Looks like some Soaps kill off more than Germs!

In my view ALL futures thinking about ‘big issues’ starts with futures thinking about personal issues. The idea that we take for granted the way our lives operate has for millennia been shown to be a high risk assumption. From the food we eat, to where we live, to products we use (and how we use them). Simply put, our assumptions about our personal safety sometimes increase the risks we face. In this chat with Vicki Kerrigan on ABC Darwin we consider the rise of the marketing driven ‘anti-bacterial’ soap phenomena. One that as it turns out, could well be killing us

 

The FDA (Food & Drug Administration) is a huge agency in the United States that oversees approvals of consumer products. One of those products approved not so long ago, is anti-bacterial soaps containing Triclosan. It turns out that the FDA’s ongoing research tags it as a signififcant health risk.

You can listen to the conversations here: Are AntiBacterial Soaps Killing You? Marcus Barber & Vicki Kerrigan 

For an additional story about the dangers of Triclosan, reads this

2013 Trends – fair or fantasy?

Dec 4, 2012

Over at The Australian Strategic Planning Institute an observation has been made about the so called Top Ten Trends for 2013 and whether, with deeper consideration, the trends suggested deserve their place as new, or emerging or whether in fact, by relying upon them you might be chasing a ship that has long since sailed.…

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Open, Closed, Free or Fare?

Dec 2, 2012

Creative Commons is an approach that attempts to ensure that information in its various forms, can be shared by others for free. That is my take on it at least. And over time we’ve seen some major organisations shape the idea of ‘free’ to ‘free with conditions’ and ‘free for a fee’. The last one…

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The Energy challenge & rising prices

Nov 21, 2012

Some topics are too big to cover in a few minutes on radio. In this brief snapshot, the ABC Darwin’s Vicki Kerrigan and I chat about energy costs, causes and the future ahead for places like Darwin   You can download the media file here: Marcus Barber Future of Energy

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Cities of the Future: a view from Perth

Nov 19, 2012

What does a City tell you of itself, by how it shows itself? There’s much to be learnt by noting the small yet ‘obvious’ signs of life in any city you visit, that reveal to a certain extent, it’s ‘true self’. I’ll mention a few cities here but will focus on my most recent visit…

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The Melbourne Cup and a Futurist’s view

Nov 4, 2012

Okay the time has come again where people ask me, as a professional futurist, for my tips for the Melbourne Cup. As always I advise them that my area of expertise does not reside with horse racing so really, I have as much chance as anyone and their own system, of selecting a winner. That…

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Make your own teeth? Should parents have a ‘licence to parent’? and more on ABC Darwin

Oct 31, 2012

ABC Darwin’s Vicki Kerrigan and I chat about the future of dentistry – is it possible to grow you own teeth? Are dentist visits going to become a thing of the past? And in the second of today’s updates, we also chatted about the Future of Parenting – is it time that you needed a…

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Time to combine Life Cycle design & penalties for environmental waste to solve a ballooning problem

Oct 21, 2012

Organisations like CleanUp Australia and Take3.org have (along with many others) taken a leading role at identifying and removing waste that has entered our environment. Their efforts are fantastic yet have one clear problem – they rely on volunteers to clean up the mess of others, after the fact – it’s a ‘playing catch-up’ strategy.…

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Selective Consumption and the Retail sector

Oct 13, 2012

The Retail sector in Australia is slowing coming to grips with the fact that for the past 50 years, they’ve had a captured market and enormous profit margins. and that now, the times have changed. Whilst many point to the internet as a cause of their woes, others are pointing out the apparent high cost…

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Strategic Agility and the Art of Paying Attention

Sep 24, 2012

he many people who’ve been through one of The Australian Strategic Planning Institute’s workshops over the past six years, will know how much emphasis is placed on the need to pay attention to things going on around you. In particular as part of the idea of tracking your progress toward your desired future (your Vision).…

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How to Build an Effective Twitter Group

Sep 18, 2012

As a Futurist I’m often asked what I think about certain social media tools (and most technology for that matter). My answer is always aligned to the thought that ‘if the technology is working for you, and not against you, it’s probably a good thing. Here then are my thoughts about building up a useful…

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