In the future (avoiding trends) and how to write about it

when writing about or thinking about the future start by writing these words ‘in the future’ or maybe ‘Wouldn’t it be cool, if in the future’.

Remember back at school doing free writing or projects on people in space. Teachers would always get you to write about the future and using the phrase ‘in the future’ sets you directly to writing about that.

So thinking about the future is not about tomorrow, next month or next year. The future is a bit further away. Like 5 years or 15 or 20.

Writing about the future as it will be next year is alot easier – thats what trendsetters are doing. Watching what’s happening today, not looking at whats going to hapen in 15 or 20 years is the difference between a trend and the future.

Aging music lovers what happens when we are 80?

In a few years time, many of us will want to retire … what’s going to happen to us and our communities we live in if suddenly todays 20 and 30 somethings are 80? What music or digital entertainment will there be? Remembering also that as we start ‘age’ we will have to work later in life beyond today’s retirement age.

If, the aging population is bigger than the younger generation – does that mean nightclubs, discos and places like Ibiza will become the place for the 70+ age group? At what point will content like music, film and even mash-up user generated content have to retune to support either the stay at home ‘clubbers’ or OAP (old age pensioners) clubbers?

Today’s 30+ set are starting to appreciate that if old rockers like the Stones are still on the stage – what will it be like for us to be 60 and going to see Depeche Mode, U2 or artists like Bjork and Portishead. Will we all need to exist in a silent disco with the volume down low to not affect our ears?

What does that mean for the clubs, their management and the artists?

15 minute guide to Virtualbox Windows 7 RC1 and your Mac

So this follows an earlier post of mine about Virtualbox and running Windows XP on a Macbook Pro. Virtualbox is a great piece of software for running virtual operating systems on another machine (like runing Windows 7 on a Mac OSX).

Today’s guide shows that you can be up n running with Windows 7 RC in about 15 minutes … thats got to be good ??

So Grab your Windows 7 RC1 ISO file from the Windows website, grab a copy of Virtualbox for Mac and get going. Please keep your Microsoft Windows 7 product key handy.

• Virtualbox – Setup a new Windows 7 Guest OS

The latest version of Virtualbox already has an option for Windows 7 so just select this.

Set your RAM to at least 1GB as recommended by Windows

You can use an existing Windows Virtualdrive if you wanted (as an upgrade) but I prefer to create a new one

Then go to your Settings and mount the Windows 7 ISO file which is what you want to start when you ‘turn on’ your virtual PC.

Now just run that Virtualbox Windows 7 guest and it will start the installation process.

• Configuring the Windows 7 and Virtualbox Guest Additions

Guest Additions is the nice little Virtualbox package that allows seamless inter-operability between Windows Guest and the Mac OS for the Mouse and also for cut n paste for text.

But when you are setting up Windows 7 guest in the mac osx, you will need your Product Key that Microsoft gave you … and you can’t cut n paste it …

The latest version of Virtualbox fixes issues in previous releases where the internet wouldn’t work if you were using a Macbook .. nice one thanks

also in the latest version, the Virtualbox Guest Addtions are back in the menu .. so once Windows 7 is running go to Devices menu > Install Guest Additions

So that’s it … you’re now setup with a Windows 7 guest with a Mac OSX host using Virtualbox … go enjoy those new Windows things

see also … how to setup Winxp guest on mac osx