462B_Reflections with Ben Vass and Fanni Melles

<p>&quot;The future is here, just not evenly distributed.&quot;</p><p>Are you interested in urban conscious evolution and a hopeful future? What do you think about the saying: the future is here just not evenly distributed? How can we move towards better urban futures? </p><p>Special reflective episode with Ben Vass, senior research engineer and yours truly, Fanni Melles, future of cities researcher, discussing what the last five years of the podcast and the world have taught us. We will talk about energy abundance, not evenly distributed but already present futures, antifragility and residuality theory, human progress and hope, and many more. </p><p>Ben Vass is a senior research engineer, graph shaman and data magician who wants to build a Dyson swarm, explore the stars and understand consciousness. Standing between two worlds, he sees everything as a network of networks. He works on upgrading the world’s financial infrastructure for transparency and verifiability. And his voice might be familiar because he voiced the podcast intro. Ben is also my partner in crime in every sense.</p><p>My name is Fanni Melles, PhD and I am an architect, future of cities researcher and creator of the What is The Future for Cities? podcast. Hungarian-born and Melbourne-based, my PhD argued that generic solutions fail because every city is unique. I see cities as emergent properties of their people and want to help people shape places more consciously, creating urban conscious evolution.</p><p>And with Ben, we are expecting 2 new urban agents, thus, this seemed a good time to stop and reflect on the last five years of the podcast and look into the future before a major paradigm shift in our thinking.</p><p>Check out the <a href="https://wtf4cities.com/wtfbook/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferer">Building Better Cities book</a> which synthesises the last five years of the podcast, written by Fanni Melles.</p><p>Find out more about Ben through these links:</p><ul><li><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/ben-v-data/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Ben Vass</a> on LinkedIn</li><li><a href="https://www.bretthall.org/tokcast">⁠TokCast⁠</a> by Brett Hall</li><li><a href="https://www.thebeginningofinfinity.com/">⁠The beginning of infinity⁠</a> by David Deutsch</li></ul><p>Find out more about Fanni through these links:</p><ul><li><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/fanni-melles-phd-a7113350/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Fanni Melles</a> on LinkedIn</li><li><a href="https://fannimelles.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Fanni Melles</a> website</li><li><a href="https://twitter.com/fannimelles" target="_blank" rel="noopener">⁠@fannimelles</a> as Fanni Melles on X</li><li><a href="https://www.instagram.com/fannimelles/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">@fannimelles</a> as Fanni Melles on Instagram</li><li><a href="https://vitruvian.solutions/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Vitruvian Solutions</a> website</li><li><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/vitruvianurbanfutureexpert/home/?viewAsMember=true" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Vitruvian Solutions</a> on LinkedIn</li><li><a href="https://rtrfm.com.au/story/what-is-a-smart-city/">⁠Fanni Melles⁠</a> on RTRFM On Record program;</li><li><a href="https://www.rrr.org.au/explore/programs/byte-into-it/episodes/26013-byte-into-it-16-august-2023">⁠Fanni Melles⁠</a> on RRR ByteIntoIT radio;</li></ul><p>Find out more about the podcast through these links:</p><ul><li><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/what-is-the-future-for-cities-podcast/?viewAsMember=true" target="_blank" rel="noopener">WTF4Cities</a> on LinkedIn</li><li><a href="https://wtf4cities.com/2023/09/07/156i_fanni-melles-future-of-cities-researcher-and-podcast-host/wtf4cities.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">WTF4Cities</a> website</li><li><a href="https://twitter.com/WTF4Cities" target="_blank" rel="noopener">⁠@WTF4Cities⁠</a> as WTF4Cities on X</li><li><a href="https://www.instagram.com/w.t.f.4cities/" target="_blank" rel="noopen