Topic: Trends & Fads

Like reality-show stars and pop singers, pro athletes have a shelf-life on their celebrity. For every Michael Jordan, there are dozens who have just a brief moment in the sun. For reasons ranging from injuries to lost mojo, they quickly faded from the public eye. Read ahead to see athletes who faded away after their 15 minutes of fame.

Every so often, a movie depicts a character in an outfit that becomes iconic. What follows is a list of those that made an article of clothing famous, made characters famous for fashion sense, or managed some combination of the two.

The market for equities has gone through numerous crises, bubbles and ups and downs, but when an initial public offering comes, it can create lots of excitement for investors and generate perhaps billions of dollars for the company.

India is set to overtake the U.S. as the world’s largest Facebook market by number of users as early as 2015, according to social media analysts, driven by growing internet penetration and high rates of growth in mobile connections.

Facebook plans to increase the size of its IPO by 85 million shares, says someone familiar with the matter, a move that could value the offering at as much as $18.5 billion.

Spun out on spinning? Bored in barre class? Group fitness gadflies can rejoice. Indoor surfing is a new workout, born of the sea but carving out a place in the center of town.

Facebook is staring down some unnerving obstacles when it comes to key areas of monetization and growth: public distrust and display advertising apathy.

With a little creative packaging and a lot of innovation, spirits manufacturers are expanding the market. Click ahead for some of the most  unusual ways businesses are innovating in the world of alcohol.

AT&T dominated the social conversation at the International CTIA Wireless 2012 conference in New Orleans, according to the just-released rankings of the exclusive CNBC Social Conversation Index: Mobile Edition.

The driving force behind many of the relationships and rivalries that will play out in New Orleans?  Long-Term Evolution, the 4G wireless standard. 2012 is shaping up to be the year when the carriers and smartphone makers put their best LTE efforts into the arena to triumph or fall.

Billionaire investor Philip Falcone may be wishing upon a star - the Republican super strategist kind, that is - to keep his ailing telecom start-up LightSquared alive.

Three years into the web’s most popular crowdfunding experiment, Kickstarter is still learning the ropes. The startup celebrated its third birthday with some impressive stats. More than 2 million people have shelled a combined $200 million to back 22,000 projects.

When Nike first got into the data-collection game it stuck sensors to elite athletes running, jumping, spinning and generally doing those impossible things they do. The idea was that the data collected would point Nike designers and engineers toward building better shoes.

If you like doing business online, have a knack for sites like Facebook, and want to meet new people, sharing-for-money may be an intriguing part of your retirement plan.

So how do we spot the future—and how might you? The seven rules that follow are not a bad place to start. They are the principles that underlie many of our contemporary innovations. They have played a major part in creating the world we see today. And they’ll be the forces behind the world we’ll be living in tomorrow.