Welcome to the Future of Making! We are on the verge of a transformation of how products are designed, manufactured, and distributed. The entire supply chain is undergoing reinvention and the impact will be felt not only by manufacturers but also by individuals, households, communities, even entire regions. Driven by the need to innovate faster than ever before, green aspirations, and a quest for authenticity, new paradigms for “making things” are emerging.

Two future forces, one mostly social, one mostly technological, are intersecting to transform how goods, services, and experiences—the “stuff” of our world—will be designed, manufactured, and distributed over the next decade. An emerging do-it-yourself culture of “makers” is boldly voiding warranties to tweak, hack, and customize the products they buy. And what they can’t purchase, they build from scratch. Meanwhile, flexible manufacturing technologies on the horizon will change fabrication from massive and centralized to lightweight and ad hoc.

The 2008 Ten-Year Forecast Annual Retreat, "The Future is a New View of Life," took place in San Francisco, CA on April 9 & 10. Materials from this meeting are available for download to TYF members, including:

2008 TYF Map of the Decade (SR-1142)

The future is everything we can imagine: the fearsome, the inspiring, the inexplicable, the essential. 40 years ago, our founders imagined a world in which it would be possible to improve human lives and build better institutions by thinking systematically about the future. Today, we call this practice "Foresight to Insight to Action."

This map is a dynamic work-in-progress, and will likely change throughout the year. Stay tuned for updates.

The Health Horizons Studio Project, The Future of Foodscapes, maps the trends and drivers that will configure the global food landscape over the next decade.

If you are already a Foodscapes member, please visit our dedicated wiki to access materials from the November 7, 2007, workshop. For assistance, please contact Jeannie Swanson, Programs Administrator.

Our Fall 2007 Conference focused on the application of open innovation principles in the global health economy. The event kicked off with a keynote address by Alph Bingham, founder of Innocentive. IFTF's Jody Ranck introduced the concept of "Open Health," and presented an overview of our Open Health Map of Disruptive Innovation. Crystal Lynn Keeler and Cesar Castro gave us a sneak peek at the Open Health Toolkit.

The Biocitizens and New Media Technology conference explored the convergence of trends around new media, health, and biocitizenship. After the conference, we launched a new Web site (http://biocitizennewmedia.org) to demonstrate the participatory nature of new media. The Web site sought to encourage interactive communication with our clients around the potential implications of engaged biocitizens equipped with new media tools.

The Health Horizons Spring 2007 Conference examined the emergence of biocitizens and the role of new media technologies. The PowerPoint presentations are available above, along with the graphic recording wall charts and the agenda booklet.

The Chinese-language Internet is part of the transformation of contemporary China and the emergence of China as a world power in the 21st century. As it has been in other places, the Chinese-language Internet is a platform for new kinds of connection, collectivity, and expression.

The Health Horizons Spring 2007 Conference opened with a pre-conference workshop on the future of games & gaming in health. Panelists included Pat Christensen from HopeLab, Ian Bogost, and Jane McConigal. The workshop also featured an immersive gaming experience, lead by IFTF's Jason Tester and Jane McConigal.