DEMOS

• Facing the music There’s another interesting record industry story around today – Radiohead are allowing their fans to download their latest album and decide for themselves what price they want to play. I’m not sure what we’ll learn from it, but it will be interesting to see where this one goes. As the musings of the BBC’s entertainment reporter show, though, this all plays into a bigger set of questions about the role of record labels in the future of the industry. continue reading Posted by Duncan O'Leary on 10th October 2007
• The Future is Disruptive The Disrupters, a Demos-Nesta publication by Molly Webb, Rebecca Willis and James Wilsdon, is the focus of this months Green Futures magazine cover story. You can download the article here:The Future is Disruptive.pdf continue reading Posted by Molly Webb on 9th October 2007
• Death tax or life tax? One of the more interesting Political developments of the last week – the non-election aside – has been the silence on the Left about the moral case for inheritance tax after George Osborne’s passionate (and popular) argument for raising the threshold to £1 million. Rather than engage with the principles behind the Tories’ argument, most of the attacks on the policy have been on technical grounds – whether the sums add up or not – not whether the principle is fair. continue reading Posted by Duncan O'Leary on 8th October 2007
• The hair and the home office Being pretty geeky, it pleases me when stories that you might assume are a bit tecchie make headline news. So I was delighted to see the BBC all over a story about identity theft, based on an impending report from the All-party Group on Identity Fraud. Unsurprisingly, and understandably, it has made the news because it is about some potentially serious threats stemming from some very popular behaviour and activities - specifically social networking... continue reading Posted by Peter Bradwell on 6th October 2007 in For Your Information
• Demos Podcast: Seen and Heard Some people will tell you that "hoodies" are just another example of a youth cult scaring adults. For hoodie we might as well just read Teddy Boy, Rude Boy, Mod, Rocker, Skin-head, Casual and so on... But rather than being a specific style or cult, the hoody is an item of clothing worn by most children and mostly by children. It's not the visibility of a youth cult in public space that scares people - it's youth culture itself. This is fundamentally changing public space. 71% of... continue reading 5th October 2007 in Demos Podcasts
• A workshop on Free and Open Source Software The free and open source software debate has for the last decade or so seen a fascinating place to observe the politics of technology. It has been a forum for experimentation and empowerment, and has opened up some long held assumptions about ownership, research and the role of users. We're just begun a project on science and civil society, in partnership with a number of organisations across Europe. One of them is the Free Software Foundation Europe. Next month, they're coming over to London... continue reading Posted by Jack Stilgoe on 4th October 2007 in Technology and Civil Society (STACS) ,Science
• agile & government: oxymoron? Simon Parker and I have published a provocation paper with the State Services Authority in Victoria, Australia, exploring the concept ofagility and what it might mean for government. http://www.demos.co.uk/publications/agilegovernmentaprovocationpaperIn it, we examine characteristics of agile organisations and how these characteristics relate to the public sector environment. The increasing uncertainty of the future means that the public sector cannot predict many of the challenges that it... continue reading Posted by Jamie Bartlett on 3rd October 2007
• Grey Majority vs. Ipod Generation I was at Tory Conference yesterday speaking at a Fringe event organised by the Smith Institute & Reform, entitled 'Advancing Opportunity: the grey majority versus the ipod generation', looking at economic and social fairness between generations. continue reading 2nd October 2007 Comments (2)
• Pro-Poor innovation The latest issue of id21, published by our friends from the Institute of Development Studies at Sussex University, is just out. It includes an article on our nanodialogue in Zimbabwe, and another on our Atlas research on China. Plus biotech in Bangalore, social entrepreneurs in Kenya and rural innovation in Nepal - all this and more can be found here. continue reading Posted by James Wilsdon on 27th September 2007 in The Atlas of Ideas
• Skills, innovation and Ben Bradshaw So we're all back from Bournemouth and if I'm honest, most of the office looks a little bleary eyed, myself included. I've spent the last few days reading the political commentary about the conference, but being a wonk I was really interested in what it all means for policy. So here's what I learned in my three days beside the seaside... continue reading 27th September 2007 Comments (1)

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