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The coronavirus pandemic has had a dramatic impact on the lives of everyone. The reaction by governments to the crisis has varied widely, but most countries have implemented some form of lockdown to reduce the spread of the virus.

With schools and businesses forced to close, and people restricted to limited movement outside of their homes, lockdowns have forced people to adapt to a new way of life. Whether working from home, attending lectures or catching up with friends, technology has facilitated the continuation of life.

While the lockdowns have been a challenge, there have been many positive outcomes from exercising more to eating fresh food to having more time with your family. The ease at which companies have adapted to remote working and the broader benefits this offers both the staff and the company, many are now considering becoming remote-first organisations.

The vast majority of people have complied with lockdown rules. A willingness to protect the general population and get back to ‘normal’, as quickly as possible, has meant most have accepted that they must temporarily give up some of their civil liberties. But there are now concerns that not all of the measures put in place will be temporary.

The old adage “never let a good crisis go to waste” has undoubtedly been true of this pandemic. Governments around the world are overreaching and implementing surveillance that they will likely be reluctant to relinquish, and the post-coronavirus world may be an Orwellian dystopia.

In this episode, I am joined by leading tech experts and futurists Jonathan Brill, Ross Dawson, Sam Lessin, Rob Reid and human rights activist, Alex Gladstein. We look at the good, bad and Orwellian technological changes in a post-coronavirus world.

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Coming soon…

Connect with the guests:

• Alex Gladstein on Twitter

• Jonathan Brill on LinkedIn

• Rob Reid on Twitter

• Ross Dawson on Twitter

• Sam Lessin on Twitter

Mentioned in the show:

• Wikipedia: George Orwell

• Wikipedia: Nineteen Eighty-Four

• BBC; Hong Kong police arrest hundreds and fire pepper pellets amid fresh unrest

• Wikpedia: Skynet (Terminator)

• Business Insider: China social credit system, punishments and rewards explained

• Wikipedia: Xi Jinping

• Forbes: Innovation Ultimatum: A Futurist Looks At How Business Can Use New Technology 

• Quartz: A futurist’s guide to managing the dire present 

• Slate: I Went to a Sex Party on Zoom 

• Rolling Stone: High-Tech Sex Toy Sales Rising During COVID-19 Pandemic 

• The Telegraph: China Uber-rates its citizens... A harmless nudge? Or sinister surveillance society? 

• Tech Crunch: Fortnite hosted a psychedelic Travis Scott concert and 12.3M people watched

• Engadget: Teledildonics gave me the gift of long-distance sex with a stranger

• Quartz: How coronavirus is changing education

• Voa News: Hungary Introduces Europe's Most Restrictive Media Law

• The Guardian: Coronavirus is now contaminating Europe's democracy | Jarosław Kuis and Karolina Wigura

• The Guardian: Facebook expects half of employees to work remotely over next five to 10 years

• YouTube: Rahm Emanuel on the Opportunities of Crisis

• The Guardian: Work after coronavirus: how will it change when the lockdown is over? 

• The New Yorker: A Study on Driverless-Car Ethics Offers a Troubling Look Into Our Values

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