I help organisations become future-fit. #Mindcandy scenario prompts are part of that. They are designed to stretch your imagination, sharpen situational awareness, and spark opportunity thinking. Find out more here.
Scenario Prompt – 1 October 2025
Abundant labour and its impact on your future business models. When the marginal cost of labour approaches zero, when every human can access comprehensive expertise instantly, and when there is no financial difference between premium versus mediocre quality of goods and services, then true material equality will become possible for the first time in human history
Other prompts to expand your lens today are:
- You are the upgrade (lessons from 25 books about AI)
- 2276 as a time horizon
- Building an enduring company
- Spin-offs
- Decentralized organizations (DAOs)
- Voice cloning
- Grief bots
- Boosting innovation with an idea market place
- Genetically engineering an embryo from skin cells
You are the upgrade
https://www.ronimmink.com/product/a-book-about-books-about-ai/
Data, acceleration, and the future of intelligence: Lessons from 25 core books (and links to 114 other books) about AI, technology abstraction, and consciousness.
2276 / The +250 Exercise
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/2276-250-exercise-john-reaves-alcxe/
+250 is an exercise in mid-term futures, as these things go. It’s not +5 to +50 years, where most practical scenario builders live. And it’s not +1,000 to +10,000 years, where the deep long thinkers go, imagining the rise and fall of civilizations. +250 is on the same scale as the average lifespan of a successful dynasty, or the typical lifecycle of a technological ecosystem (like steam engines). It’s what might be called historical time.
Costco’s Jim Sinegal on Building a Company That Will Endure
https://hbr.org/2025/09/costcos-jim-sinegal-on-building-a-company-that-will-endure
Sinegal and his cofounder, Jeffrey Brotman, didn’t set out to be the biggest retailer; they set out to be the best
Why the AI “megasystem problem” needs our attention
https://bigthink.com/the-long-game/why-the-ai-megasystem-problem-needs-our-attention/
The real AI risk isn’t one system going rogue — it’s a web of systems colluding in ways we don’t anticipate. In some respects, AI feels like Facebook all over again: connection promised, disconnection delivered.
The business of break-ups: do spin-offs pay off?
https://www.raconteur.net/finance/the-business-of-break-ups-do-spin-offs-pay-off
Breaking up is never easy. For businesses, decoupling may help to unlock trapped value and reset strategic direction, but the process is precarious. It requires rigour, foresight and vision
Intro to DAOs: Deep dive into decentralized organizations
https://www.cryptopolitan.com/daos-decentralized-organizations-deep-dive/
Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs) represent one of blockchain technology’s most revolutionary applications, fundamentally reshaping how communities organize, govern, and collaborate in the digital age.
People Can’t Distinguish AI Voice Clones From Actual Humans Anymore
Researchers created extremely realistic voice clones with just four minutes of recordings.
Ready or not, the digital afterlife is here
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-02940-w
Developers of griefbots say that they help people by allowing them to commune with recreations of the dead, but others say that the technology is fraught with danger.
New Research Shows How an “Idea Marketplace” Can Boost Innovation
https://hbr.org/2025/09/new-research-shows-how-an-idea-marketplace-can-boost-innovation
Many companies already have the ideas they need to innovate but lack effective systems to surface and connect them. Research shows most employee ideas go unreviewed, leaving major value untapped.
Human skin DNA fertilised to make embryo for first time
https://ca.news.yahoo.com/human-skin-dna-fertilised-embryo-150212169.html
US scientists have, for the first time, made early-stage human embryos by manipulating DNA taken from people’s skin cells and then fertilising it with sperm.
Living Like Kings: How Humanoid Robots Will Democratize Luxury
https://www.rethinkx.com/blog/living-like-kings-how-humanoid-robots-will-democratize-luxury
The network effect of superabundant labour
