From Little Big Planet to a Smart Planet

As you know we don’t usually do press releases or “official” stuff here on eightbar, but the very recent words from Sam Palmisano around the drive for a Smart Planet do fit in rather well with what we have been doing over the past years.
Firstly Smart Planet is not directly named after our very own Rob Smart, but just as Second Life surnames act to aid serendipity we should not ignore that link.
Secondly, this is not really related to Little Big Planet as such, but there are parallels that can be drawn.
However the main drive behind the Smart Planet is around these three themes.

First, our world is becoming instrumented
I often talk about things being instrumented, but this fits in with the approach we took to Wimbledon in SL(first blogged in 2006), an instrumented world re-envisioned and experienced. It fits with Andy SC and DCJ’s work with sensors, actuators, current cost meters etc. It was the core of my business process management pitch at VW London. If we have the data, openspimes, facts, figures, messages then we can do a whole lot with it.

Second, our world is becoming interconnected
Well…. if you are reading this blog you know this is the case. This is not just about the data but about the people. Web2.0 and virtual worlds have connected us all in incredible ways, formed new tribes of interest, brought eightbar into existence. Being able to create and share across company and cultural boundaries, breaking geography, all fit into this from what I can see. This is where Little Big Planet fits too, even Sony dipping their toe into the great creative power of user created content.

Third, all things are becoming intelligent
This is the extra leap, but we can apply compute power to vast amounts of data as a service. We can also apply human power, the wisdom of crowds. Things are not isolated units of processing. We can gather insight and points to innovate on with more simulations and visualizations at a global level.

So bring on augmented reality, transparent sharing across interested groups, remote rich interaction between people and information at distance and new ways to determine what is happening in the real world.

So to finally quote Sam Palmisano “But I think one thing is clear: The world will continue to become smaller, flatter… and smarter. We are moving into the age of the globally integrated and intelligent economy, society and planet. The question is, what will we do with that?”

Tell me that does not fit in with all the drivers of virtual worlds that we and our fellow tribe members inside and outside of eightbar have been pushing?

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