Just a quick note to announce a new Sil­ver Spon­sor of the Sharp­Brains Sum­mit, and link to a cou­ple stim­u­lat­ing online conversations.

The Insti­tute For the Future is an inde­pen­dent, non­profit strate­gic research group with more than 40 years of fore­cast­ing expe­ri­ence. The core of our work is iden­ti­fy­ing emerg­ing trends and dis­con­ti­nu­ities that will trans­form global soci­ety and the global mar­ket­place. We pro­vide our mem­bers with insights into busi­ness strat­egy, design process, inno­va­tion, and social dilem­mas. Our research spans a broad ter­ri­tory of deeply trans­for­ma­tive trends, from health and health care to tech­nol­ogy, the work­place, and human iden­tity. The Insti­tute for the Future is located in Palo Alto, California.

I have been col­lab­o­rat­ing infor­mally with IFTF projects for a few years, and it is excit­ing to col­lab­o­rate on the upcom­ing Sum­mit and related work.

Now, two stim­u­lat­ing links:

1) Ency­clo­pe­dia Bri­tan­nica Blog is host­ing an online con­ver­sa­tion on Multi-tasking:

“Mul­ti­task­ing” remem­ber when that was some­thing com­put­ers did? They were sup­posed to do it for our ben­e­fit, to make our lives eas­ier, but some­how it hasn’t quite worked out that way. With fast com­put­ers, the Inter­net, and smart phones in our pock­ets, today we’re always teth­ered to The Net­work, and some­times it seems we’re doing its bid­ding instead of it doing ours. There’s so much to do, it comes at us so fast, and it all has to be done now. The solu­tion: for­get what you were taught about doing one thing at a time and start doing sev­eral things at once. Call your office from the express­way. Bring that Black­berry to the meet­ing. Answer e-mails over din­ner. Multitask.

Of course, whether mul­ti­task­ing really is effi­cient is a mat­ter both of pub­lic debate and clin­i­cal research, and it’s just one of the ques­tions we plan to get into next week in a new forum on the sub­ject here at the Bri­tan­nica Blog.”

You can par­tic­i­pate Here.

2) For extra brain & mind read­ing, you can visit  yesterday’s Encephalon edi­tion at The Mouse Trap. Enjoy!

My pre­sen­ta­tion to open our Games for Health Con­fer­ence track is now avail­able via SlideShare:

See Bird’s Eye View of Cog­ni­tive Health Innovation

Descrip­tion: Sci­en­tific, tech­no­log­i­cal and demo­graphic trends have con­verged to cre­ate a new $265m mar­ket in the US alone: seri­ous games, soft­ware and online appli­ca­tions that can help peo­ple of all ages assess and train cog­ni­tive abil­i­ties. Alvaro Fer­nan­dez will pro­vide a Bird’s Eye View of the sci­ence, mar­ket seg­ments and trends, com­pet­i­tive land­scape, and main chal­lenges ahead, based on The State of the Brain Fit­ness Soft­ware Mar­ket 2009 report released in May, which included Research Exec­u­tive Briefs pre­pared by 12 lead­ing sci­en­tists and a sur­vey of 2,000+ decision-makers and early adopters.

61% of respon­dents to the sur­vey Strongly Agreed with the state­ment “Address­ing cog­ni­tive and brain health should be a health­care pri­or­ity.”  But, 65% Agreed/Strongly Agreed with “I don’t really know what to expect from prod­ucts mak­ing brain claims.” In this ses­sion, Alvaro will pub­licly unveil the new book The Sharp­Brains Guide to Brain Fit­ness: 18 Inter­views with Sci­en­tists, Prac­ti­cal Advice, and Prod­uct Reviews, To Keep Your Brain Sharp, co-authored by neu­ropsy­chol­o­gist Dr. Elkhonon Gold­berg and him­self, aimed at help­ing con­sumers and pro­fes­sion­als under­stand and nav­i­gate this grow­ing field.

To see slides, check out Bird’s Eye View of Cog­ni­tive Health Innovation

Enjoy the 4th of July!