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Welcome to the Epoch Hothouse blog. What drives the agency is our curiosity about the future. Our Epoch Hothouse initiative is what drives our thinking, our approach and our ideas. It consists of events, research and an expert panel that allows us to question and challenge conventional thinking.
Posted by Nick on Mon Mar 08, 2010 9:56am
Last week I attended a Hansard Society event to mark the launch of their annual Audit of Political Engagement. The Hansard Society is a not for profit organisation concerned with promoting understanding of the role of parliament and politics. It was a good line up of speakers including the Right Honourable David Blunkett MP, Lord Rennard MBE, Shailesh Vara MP and Dr Ruth Fox from the Hansard Society.
Posted by Chris on Fri Feb 12, 2010 11:17am
It has been a big week in the work we have been doing to support the UK Industry Taskforce on Peak Oil and Energy Security. On Wednesday, at the Royal Society, the Taskforce launched their second report - ‘The Oil Crunch – a wake-up call for the UK economy’.
On Wednesday I attended a Computer Weekly 500 Club event for UK CIOs and IT leaders at the Royal Lancaster Hotel in London. A lively event looking at the challenges CIOs face in 2010. When I arrived at the hotel I was surprised to see more police officers than you would expect at a derby football game – I hadn’t taken CIOs for the rowdy type.
Net Neutrality is an issue that can sometimes bypass us in Europe and often seems like an argument being held in Washington, with a case study being played out in China. For us this debate should receive a little more airtime as the outcome will set out the fundamental governance rules of the internet.
Posted by Chris on Thu Jan 07, 2010 16:30pm
The week most people return to work after the Christmas break has been one of high drama – some real, others less so. Apocalyptic headlines scream ‘The Worst Snow in 30 Years’, ‘Frozen Britain’ and the ‘Deep Freeze’. However, yesterday’s developments at Westminster saw confused broadcasters battling with which story to lead on: Frozen Britain or the attempted coup of the Prime Minister?
Posted by Nick on Tue Dec 08, 2009 17:16pm
The decision by Google to restrict access to content through its Google News service is a landmark moment.
Posted by Chris on Mon Dec 07, 2009 18:33pm
With the Copenhagen Summit on Climate Change opening today, there was a stark warning from the Danish Climate Minister, Connie Hedegaard, that the political will ‘will never be stronger’.
I think this is a correct analysis.
With the prospects of a global economy growing much slower than we’ve been used to and with increased public questioning of the science behind climate change it is vital that governments maximise the opportunities presented at Copenhagen. If they don’t, it may well be too late – not just for the planet but politically.
Posted by Chris on Thu Dec 03, 2009 17:39pm
This morning, we launched our Hothouse Foresight 2010 research with a breakfast salon at the Royal Society of Arts, London.
We had a prestigious line-up of speakers including Adam Boulton, political editor, Sky News; Paul Mason, economics editor, BBC Newsnight; Bronwen Maddox, chief correspondent, The Times; and Professor James Woudhuysen. Speakers shared their perspectives on the issues and trends likely to shape the coming twelve months and beyond.
Last week, our client the London Sustainable Development Commission hosted an event together with the Centre for Sustainable Fashion (of the London College of Fashion). It was an event at City Hall to announce the winners of a major international student competition, called ‘Fashioning the Future’. The Epoch team was there in force, meeting both the students and speakers to discuss with them the importance of sustainability in fashion. The aim of the competition was to present fashion opportunities for the future, bringing together creative new minds and fresh talent, which it certainly did. The awards proved thought provoking and inspirational, as students received prizes for their innovative designs, which aim to reduce waste and encourage ingenuity in the fashion industry. Speakers included the Centre for Sustainable Fashion Ambassador Jo Wood (yes we met her, and yes she was lovely!) and BBC 1 One Show presenter Lucy Siegel.
Posted by Chris on Thu Nov 26, 2009 15:39pm
Yesterday, I took part in a lively debate at the Future Democracy 2009 event on the net’s role in boosting transparency in light of the MPs’ expenses scandal. Heather Brooke, the campaigner and journalist responsible for forcing Parliament to disclose MPs’ expenses under the Freedom of Information Act, and James Crabtree, managing editor of Prospect, were both on the panel. With the parliamentary expenses scandal at the heart of the discussion, we examined the issue of transparency, and whether or not ‘naked transparency’, as Professor Lessig refers to it, is a good thing for democracy and the functioning of government.
Posted by Chris on Wed Nov 18, 2009 0:36am
This week we held a future-gazing session in Soho. In addition to our Hothouse expert panel, we welcomed Gary Duncan, economics editor at The Times, as a guest contributor.
It was a broad ranging session. In four short hours, we debated the future of democracy, energy innovation, macroeconomics, global communities and the fusion of nanotech, biotech and artificial intelligence.
Posted by Amanda on Mon Oct 26, 2009 16:48pm
Never wanting to miss the opportunity for a party, we held a lunch to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Internet. Guest speakers were David Rowan, editor of Wired UK and Nico Macdonald, the creator of the Internet Development Map. The idea was to discuss how the internet has evolved and what we can learn from this about the nature of innovation and also look forward to what might be coming.
Posted by Helen on Wed Sep 23, 2009 13:41pm
Yesterday we launched our latest report, The New Business Psyche, at a breakfast salon to discuss whether greed and risk could ever be anything but negative attributes in the business world. And after months of preparation, we also announced the rebirth of our agency as Epoch – a new and improved evolution of the precocious five-year-old Clarke Mulder Purdie.
Posted by Chris on Wed Sep 23, 2009 13:47pm
The New Business Psyche report provides a snapshot of the attitudes and cultural factors likely to shape the new economic era. The report focuses discussion on several key areas: bad business behaviour; a new era of regulation; the risk-aversion culture and the business people of tomorrow. It also includes an illustrative spotlight on the UK biotechnology industry which encapsulates many of the issues raised through the rest of the report.
Trust and integrity have come to the forefront of debate in the last few weeks. What is common to the MP expenses scandal, the Iranian presidential election and the elections to the European Parliament is that trust, or the lack thereof, is responsible for the difficulties.
It is clear that for political systems and democracy to function, trust needs to be present. The difficulty with this is that trust is inherently intangible, something emotional and something that cannot easily be measured.
The past six months have been dominated by discussions of the broken financial system and flawed ideologies. A crippling global recession has given rise to mass disillusionment with the fundamental principles of capitalism and called time on self-interest as acceptable motive in business conduct. The reverberations of the 2008 crash are still being felt within the real economy: in the UK, familiar high street names continue to disappear; repossessions are up 50% year-on-year, and unemployment is steadily climbing towards 3 million. In the States, just days ago, Barack Obama was forced to step in to save General Motors as it filed for bankruptcy. Talk of ‘green shoots’ is sporadic and unconvincing.
Spending 15 hours in ExCel isn’t something I would wish on anyone. However, spending 15 hours in ExCel at the London Summit of the G20 yesterday was an incredible experience.
Posted by Helen on Wed Jan 28, 2009 3:25am
The BBC is showing a number of shows on Darwin to celebrate the 150th anniversary of The Origin of the Species. The ever-brilliant David Attenborough is hosting a programme on the tree of life, and the Open University and the Guardian seem to be getting in on the act with poster giveaways of the mighty tree itself.
Posted by Helen on Mon Jul 14, 2008 3:01am
A couple of weeks ago the second seminar in the 2008 Hothouse series, hosted by spiked, took place at RIBA. The subject discussed was ‘Nuclear Power: What’s The Alternative?’