The major question Top7 host cities have before I set out to visit them is what I want to know. There is some anxiety on their part because they want to make sure that they do well in Columbus on June 16, but also because they want to show off their cities. There are also several people involved and a lot of coordination and, I’m sure, cost involved with a Top7 Site Visit. So I am sensitive to this and try to be a good guest and not make people feel like the Grand Inquisitor and Inspector General has rolled into town.

PART 2: With smart infrastructure, smart people and smart money, an innovation ecosystem is never too far behind.

As we see the emergence of the Internet of Things in the short years ahead we will become even more used to changes in how we will expect things to work and how differently we will want to do things. Resistance to change has been the usual excuse for communities and people, in general, in the past to accept new ways of doing things, but as our urban areas increase their populations and it becomes more difficult to be mobile; to be able to do the things that we may have done previously and we will now have to share it with more people waiting to have access to it, there will be less resistance to change. Perhaps even pent-up demand will be experienced for things that people see in other communities and expect will or should be available to them in short order.

PART 1: Disruption - to transformation - to evolution: the circle of life continues.

As I move through my day, I am constantly disrupted in my normal ways of doing things to the point where I am no longer disrupted but maybe only annoyed that what I am now doing on a regular basis is the new normal. Then I become resigned to this fact and don’t expect to ever go back to what I had been doing years before. I begin to see the advantages of what I am doing today and would never wish to go back to what I had been doing. I even advocate the fact that this new thing is so much better and encourage others to do the same. As society accepts these acts by me and others, they become normalized and the disruption is no longer ever thought of as a disruption. Besides a new disruption has already taken its place.

Today, the 50 most prosperous cities in America produce 34% more economic output per person than the national average. Their populations are growing at 3 times the national rate. That’s because they are magnets for ambitious and talented workers and the companies that need their services to power growth.

“Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?” King Henry II of England allegedly said nearly 1,000 years ago, referring to a saintly man who had crashed into his majesty’s sense of imperial inevitability. Given the tone of today’s national politics and the rage palpable in cultures everywhere, the angry King’s words echo through the centuries, and may be repeated in 2017 by at least one leader anywhere on the planet.

Congratulations to the Intelligent Community of Vancouver! The GLOBE Leadership Summit in Vancouver from March 2-4 was an exceptional experience. Nearly two thousand business and government leaders from over 50 countries came together to network and advance global business and sustainability agendas in Vancouver. 200 thought leaders from around the world focused on issues regarding sustainability, urban resiliency and all things related to the future of the planet.

Six US Senators, mostly from small rural states, wrote recently to the FCC about the inconsistencies they found between its recent report on broadband progress and its Open Internet order that was issued last March.

The best acts of defiance are made in pursuit of a greater good. History is complete with tales of passive resistance, armed rebellions and legends of a person or group of dedicated souls who refuse to sell-out, cave-in or toss-down the towel, no matter how overwhelming the forces stacked against them or the depth of corruption from a perverse civil order. You and I honor the private inspirations in our lives who get us out of bed and roll us forward, somehow putting in us a deeper psychic mark and recalibrated moral settings. Those whose actions are given the stamp of the “heroic” or “visionary” after their time of persistence are seen to have been clearly on the right side of the cause, while most could only see through the glass darkly. They are, in the words of my father, not deliberate and intentional provocateurs, but people who simply “stuck by their guns.” At ICF we have 145 of them.

Get ready for the next industrial revolution. Change is inevitable. Get over it! And in today’s world, it will happen quickly. The drivers for it are not only structural, political, scientific and economic, but also cultural and social. They are manifested through such things as products and services, platforms and processes, as well as how people, governments and organizations are willing to accept and work with them. On the horizon is a phenomenon that is already changing the way we live. Billions of machine–to-machine (M2M) connections are actively connecting devices and applications that people use everyday such as Amazon’s Echo, Google’s Nest, or Apple’s HomeKit. On the Smart City scene are digital programs ranging from water and air quality sensors to sensor-enabled trash collection, using data to improve efficiency, reduce costs and make better use of our limited resources. The Internet of Things (IoT), which includes M2M connections and sensor-enabled environmental data generators, will probably be one of the most revolutionary impacts on our communities and on our lives since the broad-scale adoption of the Internet. While over 15 billion devices are already connected with one another today including computers with mobile devices, medical and environmental sensors, and industrial and commercial machines, 85% of these devices and other things are still unconnected. It is expected that 50 billion devices and applications will be connected by 2020. The growing adoption of IoT is driving businesses of all makes and sizes to bring about changes in the way they do business, service customers, attract and retain talented workforce and deal with supply chains.

The multi-billion-dollar circus that is the American Presidential election rolls ever on. We stand amazed that a billionaire real estate developer and reality TV star, spewing a sneering mix of lies and vitriol, dominates the Republican side of the contest. He is less a Presidential candidate than a walking Twitter account, with a gift for finding words and attitudes that speak powerfully to a segment of the American people.