Op het Marketing Information Event van 18 en 19 maart a.s., georganiseerd door het Data & Insights Network, is een van de sprekers Carl Rohde. Zijn bijdrage heeft als titel ‘Generative AI: trends and soft spots in society’. Hij maakt een verhaal over het onderwerp en stelt daarin ook nog wat vragen. Zoals: ‘What do you predict will be the next iconic AI innovation? What holds you from becoming one yourself?’
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AI is reshaping our world, from business strategies to everyday experiences. As a professor of Future Forecasting & Innovation—with during the last decade chairs in Amsterdam, Shanghai, and Barcelona — I’ve conducted over 250 deep-dive interviews with (sub-)CEO suite Thought Leaders. AI always emerges as a pivotal theme.
I’ll be sharing my insights at MIE’25. But instead of just talking at you, why not make this a more interactive experience? I want to crowdsource the brilliance in the room—your insights, your extreme AI scenarios, and your examples. Below are my key themes. Feel free to enrich them with your knowledge. Some of your contributions might feature in my presentation—credited to you, of course.
1. At the heart of the future, for better or worse
Not every part of your job is thrilling, but if AI is woven into your work, you’re part of the future—for better or worse. AI holds breathtaking potential. To name a few from our content analysis of the world’s most authoritative newspapers, magazines and podcasts this month:
- AI-powered satellites detecting gas leaks globally.
- Robotic bees pollinating and monitoring crops.
- World-class doctors accessible through your smartphone.
- (And some even more mind-blowing examples I’ll reveal at MIE2025.)
Yet, AI’s darker sides also loom large — Surveillance Capitalism, Dark Enlightenment, monopolistic tech power gripping knowledge and economies.
What’s your most extreme AI scenario? A utopian dream? A dystopian nightmare? Especially, what is your strongest concrete example? Let me know: carl@scienceofthetime.com
2. Understanding clients better: AI’s power move
The best way to innovate is to understand people deeply. AI-driven insights are revolutionizing industries:
- Gyms have started tracking not just workouts but sleep, diet, and recovery.
- Barcelona Football Innovation Hub ‘quantifies’ players like never before. Helping them to excel even more. Calibrating their transfer values more meticulously.
- Also in gaming, in music and entertainment, in health & longevity AI is rewriting the rulebook.
What’s the most powerful AI-driven customer insight tool you’ve seen? Tell me/us: carl@scienceofthetime.com
3. The digital loyalty loop: the new brand battle field
In last-century’s television age TVs educated us what brands to like, to trust, to buy. After the actual selling often followed long-time radio silence. No manufacturer precisely knew with how much appreciation and satisfaction, or the opposite, its goods and services were consumed. That’s over now. Partly due to the monitoring revolution (above). Partly because people online start to celebrate, evaluate, criticize what they consume. From restaurants to diapers. From detergents to K-pop. They do so within the Digital Loyalty Loop. That’s where you must position yourself. That’s where you must craft and place your stories.
What’s the most brilliant AI-powered brand story you’ve seen? One that creates real customer connection? Share it with me/us: carl@scienceofthetime.com
4. The principles of gaming: why AI must be playful
Why are video games so irresistible seductive? Because real life can be a lot more boring. Gaming represents an easy-accessible recipe against everyday life’s dreariness. Author Jane McGonigal: ‘Games make life bearable. Games give a starving population a feeling of power in a powerless situation, a sense of structure in a chaotic environment.” This might sound over-the-top, but it invites us to analyze what makes gaming so seductive and involving. And how we can use that.
Two leading principles are at work. Games keep you going because they offer you step-by-step challenges that lets you win enough – and timely – to get you enduringly involved. There might be frustrating moments, but never that long for you to give up. That’s flow. At the same time, overcoming successfully all the incremental challenges, makes you feel on top of your game, a conquering winner. That’s fiero – Italian for proud, noble, fierce.
Best examples in my presentation: Candy Crush, Strava, Duolingo.
What are your best examples of the principles of gaming revolutionizing involvement? carl@scienceofthetime.com
5. A little bit (more) of that human touch
I use booking.com regularly. As an experienced traveler, I nowadays prefer visiting second-tier destinations instead of the most famous one. Valencia instead of Barcelona. Leipzig instead of Berlin. I’ve booked both Valencia and Leipzig. Since then, I am bombarded with new offerings for these cities. Booking’s AI’s doesn’t understand what I desire: Orleans instead of Paris, Oxford instead of London. Instead they spam me with the second-tier cities I already visited.
Booking – but Airbnb as well – ask me repeatedly about my experiences with them. In both cases I once took the trouble to communicate a minor misunderstanding and asked for some changes. In both cases they responded that my remarks were dear to them to improve their services. The rest was silence.
I still use them. But the relationship is purely transactional. There’s no emotional bonding with these ‘brands’. There’s no love lost between us. No understanding. No human touch. No EQ. Only instrumental tech. Consequence: No Brand Love. Just instrumental use.
How to do better? What (emotional) stories brands that radiate ‘tech’ can & must tell? What are your best examples – and practices? carl@scienceofthetime.com
6. Hunting for future iconic AI examples
Here is one Iconic Future AI Example, known and admired already, but still ticking all the boxes of future growth potential.
Nike+ incorporates sensor technologies embedded in running shoes and wearable devices, that connect with the web, apps for tablets and smart phones – plus training programs, and social networks. In addition to tracking running routes and times, Nike+ provides motivational feedback and links users to communities and friends, and even to coaches and personalized programs. Nike+ also monitors progress. They can tell a aspiring first-time half-marathon runner from a seasoned runner rebounding from an injury, from a first-time young mum aiming to get in shape again. People are rewarded for good performances. They can post their accomplishments, compare them with other from the Nike+ community – even learn from them. In the meanwhile Nike+ can predict when your shoes are getting worn out, sending you a personalized offer.
Nike+: the perfect blend of tech, personalization, and human connection. There are more exciting examples. In my presentation I will talk about Eatlove.is and on PillarWellbeing.
What do you predict will be the next iconic AI innovation? What holds you from becoming one yourself. Let me know: carl@scienceofthetime.com
I’m looking forward to your insights!
Geïnteresseerd in wat Prof. Dr. Carl Rohde vertelt op MIE’25, meld je dan nu aan!
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