Episode 5.06 – What’s the next fuel after batteries?

Co-host Sally Dominguez looks beyond battery-powered vehicles, opening the door to a future featuring hydrogen, “paste”, and ammonia-powered engines. This diverse transition from fossil fuels enables a range of new vehicles for all of the ways we’ll live and work in the decades to come.

Sally’s new book EPIC Resilience is a great guide to staying match-fit in an ever changing world. Grab a copy here!

Episode 5.05 – Has Europe gone ‘all-in’ on electric vehicles?

Special correspondent Drew Smith explores a European car market that appears to have reached a tipping point in sales of electric vehicles. Is it real? Is it sustainable? Can the power grid handle all those new EVs?

Drew asks the experts – and gets some surprising answers.

Drew co-authors the amazing ‘Looking Out’ newsletter – read the latest one here.

Episode 5.04 – Series 5 Predictions: Has social media turned us all into conspiracy theorists?

The Capitol Insurrection, #wallstreetbets and Facebook’s brief war with Australia demonstrate the power of social media to change how we believe – and behave.

At the end of this decade, could social media drive us all into our own private worlds of fantasy, conspiracy, and fakery?

Episode 5.03 – Series 5 Predictions: Can we make friends with a superpower China?

Prediction: Our long-running low-level spats with China are the new normal, the Chinese superpower rubbing up against the regional power of Australia.

Series 5 continues with some predictions on geopolitics in this decade, when America and China swap positions, and political power tilts eastward.

Episode 5.02 – Series 5 Predictions: Will you own an electric car this decade?

Prediction: At least half of all passenger vehicles sold by 2030 will be electric, revolutionising transportation – and energy.

Series 5 continues with more bold predictions for the next decade — an era of transition and remediation, as we work across multiple fronts and multiple industries – internationally – to cool the climate.

Episode 4.09 – What lessons has 2020 taught us?

The pandemic has touched every aspect of our lives – forcing us to recalibrate our privacy, our connections with others, even the way we use cash. Walking through series 4, we peek into a few of the significant discoveries in this series – reflecting on what we’ve learned.

This show gave us a chance to touch base with these guests:

Dr. Genevieve Bell is the Director of the 3A Institute at the ANU.
Listen Genevieve on Episode One.

Tiffany Shlain is a filmmaker and author of “24/6: The Power of Unplugging One Day a Week“.
Listen to Tiffany on Episode Two.

Dr. Fiona Kerr is the Director of the NeuroTech Institute.
Listen to Fiona on Episode Two.

Sally Dominguez is a futurist and co-host of THE NEXT BILLION CARS.
Listen to Sally on Episode Eleven of THE NEXT BILLION CARS.

Jonathan DeCarteret is the CEO of INDX.capital.
Listen to Jonathan on CRYPTONOMICS.

Mark Jeffrey is CEO of Guardian Circle and a frequent contributor to CRYTPONOMICS.
Listen to Mark on CRYPTONOMICS.

Jess Scully is the Deputy Lord Mayor of Sydney and author of “Glimpses of Utopia“.
Listen to Jess on Episode Eight.

George Peppou is the CEO of Vow Food.
Listen to George on Episode Five.

Episode 4.08 – What’s the secret to building a better world?

Do we have surrender our hopes for utopia, or can we learn from others who found the levers to move our world to a better place? Together, are we strong enough to use these tools to change our course?

Deputy Lord Mayor Jess Scully’s new book Glimpses of Utopia: Real Ideas for a Fairer World covers far more ground then we could in our interview – it’s well worth a read!

We were also lucky to hear from Dr. Darren Sharp of the Sustainable Development Institute at Monash University.

Episode 4.07 – Should a video game simulate the whole world?

We’re rapidly erasing the boundary between the make-believe worlds of video games and the real world of sensors and visualisation. Microsoft’s Flight Simulator 2020 allows you to fly over the whole world – with all the cities and countryside presented in detail – just as they are in reality. Is it now possible to “fly” through everything we know about the world – from ground level, up to the heavens?

In this episode we’re joined once again by the amazing Dr. Mike Zyda – founder of the Institute for Creative Technologies at the University of Southern California. In 1997, Mike authored a hugely influential study that got the US military to adopt video game technologies for simulation.

One of his first projects was “America’s Army” – a video game that simulates the training recruits undergo on their way to becoming soldiers.

The boundaries between simulation and visualisation become very blurry when we head up into Near Earth Orbit – that’s everything below about 1000km above Earth’s surface.

Andreas Antoniades’ firm Saber Astronautics uses a mixture of observation, simulation, and visualisation to create a ‘mission control’ that looks, well, a lot like it would if you were in space (click “Login as Guest” below to see it for yourself):

Once again, big thanks to my nephew Andy for sharing with us his experiences of flying a Cessna 152 – both in simulation and for real!

Episode 4.06 – Is there a ‘secret history’ of video games?

In the late 1990s, military technology collided with entertainment, a destiny reaching back to the first flight simulators, nearly a century ago. We have amazing games today because of the Cold War – and a historic tank battle no one saw coming.

We had the great good fortune to be able to interview simulation pioneer Dr. Mike Zyda for this episode (he’ll be back again in part two). Mike is quite likely the key individual who facilitated the blending of military and entertainment technologies.

The Battle of 73 Easting is arguably the most important tank battle fought in the second half of the 20th century. The battle became the foundation for a new generation of battlefield simulation:

Big thanks to my nephew Andy (on the right) for helping his uncle understand the ins and outs of flying an aircraft – for real!

The Users’ Guide to the Future #6 – Will work ever be the same – and how do we hang onto our jobs?

The post-COVID world won’t be dominated by office work. We’ll blend technologies – and new leadership skills – to create meaningful 21st jobs.  Atlassian’s “work futurist” Dom Price and Sally Dominguez share insights we can all apply, to craft a career that’s both satisfying – and resilient in a world of rising automation.

Dominic Price is Atlassian’s “Work Futurist”

Sally Dominguez is a frequent contributor to THE NEXT BILLION SECONDS, and is the author of the forthcoming EPIC Resilience.

In the show I spoke about how I created a series of videos titled “The Next Hundred Seconds“.

Here’s the first, from the 19th of March:

And here’s 75th and last, from the 29th of May: