The Rise Of Technosocialism

Statistics, analysis and commentary from top thinkers on emerging behaviour explain why industries and economies are forced to reinvent themselves.

Foreword by Dr. Harry Kloor What is the impact of COVID-19 on world economies? If the cost of providing universal health care is lower than the cost of building a political movement to prevent it, would politicians still view it as socialism? In a world where algorithms and robots take the jobs of immigrants and citizens alike, are border controls an effective response? If unemployment skyrockets due to automation, would conservative governments rather battle long-term social unrest, or could they agree on something like universal basic income? When renewable energy sources are a fraction of the cost of coal generated electricity, should lobbyists be able to prevent changes to energy infrastructure? When the crowd’s mood is measured in influence and exabytes, will real-time democracy render elections a thing of the past? International Bestselling authors Brett King and Dr. Richard Petty explore the seismic social changes that will be thrust on the world over the coming decades. The Rise of Technosocialism seeks to answer how our children will live with AI and climate disruption, the impact of COVID-19 in our lives along with which economies will likely emerge victorious in an always-on, smart world.

The Internet and smartphone are just the latest in a 250-year- long cycle of disruption that has continuously changed the way we live, the way we work and the way we interact. The coming Augmented Age, however, promises a level of disruption, behavioural shifts and changes that are unparalleled. While consumers today are camping outside of an Apple store waiting to be one of the first to score a new Apple Watch or iPhone, the next generation of wearables will be able to predict if we’re likely to have a heart attack and recommend a course of action. We watch news of Google’s self-driving cars, but don’t likely realise this means progressive cities will have to ban human drivers in the next decade because us humans are too risky. Following on from the Industrial or machine age, the space age and the digital age, the Augmented Age will be based on four key disruptive themes—Artificial Intelligence, Experience Design, Smart Infrastructure, and HealthTech. Historically the previous ‘ages’ bought significant disruption and changes, but on a net basis jobs were created, wealth was enhanced, and the health and security of society improved. What will the Augmented Age bring? Will robots take our jobs, and AI’s subsume us as inferior intelligences, or will this usher in a new age of abundance? Augmented is a book on future history, but more than that, it is a story about how you will live your life in a world that will change more in the next 20 years than it has in the last 250 years. Are you ready to adapt? Because if history proves anything, you don't have much of a choice.

Winner of best book by a foreign author (2019) at the Business Book of the Year Award organised by PwC Russia The future of banking is already here — are you ready? Bank 4.0 explores the radical transformation already taking place in banking, and follows it to its logical conclusion. What will banking look like in 30 years? 50 years? The world’s best banks have been forced to adapt to changing consumer behaviors; regulators are rethinking friction, licensing and regulation; Fintech start-ups and tech giants are redefining how banking fits in the daily life of consumers. To survive, banks are having to develop new capabilities, new jobs and new skills. The future of banking is not just about new thinking around value stores, payment and credit utility — it's embedded in voice-based smart assistants like Alexa and Siri and soon smart glasses which will guide you on daily spending and money decisions. The coming Bank 4.0 era is one where either your bank is embedded in your world via tech, or it no longer exists. In this final volume in Brett King's BANK series, we explore the future of banks amidst the evolution of technology and discover a revolution already at work. From re-engineered banking systems, to selfie-pay and self-driving cars, Bank 4.0 proves that we're not on Wall Street anymore. Bank 4.0 will help you: Understand the historical precedents that flag a fundamental rethinking in banking Discover low-friction, technology experiences that undermine the products we sell today Think through the evolution of identity, value and assets as cash and cards become obsolete Learn how Fintech and tech "disruptors" are using behaviour, psychology and technology to reshape the economics of banking Examine the ways in which blockchain, A.I., augmented reality and other leading-edge tech are the real building blocks of the future of banking systems If you look at individual technologies or startups disrupting the space, you might miss the biggest signposts to the future and you might also miss that most of we've learned about banking the last 700 years just isn't useful. When the biggest bank in the world isn't any of the names you'd expect, when branch networks are a burden not an asset, and when advice is the domain of Artificial Intelligence, we may very well have to start from scratch. Bank 4.0 takes you to a world where banking will be instant, smart and ubiquitous, and where you'll have to adapt faster than ever before just to survive. Welcome to the future.

The first decade of the twenty-first century marked the demise of the current world order. Despite widespread acknowledgement of these disruptive crises, the proposed response from the mainstream remains the same. Against the confines of this increasingly limited politics, a new paradigm has emerged. Fully Automated Luxury Communism claims that new technologies will liberate us from work, providing the opportunity to build a society beyond both capitalism and scarcity. Automation, rather than undermining an economy built on full employment, is instead the path to a world of liberty, luxury and happiness. For everyone. In his first book, radical political commentator Aaron Bastani conjures a new politics: a vision of a world of unimaginable hope, highlighting how we move to energy abundance, feed a world of nine billion, overcome work, transcend the limits of biology and build meaningful freedom for everyone. Rather than a final destination, such a society heralds the beginning of history. Fully Automated Luxury Communism promises a radically new left future for everyone.

The first edition of BANK 2.0—#1 on Amazon's bestseller list for banking and finance in the US, UK, Germany, France, and Japan for over 18 months—took the financial world by storm and became synonymous with disruptive customer behaviour, technology shift, and new banking models. In BANK 3.0, Brett King brings the story up to date with the latest trends redefining financial services and payments—from the global scramble for dominance of the mobile wallet and the expectations created by tablet computing to the operationalising of the cloud, the explosion of social media, and the rise of the de-banked consumer, who doesn't need a bank at all. BANK 3.0 shows that the gap between customers and financial services players is rapidly widening, leaving massive opportunities for new, non-bank competitors to totally disrupt the industry. "On the Web and on Mobile, the customer isn't king—he's dictator. Highly impatient, skeptical, cynical. Brett King understands deeply what drives this new hard-nosed customer. Banking professionals would do well to heed his advice." —Gerry McGovern, author of Killer Web Content

"In the next 10 years, we'll see more disruption and changes to the banking and financial industry than we've seen in the preceding 100 years"—Brett King Breaking Banks: The Innovators, Rogues, and Strategists Rebooting Banking is a unique collection of interviews take from across the global Financial Services Technology (or FinTech) domain detailing the stories, case studies, start-ups, and emerging trends that will define this disruption. Features the author's catalogued interviews with experts across the globe, focusing on the disruptive technologies, platforms and behaviors that are threating the traditional industry approach to banking and financial services Topics of interest covered include Bitcoin's disruptive attack on currencies, P2P Lending, Social Media, the Neo-Banks reinventing the basic day-to-day checking account, global solutions for the unbanked and underbanked, through to changing consumer behavior Breaking Banks is the only record of its kind detailing the massive and dramatic shift occurring in the financial services space today.

Automating technologies threaten to usher in a workless future, but John Danaher argues that this can be a good thing. A world without work may be a kind of utopia, free of the misery of the job and full of opportunities for creativity and exploration. If we play our cards right, automation could be the path to idealized forms of human flourishing.