Entries by Ross Dawson

How virtual audiences for sports, music, and conferences create a positive feedback loop of engagement

Since the advent of coronavirus here has been a lot of work put into building virtual events. However we are now realizing that having virtual audiences is an essential part of creating great events, energizing sportspeople, speakers, and performers and creating a positive feedback loop that is at the heart of a great in-person event. […]

Human-technology interfaces will drive our future: here are four innovative new wearables from Google Research

One of my oldest and most central themes in my work as a futurist is interfaces. How humans can and will interact with technology will shape not just our future, but indeed who are. We have only relatively recently begun to move beyond keyboard, mouse and screen interfaces to voice and a handful of early-adopter […]

Going beyond Zoom hell to avatar-based meetings in virtual spaces

Since March many people feel they have been caught in a ‘Zoom hell‘ of back-to-back video calls throughout their waking hours. While this would have seemed futuristic a few decades ago, it already feels deeply tired. We have all experienced the problems with engagement, attention, and effective collaboration on video-conferencing calls. One of the most […]

Reinvention and the virtuous circle of learning by doing: the case of The Virtual Excellence Show

For the last couple of months I have been selectively sharing conversations, tutorials, and highlight videos from The Virtual Excellence Show on this blog, but I haven’t written anything about the show itself. This is the story of the show and the most important things I’ve learned so far. The last time I spoke in-person […]