Digital disruption and challenges of the smart city
Tech entrepreneurs, futurists and professionals shared their visions of tomorrow at a digital disruption event.
With change occurring more rapidly then ever, experts at the pro-manchester business conference examined ideas of the living city, jobs of the future and the growth of virtual reality.
Futurist Tom Chessewright kicked off predicting that ‘the smart city as currently imagined is doomed to fail.’
The founder of Book of the Future believes the current ideal is akin to an operations room – it is too monolithic, centralised and too top down.
“It doesn’t fit the reality of the world we live in and it is hard to engineer joy centrally.”
Instead, he suggested ‘the living city is an organic alternative.’
Here he painted a society where waste heat from a building could warm passengers waiting at a nearby bus stop.
Or businesses could share a bank of lamps to light dark alleys in crime hotspots – working together to open up conversations.
He argued that the cities of tomorrow don’t need to be about command and control but instead collaboration and networks between peers.
But what job opportunities would be afforded in this ‘Brave New World’?
Entrepreneur and fellow futurist Mike Ryan tackled exactly this question, looking at the needs of a digital workforce.
Alarmingly he predicted that 46% of workers could see their jobs at risk or obsolete by 2040.
This includes the roles of office workers, drivers, professionals, retail workers and manufacturers.
The rate of automation and AI across the sectors is accelerating and it could only be a matter of time before digital judges are in situ.
He also admits that this is only half the story as there will be thousands of new roles working alongside technology.
Developing smart materials, biotech, producing clean energy and fixing robots could all be careers of the future
“The 21st century will be about the world we can not see”, predicts Ryan.
