The word escapism has become more and more relevant in our foresight studies. Escapism tells us about how people increasingly escape from the real world. It could be through any media; books, films, role plays… and new technologies enable us to hide faster and deeper. Gaming has become a dominant part of life for many youngsters and so has gambling, pornography and drugs for others. In a troublesome world we hide from what hurts and seek instant satisfaction. As the speed of change increases, adversity becomes more frequent. And the speed of change increases exponentially. Publishing companies adjust their products to it. People want entertainment, reality shows, action, virtual worlds and so forth.

As counter forces we observe more focus on “the meaning of life”, mindfullness, presence, simple living, yoga etc.

Schibsted is a Scandinavian media group that aims to become the most attractive media company in Europe. They have around 9 000 employees and operations in 22 countries. Currently they have a presence in the newspaper, TV, film, online, mobile-phone, book and magazine media. The turnover in 2007 was NOK 13.6 billion.

The newspaper industry has experienced a dramatic return in revenue lately. The question often asked is; is there room for newspapers in the future, or are we moving into a new area with new digital medias only?

Together with ECON Pöyry, we were hired to facilitate a scenario process for the Next Generation Newspaper project. A large number of top level managers in Norway and Sweden were interviewed to extract the common knowledge of the group. Thereafter we facilitated scenario workshops in both Oslo and Stockholm in order to structure the information and create future scenarios.

Akershus Fylkeskommune assignes Foresight Norge AS to facilitate a foresight process exploring the future of the Akershus region and the Capital city towards 2050. Eirikur Ingolfsson and Helge Hasvold will run the project.