The heads of leading American universities say that if they selected applicants based on grades alone, their student bodies would be 100 percent Asian.

A Facebook message will never be able to replace face-to-face interaction.

Everything that individuals ever say or write can be used against them at a later point.

Facebook and other social networking sites are bringing together spheres that used to be separate. People no longer have private and public lives the line between the two is becoming blurred.

Enormous forces are affecting the world, and we can't possibly overestimate their importance. These include demographic developments, climate change, digitalization and the rise of Asia. And then there's the most important one: the end of a life lived on credit. We must finally free ourselves from debt.

Asia has an army of low-wage laborers to thank for its economic boom.

Since loans are getting more expensive and there's less money available, we're seeing a commensurate decline in growth. Higher costs and lower growth, in turn, translate into lower profits. Figuratively speaking, in the future, we won't be able to run as far or jump as high as we used to.

The problem with our Blackberry society is that hardly anyone has time anymore to have an unhurried discussion about the long-term developments that will change our lives.