corporations will soon be changing their business models in the coming years, no longer focusing on size and expansion, but rather on speed.

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The new standard for future corporations will be speed. These companies, these corporations, have until now focused on size, expansion, getting bigger and bigger and even bigger still. The goal has always been to be bigger than your competitor; however, with the global economy in decline, these companies can’t keep relying on this old strategy. The new strategy, the model, will no longer be that of expansion, but rather that of speed: doing things faster, as quickly as they can be accomplished.

The “D-Generation”, the digital generation, was the first generation of young people to be exposed to the digital tools, such as instant messaging programs, social networks, P2P servers. These technologies have become common to us all. Now that this generation is old enough to take managerial positions in companies, they take all of this experience and utilize it at work. They know what the next generation wants from service providers. They also know that nothing is ever fast enough for the generation of children today. And so, things must change. In order to stimulate the economy, the new direction will be towards speed. Nanotechnology will play roles we never dreamed of.

So take a look around. Do you see all those large corporations, those large enterprises being bought out on a daily basis? They were moving too slow. Things are starting to speed up in the business world, and all of us must be ready to jump on the bandwagon. We’re sure to see things we never dreamed of. As we move forward and the children of today replace the children of yesterday in the design, engineering, and managerial fields, we can only get better—faster.

Are you ready for life in the fast lane?