What is Big Think?  

We are Big Idea Hunters…

We live in a time of information abundance, which far too many of us see as information overload. With the sum total of human knowledge, past and present, at our fingertips, we’re faced with a crisis of attention: which ideas should we engage with, and why? Big Think is an evolving roadmap to the best thinking on the planet — the ideas that can help you think flexibly and act decisively in a multivariate world.

A word about Big Ideas and Themes — The architecture of Big Think

Big ideas are lenses for envisioning the future. Every article and video on bigthink.com and on our learning platforms is based on an emerging “big idea” that is significant, widely relevant, and actionable. We’re sifting the noise for the questions and insights that have the power to change all of our lives, for decades to come. For example, reverse-engineering is a big idea in that the concept is increasingly useful across multiple disciplines, from education to nanotechnology.

Themes are the seven broad umbrellas under which we organize the hundreds of big ideas that populate Big Think. They include New World Order, Earth and Beyond, 21st Century Living, Going Mental, Extreme Biology, Power and Influence, and Inventing the Future.

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Big Think’s contributors offer expert analysis of the big ideas behind the news.

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Cue the Future Posts

Technology and marketing in the world of tomorrow

Cue the Future

Keynote Fever: Jobs and Zuck Look-a-likes

Zuckdawg-5218949
over 1 year ago

At this year's F8, Mark Zuckerberg's keynote was opened by Andy Samberg doing a 5 minute impersonation of Zuck (or, as Samberg began calling his character, "The Zuck Dawg").   Turns out there's another funny example of a tech CEO opening with a look-a-like. In 1999, Steve Jobs invited Noah ...

Cue the Future

Remembering Steve Jobs

Steve_jobs3
over 1 year ago

Mourn for a day. Think Different for the rest of your life. That's the only thing I can think of. I'm still speechless at the news that Steve Jobs has passed away, but that one idea keeps returning to me. Mourn for a day. Think Different for the rest of your life. (Click to tweet) That's ...

Cue the Future

Using Power as a Founder

Airbnb
over 1 year ago

Over the past few days a "scandal" has emerged from a leaked email regarding AirBnB's new round of financing.  Potential investor Chamath Palihapitiya (former head of growth at Facebook and now increasingly prolific investor), penned an email detailing his reasons for passing on the deal ...

Cue the Future

User Acquisition

Sparkline_overview_-_duarte
over 1 year ago

(The image to the left is from a Nancy Duarte presentation on the emotional path people travel down during great presentations) I was having drinks last evening with a startup that had a very innovative model, but was facing a familiar problem - user acquisition.  They wanted to engage users ...

Cue the Future

My formula for simple blogging

Dashboard_-_google_analytics
almost 2 years ago

When I first started blogging on BigThink, I compiled a list of people who I admired. I wanted to use those folks as a north star as I was trying to figure out how I should blog to a group of people who weren't just reading my personal blog (which despite all traffic numbers, in my head was ...

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Hiring at Involver

Involver
almost 2 years ago

We just opened up a positioning on the Involver Marketing team, I've loved developing relationships with you all as readers - and I think some of you might be a great fit for our team.So you know: I won't post about jobs often, but when I think there's one that particularly might make a good fit, I ...

Cue the Future

Lobbbying as a Marketing Activity

24ymhzl
almost 2 years ago

This weekend I flew to lovely Pasco, WA to officiate a friend's wedding -- it was an amazing event and was truly enjoyable. On my way back, I had an idea for Amazon's marketing team that I wanted to share with you all. I own the Amazon Kindle, and absolutely love it for travel. It's a fantastic ...

Cue the Future

What Markets are Being Disrupted by Groupon?

230px-groupon_logo
almost 2 years ago

In researching Groupon's IPO for the earlier post, I tried to think about which markets are being affected by Groupon. The biggest is almost certainly Yellow Pages ($26Bn worldwide) -- but there's also Online Local Advertising ($10Bn and growing) and Coupon Books (probably much smaller?). Are ...

Cue the Future

Why would Groupon IPO?

Groupon
almost 2 years ago

A lot of people are trying to figure out why Groupon would go public now, before their revenues/profits are a bit more derisked. Going public now allows Groupon to establish dominance against their competitors. They can show that they are the most mature and encourage a perception from the ...