Technology Trends – Page 3 – American Alliance of Museums

Risky Business: tackling the securing challenges of technology

By Elizabeth Merritt

Focusing on the horizon, as futurists do, can distract us so much that we risk tripping over what is right under our feet. The truth of this statement was brought home to me recently by Steve Keller, founding partner in the Architect’s …
Futurist Friday: Cloud Robots

By Elizabeth Merritt

Actually, the term is “cloud robotics” (machine-to-maching learning between robots over the web). But “cloud robots” sounds way cooler. In any case, your Futurist Friday assignment, this 5 1/2 minute video …
Futurist Friday: Securing the Future

By Elizabeth Merritt

Followers of CFM may have noticed I’m on a bit of a “creepy” streak–from blogging about how museums may start surveilling their visitors, to noting the emergence of computer viruses that can leap from machine to …
The Watchful Museum

By Elizabeth Merritt

I had the pleasure of contributing to a symposium at the National Museum of American History’s Lemelson Center last Friday. Inventing the Surveillance Society looked at the evolving balance between privacy and security in a world …
Inventing the Surveillance Society

By Elizabeth Merritt

When Eric Hintz called to ask if I would speak on a symposium about “surveillance,” I thought at first he had my number confused with the NSA. Eric is an historian with the Smithsonian’s Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and …
Museums & the IoT: Innovating With Wayfinding

By Elizabeth Merritt

In TrendsWatch 2013, Phil and I explored the implications of entering a time “When Stuff Talks Back.” The Internet of Things, as this phenomenon is also known, arises from the proliferation of internet connected devices that can collect …
TrendsWatch Update: 3-D Scanning and Printing

By Elizabeth Merritt

So much good stuff, what to highlight? 3-D printing overall continues to take off. In June, MakerBot was bought for $403M by industrial printing company Stratsys, demonstrating the industry’s belief in the exploding market for desktop …
Through a (Google) Glass, Darkly

By Elizabeth Merritt

At the Tech@LEAD conference last week, Neal Stimler let me try his Google Glass. I had been kicking myself for not applying to be an early adopter of Glass, so I was happy to draft off Neal’s successful bid, however briefly. I’ve been …
Do You Want to Live Forever?

By Elizabeth Merritt

Phil and I read far more broadly than we can travel, so when Rohit Talwar of Fast Future was kind enough to arrange a complimentary registration to the Global Futures 2045 conference in New York City earlier this month, we tapped Paul …
Futurist Friday: Robo-bees to the Rescue

By Elizabeth Merritt

This post from Scientific American paints a lovely picture of the future of disaster response. “Consider a rescue worker with a box full of 1,000 RoboBees—a package that would weigh less than a kilogram. The RoboBees could be …