I’ve written a newsletter, called Exponential View for the past few years. EV, as we call it, is a curated newsletter, a combination of links constructed in a narrative and against a set of theses.

People really seem to love it. I thought I’d share how it comes together.

The challenge is flows vs. stocks.

The job of a curator is to gradually turn on a flow of information, a fast moving flux of deep thinking intermingled with clickbait, into something more considered, more organised, that throws light on a number of different hypotheses.

I’ve been trained on flows and…

A fast changing world, driven by staggering breakthroughs and new fissures opening up. Can we make sense of patterns of change across the globe during this time of exponential technology?

Every week, I speak to some of the most brilliant minds building, investing in or analysing the near future. Subscribe to get notified of future columns and let me know what you think — and to stay in touch for good, sign up to my email newsletter.

I had a pleasure to speak to the founder of Linkedin, Reid Hoffman. In our hour-long conversation, Reid and I discuss the concept…

A fast changing world, driven by staggering breakthroughs and new fissures opening up. Can we make sense of patterns of change across the globe during this time of exponential technology?

In this weekly series, I speak to some of the most brilliant minds building, investing in or analysing the near future. Today, I’m in conversation with the Chinese investor and executive Kai-Fu Lee. For the first part of my conversation with Kai-Fu about China’s entrepreneurial combat, go here.

If you’d rather listen to my conversation with Kai-Fu Lee, you can do so on Spotify, iTunes, Stitcher, Soundcloud, Breaker, Overcast or…

Every week I speak to some of the most brilliant minds building, investing in or analysing the near future. I will be publishing notes from these conversations regularly. To stay in touch for good, sign up to my email newsletter.

I was lucky to speak with Kai-Fu Le, a Chinese startup-investor and globally-recognised expert in AI, on entrepreneurship, and AI in China.

China is home to 82 of the world’s tech unicorns, companies which have reached $1bn in value or more. …

Jeff Wiener, the boss of LinkedIn, says that computers are not going to be taking all our jobs quite yet. “We’re still a ways away from computers being able to replicate and replace human interaction and human touch.”

The result? Most in-demand, according to Wiener, are the so-called “soft skills” of human interaction, communication and conflict resolution. While, recent US data still shows that most in-demand roles are emphasising highly technical, “hard” skills like engineering, IT and trucking, I would agree with Jeff. These soft skills are paramount. But I think they have the wrong name.

One way to understand…

Last week’s vote in the European Parliament on the EU Copyright Directive will create enormous new rights for news publishers, and turn the clock back on how the internet works. Some key implications:

• Article 11 was intended to allow publishers to make money when online platforms link to their stories, by demanding a paid license. The article has also been dubbed a ‘link tax’. Similar attempts have been unsuccessful in Germany and Spain, where it hurt publishers more than helped them.
• Article 13 or ‘upload filter’ says that platforms “storing and giving access to large amounts of works and other…

I wanted to share four power tools I have been using for the past months, in some cases years. This is a short selection of things I use that save me time managing my various commitments.

• VoxSciences — voxsci.com — converts voicemail to text and emails. Costs £5 per month, saves me at least 45 minutes a month, so just net positive. This is one of the best work investments I make every month. It allows me to screen, prioritise and respond to voicemails dozens of times faster than having to listen to them.
• Otter.AI — otter uses ML to…

I’ve been lucky enough to get to know the work of Jeni Tennison and The Open Data Institute a little during the past year or so. They are thinking very deeply about how to build trusted institutions and systems around data.

I believe this is vital work. A world where citizen-consumers understand the value and risks of data may get us to a higher energy level where we can use data to tackle causes of disease, unhappiness & inequality while maintaining a healthy balance of power between the individual, family & community and business. One where we (and policymakers) don’t…