One of the great myths of the energy transition is the battery problem. There’s widespread concern about their cost, as well as the question of what we are going to do with ones that have to be replaced, which are often reported as potentially dangerous to the environment.
It’s true that batteries were once expensive and performed poorly. But as often happens with technology, the last decade has seen the price of lithium-ion batteries fall by an impressive 88%, a progression that is far from having bottomed out. …
A few weeks ago, Microsoft updated Microsoft Teams, to version 1.3.00.18164. No biggie, you might think: there have been several updates for this product, which checks if it is updated to the latest version every time it is started or every so often, and updates automatically.
On this occasion, however, the update came with something extra: for some absurd reason, the new version does not recognize virtual cameras, meaning the only option is the computer’s own camera. This means programs such as OBS, Mmhmm, EpocCam Pro or others that many of us use on a regular basis for our meetings…
Spotify’s announcement on Friday that it will allow all of its employees to work from wherever they want once the pandemic is over is further evidence that some companies will gain a significant competitive advantage by systematically applying many of the changes we have experienced over the last year.
The principles that Spotify applies to its WFA (Work From Anywhere) policy are very simple and make perfect sense: first, that work is an activity, not a place, and its effectiveness should not be measured by the number of hours we spend in an office. Second, that giving people the freedom…
More and more companies are using algorithms in their selection processes, particularly in an era marked by the pandemic in which a good part of the recruiting process, or all of it, is carried out remotely, via the internet.
From the initial screening based on standardized versions of resumes or diagnostic tests that determine candidates’ attitudes and aptitudes, to processing the so-called one-way interviews), more and more stages in the selection process are being entrusted to various types of algorithms capable of screening based on various criteria, with the idea that recruiters can concentrate more on the people and less…
As somebody who teaches innovation I am required to spend a lot of time keeping up to date with technology and identifying emerging trends. Little wonder, therefore, that I’m always looking for ways to be more systematic about my information gathering. I’ve written about this here on several occasions, and my approach combines tools such as Feedly, a feed reader I entrust with monitoring the sources I pick myself, as well as some specific searches, with others such as algorithmic recommenders like Refind which I use to expand my sources and allow me to closely monitor my areas of interest.
Elon Musk’s proverbial ability to kick the hornet’s nest at the right moments is once again evident in the wake of the recent news that Tesla has bought $1.5 billion in bitcoin: since then, the value of bitcoin has appreciated to almost $50,000, Mastercard has announced that it will enable the use of cryptocurrencies on its network (this would seem for the moment to be a statement of intent, saying it will do so when cryptocurrencies are “stable”, which would point for the moment only to stablecoins), while yesterday, Jack Dorsey and Jay-Z announced the creation of a 500-bitcoin fund…
Australia is becoming the world’s biggest experiment in the future of internet regulation. And thanks to Google, it’s not looking good.
What has happened? First, it is important to understand Australia’s politics and its media: it’s arguably the democracy with the highest concentration of media in the world in the hands of very few people and companies. Newsprint is dominated by News Corp Australia (Rupert Murdoch) and Nine Entertainment Co. …
A post on Salesforce’s website heralds the end of the nine-to-five era, explaining that it makes no sense to expect people to continue working in this archaic way, and proposes three new approaches: flex, fully remote and office-based, which will define how the company works when things normalize after the pandemic.
The company says it expects the flex format to be adopted by the vast majority of its employees worldwide, which will probably involve two-to-three days in the office dedicated to collaborative group tasks, presentations or meetings with clients, in a flexible regime depending on the needs of the moment…
Twitter is hinting that it may be creating a tipping model associated with its platform, whereby followers interested in giving an economic incentive to those who generate content of interest to them could do so in the form of a subscription or a one-off payment.
The idea is still under exploration and nothing is likely to happen this year, but the move would bring Twitter in line with the Patreon model, a platform founded in 2013 that has managed to direct more than $1 billion dollars from about three million donors to around 100,000 creators. Patreon collects 5% of transactions…
Donald Trump’s repeatedly postponed order to force the company that owns TikTok, China’s ByteDance, to sell its operations in the country to a US outfit if it wanted to avoid an outright ban has been shelved by the Biden administration.
The decision illustrates the marked difference in leadership style between the current and previous administrations, although it still leaves open the decision as to what actions to take with respect to a country, China, whose companies operate abroad freely while Beijing protects its home market zealously.
In an increasingly globalized world, Chinese companies have had almost complete freedom to expand…
Enrique Dans
Professor of Innovation at IE Business School, blogger at enriquedans.com and Senior Contributor at Forbes
