Jeremiah Owyang:

Jeremiah: Is it true that Millennials seek access to goods and products rather than owning them?. What impacts does that have to brands who’re trying to sell to “Consumers”? What should brands do?

Dan: A lot of industries are having a lot of trouble engaging millennials. For instance, the automotive industry is in trouble because millennials aren’t buying cars. In 2010, despite being a large percentage of the population, millennials bought only 27% of all new vehicles sold in America, down from 38% in 1985. When it comes to the travel industry, millennials are using Airbnb.com and Uber in order to save money and have a unique experience, which is why both are experiencing revenue growth.

The real estate industry is hurting because millennials would rather rent than own property. From 2009 through 2011, just 9% of millennials were approved for a first-time mortgage. Fast food restaurants, especially McDonalds, are hurting because millennials are health conscious. Hamburger chains have seen a 16% decline in traffic from millennials since 2007. Companies, in general, are having a very challenging time retaining millennials and the average tenure for a millennials is only two years.

If you want to sell to millennials, you have to build a strong brand personality, connect with them on social networks, align yourself with a cause, have an open culture and include their opinions as you build new products. They want custom brand experiences that take their wants and needs into account. If you want to retain them as workers, you need to invest in their careers, mentor them, provide them with internal hiring opportunities and feed their entrepreneurial ambitions.

Steve Rousseau:

Nissan wants to put a bevy of autonomous systems into production vehicles by 2020. To catch a glimpse of the future, we take a ride-along in their semi-autonomous car.

The semi-autonomous car exists, but it hasn’t arrived, much in the same way Google Glass exists on a select few peoples’ faces but not on store shelves. Beginning with a DARPA-sponsored research contests just under a decade ago and popularized by Google’s self-driving Toyota Priuses, automotive manufacturers are quickly developing their own self-piloting systems and creating a flurry of autonomous features in various states of development and sophistication.

Just a few examples: A route-programmed Audi TTS climbed Pikes Peak in 2010. The German automaker debuted a self-parking system in the A7 earlier this year at CES. For highway driving, GM is testing Super Cruise—a system capable of lane centering and adaptive cruise control. Mercedes-Benz’s Distronic Plus With Steering Assist, available now in the S-Class, does virtually the same thing—although NHTSA regulations demand that you still need to keep your hands on the wheel at all times. Even tire manufacturer and auto parts supplier Continental is developing a system known as Emergency Steer Assist to automatically perform evasive maneuvers.

Nick Thorpe:

Later this month a team of Hungarian researchers will publish a report on the whereabouts of the heart of one of Ottoman Turkey’s most famous sultans. But why has this become such an important historical riddle to solve?

The French statesman Cardinal Richelieu described it as “the battle that saved civilisation” – the siege of the Hungarian castle of Sziget, 447 years ago, almost to the day.

The Muslim Turks finally took the town in September 1566, but sustained such losses, including the death of their leader, Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent, that they did not threaten Vienna again for 120 years.

Now researchers are digging in the soil – and the archives – for the good sultan’s heart.

Jaclyn Trop:

Automakers trying to reach young buyers face a conundrum: How do they sell a car to people who stay away from a showroom?

“They won’t come into the stores to educate themselves,” said Peter Chung, general manager of Magic Toyota and Scion in Edmonds, Wash. “They’ll do that online.”

More than half of the younger buyers surveyed by AutoTrader.com, a car-buying site, said they wanted to avoid interacting with dealership sales representatives.

In response, automakers like Cadillac and Toyota are starting to embrace technology that tries to take the showroom to the buyer. Known as augmented reality, it embeds images and videos in a picture on the user’s smartphone or tablet. The result is a far more detailed view of the image, often in three dimensions with added layers of information.

For example, when Cadillac introduced the ATS last year, it created a campaign in cities across the country that allowed observers to point an iPad at a chalk mural and watch the car drive through scenes like China’s mountainous Guoliang Tunnel and Monaco’s Grand Prix circuit. The goal was to grab the attention of potential buyers, especially younger ones, who would not normally think of Cadillac when researching new cars.

Later, Cadillac added the technology to its print advertising, pointing readers to download the brand’s smartphone application to view a three-dimensional model of the car. The app allows users to zoom in on the car and turn it 360 degrees by swiping their finger across the screen.

Jaclyn Trop:

Automakers trying to reach young buyers face a conundrum: How do they sell a car to people who stay away from a showroom?

“They won’t come into the stores to educate themselves,” said Peter Chung, general manager of Magic Toyota and Scion in Edmonds, Wash. “They’ll do that online.”

More than half of the younger buyers surveyed by AutoTrader.com, a car-buying site, said they wanted to avoid interacting with dealership sales representatives.

In response, automakers like Cadillac and Toyota are starting to embrace technology that tries to take the showroom to the buyer. Known as augmented reality, it embeds images and videos in a picture on the user’s smartphone or tablet. The result is a far more detailed view of the image, often in three dimensions with added layers of information.

For example, when Cadillac introduced the ATS last year, it created a campaign in cities across the country that allowed observers to point an iPad at a chalk mural and watch the car drive through scenes like China’s mountainous Guoliang Tunnel and Monaco’s Grand Prix circuit. The goal was to grab the attention of potential buyers, especially younger ones, who would not normally think of Cadillac when researching new cars.

Later, Cadillac added the technology to its print advertising, pointing readers to download the brand’s smartphone application to view a three-dimensional model of the car. The app allows users to zoom in on the car and turn it 360 degrees by swiping their finger across the screen.

Many younger buyers no longer even test-drive a car before buying it, said Mr. Chung, the general manager of Magic Toyota and Scion. Instead, they read reviews and add features to their vehicle online before going to the dealership with the exact model and price they expect shown on their smartphone.

That is one reason Mr. Chung and other car dealers expect augmented reality to serve as a powerful selling tool in place of a sales associate.

“The consumer is no longer coming in and looking at 10 colors,” Mr. Chung said. “They’ve seen all 10 colors online and know what they want.”

Felix Salmon:

Ultimately, it’s far too easy to get caught up in the “business model” question, and thereby lose sight of the much more important question of who’s doing the best journalism. NSFWCorp is producing great stuff, as is Business Insider, as is the New York Times. All three of them look as though they’re going to find a way to make that journalism pay, which is fantastic. And here’s something else they all have in common: if one of their writers finds a great story, and needs to spend a lot of time deeply reporting it before it can be published, all of them will make sure that can happen. When it comes to what matters, it turns out that profound differences in business models make much less difference than you might think.

Austin Ramzy:

HAVING learned to speak Japanese as a child while Taiwan was under Japanese occupation, he traveled to Japan and studied what was then the premier bike manufacturing economy. A major breakthrough came in 1977 when Giant’s chief executive, Tony Lo, negotiated a deal with Schwinn to begin manufacturing bikes for the iconic American brand.

Schwinn became both Giant’s strength and weakness. Bike sales leapt in the United States during the oil crisis, and after workers at the Schwinn plant in Chicago went on strike in 1980, Giant became a key supplier, making more than two-thirds of Schwinn’s bikes by the mid-1980s.

Then Schwinn decided to find a new source, and in 1987 signed a contract with China Bicycle Company to make bikes in Shenzhen, near Hong Kong. “We were terrified,” Mr. Liu said. Giant relied on Schwinn for 75 percent of its orders, and its survival was at risk.

Giant began focusing on building its own brand, setting up operations in Europe and the United States. Gradually sales of Giant-brand bicycles grew. At the same time Schwinn’s fortunes declined, and it filed for bankruptcy in 1992. The American company was never able to get cheaper production from its China Bicycle investment, said Jay Townley, an industry consultant who was an executive at Schwinn and later Giant’s American arm.

Claire Bal:

In Bangle’s opinion, many designers talk about innovation, but nobody is really doing it.

“Even concept cars today simply anticipate the next production model coming down the line. Is this innovation? No. And at the end of the day this is what’s preventing car design from moving into a new era,” Bangle said.

He said he has offers to become design director at some automakers, but has turned them down every time.

“Designing cars consumes you; it has a hold on your spirit which is incredibly powerful,” he said. “It’s not something you can do part time, you have do it with all your heart and soul or you’re going to get it wrong.”

While he loved working for BMW, he said “you have to know when to leave the party.”

Emily Badger:

Driving has been on the decline in the United States since 2004, as researchers have documented every which way. What they still don’t know, though, is precisely why. The answer likely has to do with some messy mix of rising gas prices, changing demographics, new technology, a souring economy and the shifting preferences of Millennial drivers. But it’s tempting to lean on some of those explanations more heavily than others.

The economic theory is a particularly deceptive one. If you believe that driving trends have gone south because the economy has, too, then that means U.S. policy doesn’t need to adjust to a new transportation reality less focused on cars. Wait long enough, and everything will go back to the old normal.

Years will have to pass before we can look back on this moment and know for sure if the decline in driving was primarily a product of the economy or something else. For now, though, the U.S. PIRG Education Fund has proposed a “natural experiment” with the data we do have: vehicle mileage per capita by state. If the economy is a major factor here, then states hardest hit by the recession – with the steepest rise in unemployment – would experience the most significant drop in driving, right? For one thing, unemployed people without jobs to drive to don’t drive as much.

Via Steven Sinofsky

Horace Dediu and Jim Zellmer discuss the pleasures of traversing continents by road. This leads to a grand tour of powertrains, composites, fuel efficiency, regulation and Tesla’s luxury market entry. Which naturally leads to a conversation on emerging auto modularization, apps and ecosystems and where value will accrue. [32MB 67 minute mp3]

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