The 13-foot-long three-seater’s interior and exterior are blank slates for whatever visuals you would like to wirelessly paint onto them in real time. And if you get too confused, there’s a holographic “navigation concierge” lady with a cute little hat to accompany you, guiding you around the vehicle’s futuristic features. She also helps you find your way from one place to another, which is probably effortless considering that the vehicle is networked with all the other cars on the road and drives itself.

Sorry if that's harsh, but I'm with John Gruber: These spit-polished masterpieces of magical thinking are the tech-elite version of LOLcat videos. They make you feel warm and fuzzy for a minute or two and...that's about it. As Gruber scathingly puts it, "We've seen Minority Report already. Imagine if [Microsoft] instead spent the effort that went into this movie on making something, you know, real, that you could actually go out and buy and use today."

Carnegie Mellon University Professor, Jesse Schell, dives into a world of game development which will emerge from the popular "Facebook Games" era.

If you haven’t heard (it’s not for lack of me trying), I’m moving my family to London for 2 years. As part of the transition I bought all of my kids tablets that they could hold all of their music and books on and that they could also access email, skype and their own blogs. It has been an interesting experience, especially since my kids are all at such interesting ages.

When I was growing up I moved around a fair amount early in life and even a move across town meant that I wouldn’t see my friends anymore. Especially if you were grade school age, you just didn’t use the phone much and unless your parents were friends with their parents, cross-town “play dates” just didn’t happen.

But now, moving my kids to another country isn’t that big of a deal. Like I said they all have email, blogs and Skype, as do most of their friends.

Dr Richard A. Bartle, Senior Lecturer and Visiting Professor of Computer Game Design at the University of Essex, UK is often quoted by, well pretty much anyone involved with gamification... And I'm just about to disagree with him. I just read Will Gamification be Ubiquitous in 5 Years? on Gametuned, and although I believe Dr. Bartle makes a few good points, he's missing some important new developments. Either that, or his and my definition of gamification just don't agree.

Games perpetually revolutionize computer use toward denser interaction with the human mind. To do that, they perpetually revolutionize themselves. Understanding the next frontiers of the genre is one way to understand where society is going.

In this talk Jesse Schell explores the social, cognitive, and technological trends in computer game design and use.

Jesse Schell is the CEO of Schell Games, the author of the authoritative text, The Art of Game Design: a book of lenses, and a Professor of Entertainment Technology at Carnegie Mellon, specializing in Game Design. At Walt Disney, he was Creative Director of the Imagineering VR Studio.

Our recently launch Map of the Decade triptych comprised three parts: the Map of the Decade, details on the ExaTrends of the Decade, and the 11 themes of the Zeitgeist for 2011. I think may have been a mistake to put the Map of the Decade and Zeitgeist themes in the one document, as many only see the front page and don't get to the Zeitgeist themes, and they come from quite different perspectives (1 year as against 10 years). As such, I've taken out the Zeitgeist themes here, with the image and full text below. Click on the image to download the complete pdf - go to page 3 for descriptions of the Zeitgeist themes.