Listen Now

The year is 2025 and the world is a very different place. We have automated homes, self driving cars, and even drone delivery systems. Most importantly, we don’t use cash anymore. All of this, supposedly, makes life so much easier. With all of this technology what could possibly go wrong? Join John for part two of this peek into a future with “A Digital Day in 2025”, written by Jake Thomas.  

The year is 2025 and the world is a very different place. We have automated homes, self driving cars, and even drone delivery systems. Most importantly, we don't use cash anymore. All of this, supposedly, makes life so much easier. With all of this technology what could possibly go wrong? Join John for a peek into a future with part 1 of our 2-part radio drama "A Digital Day in 2025", written by Jake Thomas. Come back in two weeks for Part 2!

Bob Gleason, Editor at Tor Books, joins John and Kevin, to discuss the devolution of world democracies, threats of nuclear standoff, and existential threats to democracy at large. Relevant links: RobertGleasonbooks.com  wordfirepress.com  breakingdigitalgridlock.com 

This week John and Kevin discuss Kevin’s upcoming projects; ‘Avatar Dreams’, and ‘Uncharted: Lewis and Clark in Arcane America’, as well as Cambridge Analytica and if Avengers: Infinity War can live up to its hype.

Kevin and John discuss the obligations, and advantages, of successful creators and innovators passing along their skills to the next generation, with a focus on Kevin’s cornerstone “Superstars Writing Seminars,” now in its tenth year.  

Jake Thomas, Editor at Marvel Comics for projects including Avengers and Thor, speaks with John and Kevin about his journey to working with Marvel, and a day in the life of an editor.

Editor Lisa Mangum talks about sifting through mountains of submissions from aspiring authors at a mid-sized publishing company, and the criteria she uses to select which ones are ready for prime time. Lisa also talks about assembling the new UNDERCURRENTS anthology to raise money for the Don Hodge Memorial Scholarship fund. For more on "Undercurrents: An Anthology of What Lies Beneath" with selections from Kevin J. Anderson, edited by Lisa Magnum.  Download John's new book Breaking Digital Gridlock. 

Ira Pastor, CEO of biotech company Bioquark joins John and Kevin to deliver the message that super powers derived from animal genes are quickly becoming science fact, not fiction. From tissue regeneration, to fighting cancer, to augmenting memory, Pastor shares the research process that is driving innovation in the future of biological transhumanism. www.bioquark.com  Preorder Kevin's new comic with Stephen Sears, Stalag X on Amazon Preorder John's book Breaking Digital Gridlock on Amazon  

Editor, bestselling writer, publisher—and former pro golfer and tournament poker player—Dean Wesley Smith shares his roller-coaster career of riding the waves and surviving the crashes of the turbulent writing/publishing industry. Learn more about Dean Wesley Smith at www.deanwesleysmith.com

Jean Leggett, the force behind story.games, talks about the gaming industry and new ways for authors to take control over developing story-based games with her platform. Related links: https://onemorestorygames.com/ Jean's Ted Talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CvUSvpFk0A Transcription: John: Hello everyone and welcome to this episode of Creative Futurism. My name is John Best.   Kevin: And my name is Kevin J. Anderson. And I am sitting out here in the mountains of Colorado hauling up so I can wear my hat as a writer instead of a podcast co-host. But you know, some things don’t wait. So, I have to pop up and login. You would basically have tin cans and telephone wires in trying to get enough of an internet signal. So, if I drown out it’s either because John was either bored of what I had to say and he muted me or we’ve got something flakey going on. But it’s one of those where by me being a publisher as well as a writer as well as all kinds of other things, there are times when you just need to carve out some free time where you’re uninterrupted. So, I’m in a cabin and when I’m not on this podcast right now I’m going to go back to causing great mayhem in this big fantasy novel that I’m editing.   John: Yeah, I watched a show not too long ago. It was on-it was about a guy in a cabin and he liked to write. It ended up with him being arrested.   Kevin: Jack Nicholson?   John: No, no. This was a unabomber I think. Something like that. But yeah, same thing. In a cabin and a lot of writing. And he had a typewriter he really liked. He skewed technology. But all kidding aside, you’re out there like near the actual real life inspiration for South Park, right? Are you out towards Fairplay in Colorado? I don’t know if a lot of people know that like South Park’s a real place.   Kevin: Well, South Park is a real place. It’s a big open place and there’s a little kind of a mining town here. And it’s kind of out in the middle of nowhere but it’s my little cabin. And I can basically sit here and type all day long that says all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.   John: Yeah, that’s a whole different show.   Kevin: But you know, that’s a whole different show. But that’s not what we’re doing now. We’re going to have something that’s much more fun. We’ve had exactly this sort of many many times before. Her name is Jean Leggett. And she’s a standup comedian turned life business coach and speaker who joined forces with her husband to set up a video game company with a focus on helping authors develop narrative based video games. So you know, just another one of those. I don’t know how many episodes we can have with standup comedians and life business coaches and video game people. But here’s the thing that kind of impresses-well, a lot about Jean impresses me. But she was brought to my attention by Mark LaFay who’s from Kobo, who was one of our guests from oh boy, I think our second episode? Our first episode? One of our very early episodes on this podcast. But the other really impressive thing is that she’s actually got a Ted Talk which means that people really do want to hear what Jean has to say. And we’ll put up a link on the website to her YouTube Ted Talk. But this is the formal biography that she’s got. And if it was good enough for a Ted Talk I think it should be good enough for us. Jean Leggett is a standup comedian who found herself running a video game company. In 2001 she graduated university with a B.A. in English, tech skills, and wicked sense of humor. Which I’m sure she will prove for us in the next 45 minutes. Fresh from a projection of a master’s proposal to study the impact of the internet on traditional publishing, I’m going to want to hear more about that. Jean went on to develop websites and databases for several non-profits. In 2012 while living in Dallas, her husband Blair experiences a near fatal medical error,

John and Kevin are joined by Kaliya Young, aka Identity Woman,  to explore the burgeoning concept of 'Self Sovereign Identity'. Learn how decentralized identifiers and verifiable claims may very well give you the keys to owning your digital identity in the same way you own your physical one. Related Links: www.identitywoman.net www.internetidentityworkshop.com   Full Transcript: John: Hello everyone and welcome to this episode of Creative Futurism. This is John Best.   Kevin: And this is Kevin J. Anderson   John: And Kevin J Anderson, we talk about how the future and how all this technology comes together. And how it’s very thrilling how what you write about comes true. And right now, we usually do this together. But you’re not with me right now. Where are you?   Kevin: Well, we’re using technology and connecting through Zoom so we can do this. But it’s sort of an interesting thing that I’m writing about really high-tech science fiction and futurism and all kinds of things like that in my writing. But there comes a time when you just need to sort of unplug and get away from it all so you can actually get work done. So, I’ve had to sort of hall up in a metaphorical room with no windows and pull up the drawbridge. I’m in a mountain cabin up in the Colorado mountains surrounded by snow on the ground. It’s a beautiful perfect place. But there’s not very good phone service and not very good internet service. Which is wonderful because it lets me concentrate on things. And I got like 100 pages edited yesterday. 100 pages edited the day before. I have a killer deadline coming up in a couple of days so I just needed to drop off the face of the Earth. I am emerging to record a podcast because we’ve got a great guest and it took a while to arrange all three of our schedules. So, I am becoming technologically able again for just an hour or so. And then I drop off the face of the Earth once more.   John: So, can I ask what you’re writing on? Am I allowed to ask what you’re working on at the moment? Or is that like something that’s got to be under wraps?   Kevin: Well, it’s a really big fantasy novel that I have. So, I guess it’s not science fiction. It’s a medieval mindset with swords and dragons and magic.   John: Oh, well being in the woods is a perfect place.   Kevin: 700 page manuscript, yep.   John: So, it’s your version of Game of Thrones.   Kevin: Well, I will turn mine in on time though. So, there is that extra little-George is a good friend of mine as I think most people know. Going back to lower technology where-in fact, here’s a segway with the fantasy stuff. Because I just watched a really terrible movie. I don’t recommend it. It’s King Arthur: Legend of the Sword or something like that.   John: I saw your Tweet about that. You did not seem like you liked it.   Kevin: It was actually not a terrible fantasy movie. It just had absolutely nothing to do with King Arthur. But here’s the thing I want to bring up, which will lead us into our guest today. There’s a little conversation I liked where they’re in the bar and they’re talking about getting other people to join the revolution. And they said, ‘Well, we should get Bill to join because he can help out.’ And they went, ‘Bill, the potter’s son? Or Bill with the one finger? Or Bill who makes tapestries? Or Bill the guy who cheats at cart?’ And they were arguing over which Bill they were talking about because there just wasn’t a very good way to identify people in the middle ages. You had townspeople who all had jobs and they had the same name of Mary or Bill or Tom or whatever. And our guest today is going to talk a whole lot about personal identity and who we actually are. So, I will use that as a very well-planned segway to punt over to you John for a brief introduction.   John: Yeah, thank you. A brief introduction,

Just after the mid-season finale of The Walking Dead, we had zombies on our mind (and spoilers!) Kevin discusses his brand new novel in his series featuring Dan Shamble, Zombie P.I. and transitioning those books from a traditional publishing house to his own new-model indie press, a path that many authors are being forced to follow. Relevant links: Join the Wordfire Readers Group Buy Kevin’s latest book “Tastes Like Chicken” Pre-order John’s book “Breaking Digital Gridlock” Transcript:   John: Hello everyone and welcome to Creative Futurism. I’m John Best.   Kevin: And I’m Kevin J. Anderson.   John: And we’re here to bring you the future and-   Kevin: -and creativity and business and all those things together. We’re sort of like the Seinfeld podcast. No, it’s not a podcast about nothing. It’s a podcast about interesting things that are changing and interesting opportunities to look at. And how we as supposedly intelligent people are trying to deal with a rapidly changing world.   John: Adapting quickly.   Kevin: I just came home and this is like totally ad lib guys because we aren’t planning this. But we wanted to chat a little bit. I was just in Las Vegas and Arizona this past weekend. I went to visit some friends and visit family members. We had sort of a halfway between Thanksgiving and Christmas thing. And I had two almost identical conversations with utterly different people. And I was kind of doing the things are changing so fast and it’s exhausting to keep up with it. But as a writer and an entrepreneur you can’t sit back on your morals. And then we had this discussion, again this is two completely different people. One in Las Vegas and one in Kingman Arizona. And the discussion was that it’s a different generational expectation. And my parents’ generation they expected that you got out of high school, or college if you went to college, and you got a job. And you worked your way up in the company and you had that job until you retired. You worked in the auto plant. My dad worked as an accountant who then got a job at a bank. Who then worked his way up to a loan officer and a vice president, the president of a bank. And he’s been president of a bunch of banks. So, that’s the way-I mean he’s moved around a little bit. But that’s what his career was. And I’m the next generation. And I became a very successful writer. I’m like in the 90’s-well, I published 145 books. And 56 of them have been best sellers.   John: It’s amazing.   Kevin: And 23 million copies in print. And I’m thinking like one of the years in the 1990’s I had like five New York Times best sellers in one year. So, that was my job. I was set. I was like a professor invested in college and everything. And then my whole industry just changed. It’s like everything that I was working on was building up the Blockbuster video franchise and all of a sudden that went away. And so now I’m reinventing and doing all kinds of-I mean we can talk plenty about that. So, I was kind of grousing about I’m 55 and I don’t really want to learn how to do a branded career anymore because I spent all of my time doing that. And then the two people I’m talking with were pointing out that there’s always dramatic upheaval and changes. But they used to happen slower. And the blacksmiths didn’t like the fact that factories could make things better. And the horse buggy people didn’t like the fact that automobiles were taking over. So, that was always there. But you have time for your son realized he couldn’t take over the family business of making buggy whips because it wasn’t going to be around. And now we wake up every week to go at. But then the first phase of this conversation was but the generation X or the Y or the newer people, they’re in no ways expecting that they’re going to have the same job for their entire career. They’re always open. They’re always doing things. They’re always changing.

In this episode, John and Kevin traverse the breakneck changes of the digital landscape and how they are affecting our society. Join us to explore the future of digital identity far beyond the dreaded password, the growing polarization of our news consumption, and learn about the Squatty Potty that stalked John through the entire internet. Relevant links: Join the Wordfire Readers Group Pre-buy John's book "Breaking Digital Gridlock" Buy Kevin's latest book "Tastes Like Chicken" Transcript:   Kevin: Hello, and welcome to the Creative Futurism podcast. This is Kevin J. Anderson.   John: And this is John Best.   Kevin: And we’re going to be talking about the future and creativity and business and everything you need to know to survive until tomorrow when something’s going to change. John and I got together because we have wildly different interests and wildly similar interests. And we have interesting approaches to our world. I’m a best-selling writer. John’s a financial tech guru. And together we’re looking toward the future. And so today we’ve got just the two of us talking about things that bug us. And one of the things that-this is after the Equifax breach and all that. It’s data being taken and wondering well what do people do with all that stuff and how do you ensure your privacy? And we don’t want to sound like we’re survivalists living in a bunker somewhere. But these are issues that we need to deal with that we never needed to deal with before.   John: Well, they’re modern issues, right? They’re issues that now-that were never a big- because in the past when you had your passport or something like that you would share it with someone who would then validate it and give it back to you. But they wouldn’t sort of snapshot that information and then store it somewhere. Now that was the difference. And here we live in a world where when you share information with somebody it then becomes part of their archive. And then that’s something that becomes a weakness or a threat to you later on if someone gets their hands on it.   Kevin: Well, the biggest security issue that I used to have to deal with was making sure that the bully down the hall didn’t get my high school locker combination. I mean the high school locker-the bicycle locker combination, those were the things that we used to have to remember. My grandfather never had to worry about somebody stealing his password or his social security.   John: And if he did have a password it might be one. Not 400 of them.   Kevin: Well, and I was realizing the tipping point where at one point I used to know all of my passwords because you only had a handful of them. And then it started to get so many passwords that of course you had to write them all down. And of course you wrote them all down and taped them on the inside of the drawer in your desk. So that any idiot could come in and find your passwords and put them in. And then it got to the point where there are so many passwords everywhere. Then they would be-Safari would generate the password for you. Which is an unbreakable password. But it’s also anybody can remember. So therefore, you have to store it somewhere. So, we have this thing called One Password which is a locker of all of our passwords that has a master password.   John: And you’re not the only one.   Kevin: And we use it all-it’s got all our credit card numbers in it, everything into it. And of course, the thing that we have to remember is the master password to get into it. Well, that I can remember because we chose that one. But if somebody hacked and got my master password to that locker of passwords.   John: You’re just moving the cheese, you know? Just a little more away. But you know what’s interesting? One thing I’m going to share that just happens to be my background from being a security person is let me give you a methodology that you should think ab...

Doctor Harry Kloor from the XPRIZE Foundation talks with Kevin and John about the new Avatar XPRIZE to develop augmented separate avatars, remote bodies that allow humans to do remarkable things, like surgeons operating on patients through telepresence, exploring hostile environments, and extending the human body.

Lance Bush, President of the Challenger Learning Centers for Space Science Education talks about his mission to interest kids in pursuing careers in science and engineering, how to motivate the next generation to truly look to the future. “The first person who will walk on Mars is alive today and in a classroom somewhere.” For more information about Challenger Learning Centers, or to donate, visit www.challenger.org   Full Transcription: Kevin:             Welcome to Creative Futurism podcast. I’m Kevin J. Anderson. John:               And I’m John Best. Kevin:             And we’ve got a great show for you today and a really cool guest. Something that’s kind of near and dear to my heart. And I’ll give you a little background because as a science fiction writer of course I was always interested in the space program and NASA and exploring other planets. And I’ve got almost an odd story because when I was just a little kid I was watching Lost in Space and Star Trek and science fiction movies. And I remember I think I was seven years old when Neil Armstrong walked on the moon. And everybody was glued to their television sets and everybody was watching when he came down the ladder and the eagle and stepped foot on the moon. And I remember my old aunts had tears running down their face. And my parents were all excited. And I remember looking at it and going, ‘Huh, did we do that already?’ Because I was watching science fiction movies all the time and I thought, ‘Where’s the monsters? This isn’t nearly as exciting. John:               Forbidden Planet, right? Kevin:           Yeah, but I grew up always following the space program. And I got my own telescope when I was in high school. I majored in astronomy because I wanted to be a science fiction writer and if you’re going to be a science fiction writer you have to know how like black holes and quasars and colliding galaxies and all kinds of stuff like that. But I also was following NASA, following the shuttle program. I saw a shuttle launch, an Atlantis launch in person down at the Kennedy space center. And I like just about everybody else in this country remember exactly where I was when the news of the Challenger accident happened. And that was such a huge effect on me for years. I mean that was sort of our-not exactly our first tragedy but it was really our first-you know if you’re going to go where no one has gone before sometimes it’s dangerous. And many years later after I had a career all on my own, science fiction writing, through another science fiction friend my wife and I got in touch with June Scobee Rogers whose husband was the commander of the Challenger mission. And June wanted to write a young adult science fiction series to inspire kids in science and space. And so, she started working first with my wife Rebecca but then I kind of came aboard to help write it. And we wrote a series called The Star Challengers about basically kids doing science stuff but there’s an adventure behind it. So that the readers were secretly being tricked into learning science while they were reading about alien invasions. We got to know June really well. And June is just-if you have a list of the most wonderful people in the world, June is sort of above the top of it. So, she’s great and she got me involved in her organization called The Challenger Center. The Challenger Learning Center where her goal was to get young people interested in science and technology. And eventually she asked me which means that you say yes because you never say no to June Scobee Rogers. She asked me to become a board member of the Challenger Center. And I’ve been serving them as a board member for probably ten years or so. I’m sorry, I didn’t look it up. Anyway, when you and I started this podcast one of my first guests that I wanted to have was the head of The Challenger Learning Center. John:               I remember that. Kevin:             Not June Scobee Rogers.

John and Kevin sit down with futurist Brett King, author of 'Breaking Banks' and new title 'Augmented', for a conversation about how the next wave of AI and automation will vastly alter the white collar work force. What will 'work' look like in age of AI? Is Universal Basic Income the model that will allow for society's smooth transition to this new world? Dive into the conversation and find out. For more about Brett's books, podcast, and speaking engagements, visit www.brettking.com Buy Brett's most recent book, Augmented Transcription: John:                     Hello everyone and welcome to this edition of Creative Futurism. I’m John Best. Kevin:                   And I’m Kevin J. Anderson Brett:                     And I’m Brett King. John:                      Oh, and there’s Brett. Kevin:                    Oh, he introduced himself. What a guy, good. Brett:                      But everyone else was doing it so . . John:                     I love it. Well that’s awesome. So, we’ll get right to it here. So this week we have the noted            author, best-selling author, New York Times best-selling author, and author of Bank 4.0, author of Augmented, also the CEO of Moven. And a friend of mine, I’m glad to say. And this week we’re going to talk a little bit about sort of the future, his last book Augmented. We’re going to talk a little bit about techno-socialism and then we’re going to touch on Bank 4.0. So welcome Brett. Brett:                       Thanks for having me back John. It’s always good fun. John:                       Oh yeah, well I’m excited because we’ve got the other best-selling author with us, Kevin J. Anderson. Who you’ve read his books, right? So- Brett:                      --Absolutely. John:                       Very, very cool. I hadn’t realized that when I invited you on the show. I just finished Clockwork Angels which was amazing. So, now we have you two geniuses on this show here. I just can’t wait to lop some things out there. So, let’s get right to it then. So, I’m going to lob out the first thing. So, in your book Augmented you kind of talked about how the technology cycles are continually getting faster and faster and how that’s changing the world around us. And you and I have discussed this on our show many times. But one of the points of this show is that people like Kevin inspire folks like you Brett who kind of make the future, right? I like to think of it as the Star Trek effect, right? You’re watching the old Star Trek movie, you see the communicators and suddenly we get the cellphone, right? And then we just recently had doctor doctor, is that how you say it? You have to put the two- Kevin:                    -Doctor doctor, Yes, that’s how he likes to pronounce it. John:                       Right, because he’s the only person ever to get two doctors at the same time. Two PhD’s at the same time. And one of his Xprize’s was the tri-quarter, right? And so, in your book Augmented those are the kinds of concepts that you bring together. So, why don’t you give us just a little background for the audience on Augmented. And then Kevin I’m sure has four million questions and we’ll just get rolling. Brett:                       And so, I’m a frustrated sci-fi author myself, right? I haven’t written-I wrote a sci-fi novel and never published it. Augmented was my-was cathodic in that respect. But I read a ton of sci-fi. I think if I can be so bold in terms of Kevin’s stuff, The Saga of the Seven Suns to me was a great series, The Martian War. So, I’ve grown up reading his stuff. Arthur C. Clarke, David Brin who I mentioned I’m friends with, Greg Bear. I read a lot of this stuff and it really does fuel the creative juices in respect to what is possible. But the difference I guess in the sci-fi stuff, most of the sci-fi stuff is looking a lot further out. Whereas you try and take in inspiration from that and say what’s possible in the...

Retired Air Force Colonel Doug Beason, former head of Air Force Space Command and member of the President’s Science Council—as well as bestselling thriller and science fiction writer—discusses new advances in physics, active-denial microwaves, and weapons concepts you’ve only seen in science fiction, including the possible sonic weapons that may have been used recently at the American embassy in Cuba. Books by Kevin and Doug   Kevin: Welcome to the Creative Futurism podcast. This is Kevin J. Anderson.   John: And this is John Best where you’re going to learn about the world in the future.   Kevin: And creativity and business and how everything changes.   John: Absolutely.   Kevin: We’ve got a really interesting guest this week. And a very good friend of mine I’ve known for more years than I want to remember. I think more than thirty years or so. It’s Dr. Doug Beason who’s a PHD physicist and a retired colonel from the Air Force. He’s a former member of the president’s science office, former associate director at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, former chief scientist of the U.S. Air Force Space Command, and he’s also my co-author on a whole bunch of high-tech thrillers that we did. Doug and I did-our first book was called Lifeline about space stations trying to survive after a war on Earth cut off all supplies. And we did the Trinity Paradox, a time travel of an anti-nuke protestor going back in time to stop the Manhattan project. And we’ve done a bunch of other books after that including Ignition, which we sold to Universal Studios, Ill Wind, which we sold to Fox Studios, and we just sold a big thriller called Doomsday Cascade, a thriller about nuclear waste storage in a big facility. And anyway, but Doug has got some great background on some really interesting weapons technology and science fiction concepts that’s actually being worked on. So, welcome Doug, thanks for coming on.   Doug: Oh thanks Kevin, I appreciate it.   Kevin: Well one of the things that I wanted to bring up, and I know Doug’s got some really cool stuff. Because I’ve known him and I’ve been hearing him talking, all unclassified of course, for many years about-you know as science fiction writers, we’re all accustomed to seeing these typical things like blasters and force fields and stun weapons and energy kind of things. They all seem like they came out of Star Trek instead of the real world because weapons are really just shooting bullets and launching bombs at people. But Doug, you’ve got a great background in some really interesting and innovative energy weapons and high-power microwaves and active denials. And you could talk the whole hour on that sort of stuff. So why don’t you fill in our listeners in a little bit of some of the categories of that and where we are in some of that in as much as you can say. Doug: Oh sure. Well thanks Kevin. You know before I start off, I’ll really just ask the question, what is a weapon? Since you’ve thrown that word out.   Kevin: A stick.   Doug: Well, that’s just it. To some people it can be a fast-looking hot fighter. And other people it could be a humongous tank. Some people may say it’s a destroyer or air craft carrier or even a rifle. What we found in the Gulf War, it could even be underwear. Underwear, well remember the cycle.   John: Yeah, you’re going to have to-I was going to say three lines of coke but you beat me.   Doug: No, psychological warfare. And they use that as a torture device.   John: Underwear?   Doug: They did.   Kevin: You’ve got to explain the underwear part.   Doug: They would have female military enlisted personnel show up in their underwear to these people who any sight of human flesh, female flesh, is an abomination to them. And as a result, that was torture. It was a weapon. And so the point is,

In this episode, John and Kevin speak with payments expert Chuck Davidson, head of customer engagement at Card Free, about the future of digital consumer relationships and 'internet of character'. Chuck Davidson is Mobile payment innovator; designed, developed and launched Starbucks Mobile Payment - the largest mobile payment system in the US from idea to beta to 10,000+ store launch. Leader with 19 + years of successful product innovation experience in Payments, Loyalty and Consumer Products.   John:                Welcome everybody to this episode of Creative Futurism. My name’s John Best. Kevin:             And this is Kevin J. Anderson. John:                And today we have-and by the way, you’ve had all these amazing guests, so it’s my turn to bring someone amazing. And I’m excited for you to meet- Kevin:             -It’s about time you did some work. John:               I know. It’s about time I did something for this podcast. You can hear him laughing in the background there. I’d like to welcome- Kevin:             -You brought the joker onto our podcast. John:                I did. Speaking of that I’ve got one of your Superman books here. But just a friend of mine for a long time. He was the dude who was primarily one of the main players in the Starbucks app that you said you use frequently, right? Kevin:             Oh, all the time. John:                And my wife won’t even let me buy anything from Starbucks. If I try to buy it with cash or anything else- Kevin:             -Oh no, you don’t get the points. John:                Well, you don’t get the little stars in the cup, right? So that’s a big deal. But with us is Chuck Davidson. He’s the head of customer engagement right now for Card Free, but in a past life he worked for Starbucks. He’s also one of the most fascinating guys I’ve ever met in the sense of understanding how this goes. And we’re going to talk about the future of payments today. So we’re a little bit in my wheelhouse. A little less about the physics and the last time when everyone laughed at me when I wanted to shoot radioactive waste to the moon. Kevin:             That’s a dumb idea, dumb idea. John:                I realize that is a bad idea. But welcome Chuck, how are you? Chuck:           Dude, that would look so cool by the way. Okay, I’m doing great and I’m really glad to be a part of this and really excited to chat with you guys and our huge audience. Kevin:             Well, and the whole point of Creative Futurism is to be talking about creativity and business and technology and how it’s all changing because I think all of us at our age-and of course we’re very young and virile and muscular and stuff. But at our age it’s almost like hyperventilating every day. Because just everyday stuff is changing at warp speed. And I find that I can’t even update the apps on my phone fast enough because they keep changing. And you being involved with the Starbucks app, which if I remember reading your stuff right the most popular business- John:                -Number one mobile payment app in the world still. Kevin:             Yeah, that-I resisted it first being real grouchy. I just want to use my real gold card. But it’s so easy. And once they started using it I get annoyed when I go to someplace where they don’t have the reader. And I guess what we want to talk about is this podcast is about how we deal with the future and how much it’s changing. And particularly some of the unintended consequences of it. So that’s just my kind of little soapbox, I’ll turn it back to John. John:                Sure. So where I want to start with this is what was the promise of payments like? We’ve talked about this before. Kevin and I talked about in the book Dune, right? I assume you’ve read Dune at some point? Kevin:             Of course, everybody’s read Dune.   Chuck:            Everybody’s read Dune.

“Mark Lefebvre, director of author relations for Kobo, one of the largest eBook readers and distributors, talks about the dramatic shift in reading, publishing, and bookselling with the advent of electronic books and eReaders like Kobo. It’s the equivalent of the Industrial Revolution in reading.” For a full transcription click here 

Mark Lefebvre, director of author relations for Kobo, one of the largest eBook readers and distributors, talks about the dramatic shift in reading, publishing, and bookselling with the advent of electronic books and eReaders like Kobo. It’s the equivalent of the Industrial Revolution in reading. Kevin: Welcome to the Creative Futurism podcast, bringing together the worlds of business, technology, and creativity. This is Kevin J. Anderson. John: And this is John Best. You’ll look at the world and the future in a whole new way. Hello everyone, and welcome to this episode of Creative Futurism. My name is John Best. And we’re here to talk about cool stuff about the world, the future, business, weapons I guess in our past episodes. Pretty much anything’s game, right? Kevin: uh...Creativity. John: Creativity, the future, thus the name. And who do we got today? I know we’ve got something exciting going on here. Kevin: Well most of you people I assume know how to read. And I’m a writer so I like people who read. But you never thought that the technology of reading a book was going to completely dramatically change the entire world that we live in. We’re always used to picking up a paperback and flipping the pages. But something in about 2007, when the first Kindle came out. And it sort of changed everything. And people started reading on electronic readers. And you might have heard of Kindles or iPads but they’re not the only game in town. And in fact, there are several. There’s a Barnes & Noble Nook and there is the Kobo. Which is by Rakuten, it’s a company mainly based in Canada. And the guest that we have today is the director of self-publishing and chief of author relations for Kobo. And in fact, I have a Kindle, I have an iPad. But the one that I actually read my books on is my Kobo. I just kind of like the interface and I enjoy it. Mark Leslie Lefebvre, whose been a friend of mine for quite a while. And he’s also a really interesting guy with a lot of up to date stuff. He helped develop the Kobo writing life self-publishing platform. And he’s an expert on e-book publishing, e-book industry in general as well as national publishing. He’s also the President of the Canadian Book Seller’s Association. And Mark, welcome to our podcast. Mark: I’m delighted to be here Kevin. Thanks for having me. Kevin: Yeah, you thought I was going to keep reading paragraphs of his bio. John: I was expecting another half hour but it’s all good. Kevin: We’ve got lots of stuff to talk about. I think our audience is sort of a general audience. People that have probably their own Kindle or Kobo, read e-books and things. But maybe from the outside they don’t quite understand the absolute Hurricane Katrina or watershed that’s happening in the publishing industry since e-books have appeared. John: And by e-books you mean the e-book itself in terms of the actual book or do you mean the self-publishing format? Or both? Kevin: Well that’s I think both of the projects. I can certainly talk about it but we’ve got Mark as a guest. John: Yeah, that’s what I’m trying to understand. Kevin: Let’s turn Mark loose. Tell us about the changes in the industry. Because we authors who did all this thing felt like we had invested greatly in like Blockbuster video stores. And certainly it all vanished under us. John: You mean like those guys at Borders? Because that didn’t go well for them either. Mark: No, it didn’t go well. I mean so the funny thing about it, so when you think about digital reading and e-books it wasn’t really popular until maybe it was the Fall of 2006. The Sony PSR 500 came out that was the first really good e-book reader. The Kindle followed that the following year. And ironically, digital books or e-books were roughly forty years old by the time they really took off. John: Wait, did you say forty years? You said forty? Four zero? Mark: Four zero, yeah. Roughly yeah,