Last week in Davos, Switzerland a Hong Kong-based non-profit group called Crossroads Foundation, Ltd, created a role-play exercise for some of the world’s leading CEOs and government officials in which participants played the roles of refugees. At a global conference usually known for glitz and excess, it’s interesting to read about the one hour simulation that was held in a large concrete basement near the main conference center to build empathy in these leaders.

The basement was turned into a refugee camp with barbed wire, canvas tents, armed militia and a soundtrack of nearby explosions and crying children. Participants were put into total darkness and shoved around by the "militia." Feedback from the participants was positive, although some human rights pundits did think the exercise was gratuitous and in poor taste. We applaud the sponsors for creating a simulation – albeit temporary and small – that creates even the slightest bit of empathy toward the issues involved with refugee displacement.

In today’s Wall Street Journal, there was an article entitled, "Job Loss in the Age of Blogs and Twitter" in which they reported that Internet gambling, gaming and social network sites have all grown at the same time people are losing their jobs. Beyond job searches, the Web is "performing another important role: a social anesthesia that distracts people from the stress of unemployment." Some facts pointed out in the article:

• The number of visitors to online game sites jumped 29.9% during the fourth quarter of last year, compared with a 0.3% decline during the same period the prior year, according to comScore Inc.
• Traffic on Internet gambling sites soared 28.6% over the holiday quarter, compared with a 26.9% decline over the holiday season the previous year, comScore says.
• Last week, the online movie rental service Netflix Inc. said its number of subscribers grew 26% over the holidays to 9.4 million, compared with 18% in the same period the year before.

For some, this is a period to sulk and get lost in online Soduko. For others, it is a time to seize opportunities. This applies to both individuals and corporations alike.

Kevin Kelly has a great post on his blog, "The Technium" with thought-provoking notions about ownership, renting, and borrowing as they relate to both goods and services in both the physical world and online. Here is a great quote:

“The downside to the traditional rental business is the “rival” nature of physical goods. Rival means that there is a zero-sum game; only one rival prevails. If I am renting your boat, no one else can. If I rent a bag to you, I cannot rent the same bag to another. To scale your rental business you have to buy more boats or bags. But of course, intangible goods and services don’t work this way. They are “non-rival” which means you can rent the same movie to as many people who want to rent it this hour. Sharing intangibles scales magnificently. This ability to share on a large scale without diminishing the satisfaction of the individual renter is transformative. The total cost of use drops precipitously (shared by millions instead of one). Suddenly, ownership is not so important. Why own, when you get the same utility from renting, leasing, licensing, sharing?”

These notions bring into focus some innovative ideas for designing new services.

Kevin is a terrific writer, and a very smart guy with great insights on a wide array of topics. I also highly recommend his "Cool Tools " weekly email with tips on all sorts of things (bits and bytes) to make life easier or more interesting. You can subscribe here .

So where do you think all this financial mess is headed? These are traumatic times because people are losing their jobs and companies are going under and money is being lost. But these are also very exciting times because of out of this chaos will arise new business opportunities.

How do they arise? By accident? Yes, some lucky folks will be in the right place at the right time. But those who have a framework in which to think about these changes – people and firms who can understand how the tetonic plates of technology, globalization, culture, business, government, etc. all move and shift – have a significant advantage over those that don’t. Some very enlightened people think this way intuitively. For others, service design provides a framework in which to understand their business as it is today, but more importantly – how it could be in the future.