Sam Talks Technology

Sam talked with Glenn about the entrepreneurial journey he has had to travel in order to reach this point of success. The challenges of up-scaling, fundraising in the US, letting staff go and stepping aside to let another CEO run the show.

Sam Sethi talked with Hugh MacLeod about his amazing business cards and where he gets his inspiration, his books and his work with Gaping Void.Hugh and I first met in 2005 in central London at the Tex Mex in Trafalgar Square at an event with Robert Scoble. Hugh was kind enough to do me a unique drawing for the launch of Techcrunch UK in 2006 which hangs on the wall of my study.Hugh is one of the most creative and lateral thinking people I have had the pleasure to meet in my 30+ career in technology. - Sam SethiHugh explained that he nearly gave up creating his mini masterpieces. I am so glad he decided to review that awful decision.

Sam Sethi talked with Noury Bernard-Hasan about his 16 year Microsoft career as Director, Global Analyst Relations and his recent switch to Amazon, as well as his music career with The Touch - 70s Mod group.We also talked about my prediction for a new Amazon 'Phoenix' Phone, the future of Alexa and his upcoming music revival gig in London.

Sam Sethi talked with Robert Scoble about what is Spatial Computing? We talked about Facebook's new PC-free Oculus Quest (£499) and the higher end Oculus Rift S which just came out and how they could really be game changers in the VR gaming world but also in many other industries including health, education and entertainment.We also discussed the new Google Glass Enterprise Edition 2 (which costs £999) it's a newer version of its business-focused Glass augmented reality headset.Robert also gave us his insight about what and when Apple might release the 5G iPhone and possibly Apple glasses?Other companies we discussed include Amazon, MagicLeap, Bose and Unity.Robert's BooKScoble is writing a new book about Spatial Computing and recording his thoughts using Otter.AI to transcribe his thoughts.

Sam Sethi talked with Dan Scarfe about how NewSignature help companies of all shapes and sizes make major investments around Microsoft technologiesWe also talked about the impending 'Cloud Wars' between Google, Amazon, Microsoft and some of the other players such as Alibaba and IBM plus who might win.

Sam Sethi talked with Paul Walsh about how MetaCert is building a query and response web protocol on the Blockchain that enables a 'Decentralized Trust and Reputation Protocol' for the Internet. e.g imagine being able to look up the record for every domain and see who has owned it and what it was used for overtime.Think of this as a distributed and trusted newer version of WhoIs Domain Lookup but with more detailed information, that is validated by the community who are paid in 'Tokens' to ensure its validity and maintained over time.Then in the future, the information stored on the MetaCert Protocol can be used by developers using an API to build products or services to address issues such as phishing, malware, brand protection, child safety, and fake news credibility.

Sam Sethi talked with Paul Ayres about the future of your street. From Electric Vehicle (EV) charging points for cars, bikes & buses to the future rollout, potential benefits but also the current limits of 5G today.The biggest talking point was around the terabytes of data collection this enables and how AI will be used to build smarter cities that flow and are less polluted.Paul also talked about his days as European MD of Netscape (he was my boss) and the 'browser wars' as well as his time as GM Europe of Real Media and the early days of video streaming which led us to discuss the current 'content wars' between Amazon Prime, Netflix and the recently announced Apple TV +

Sam talked with Josh about how Techfugees have used technology to "empower the displaced".Josh is also the co-founder of Tech For UK which tried to engage communities from all over the UK to fight Brexit and campaign for a meaningful vote on the terms of Brexit using tech and social media.

Sam talked with Peter about the future of VC funding and the new role of the Chief Funding Officer, as well as the changes needed in education to develop the next generation of entrepreneurs

Sam talked with Nicole about her new book, Rough Diamonds - Turning Disruption Into Advantage in Business and Life. We talk about her early life, her career influences and how she setup the Ogilvy Lab.Nicole was formerly the Director of Ogilvy Innovation Labs

Sam talked with Jane about the changing world of e-commerce and the rapidly growing role of Experiential Marketing - what it means for retailers, how it challenges traditional CRM and loyalty marketing practices both online & offline?Experiential marketing is a growing trend which involves marketing a product or a service through experiences that engage the customers and create an emotional attachment to the product/service.Physical and interactive experiences are used to reinforce the offer of a product and make customers feel as if they are part of them.Experiences are positively related to customer's attitudes, mood and behaviours. They also represent a means through which a company can gain a competitive advantage by differentiating itself from competitors.To achieve success, experience should be engaging, compelling and able to touch the customer's senses and capture his/her loyalty.Nowadays, experiential marketing is getting more technologically advanced and personalised. The widespread of the Inter

Sam talked with Lopa about white privilege, the tech engineer bros culture and how these engineers are developing algorithms to be biased towards their views on sexism & racism which is why diversity really matters across companies and in the boardroom both gender and ethnicity.We discussed how the non-western world is culturally different and is adopting the web differently to how we in the west adopted it.

The first Google employee hired outside of the US.  She went on to be Google's UK MD before running AOL, Bebo, DailyMotion and BuzzFeed in Europe.  Today she is a VC partner at Hambro Perks.   We talked about her early days selling online classified adverts at The Sun and blinking banner ads for AltaVista.  How Google changed online advertising forever and became the cash cow behemoth it is today. We discussed the rapid growth of Google and it's 'don't be evil' culture and how Kate fought for diversity against the bros-culture found in the US.  And finally, we discussed some of the major challenges facing Google today from EU regulation over copyright and threats to break it up for being anti-competitive, through to the higher tax levy proposed for online giants like Google in Europe, as well as the opportunity and threat of voice search.     As the web turns 30 this week, Kate can safely say she has been there, seen it, done it and even has the many t-shirts!!!

Sam talked with Katz about her early days as a Punk Singer, theatre designer and digital innovator through to her epiphany at Burning Man that led to her work in digital transformation for large corporations.

Sam talked with Matt Hodges-Long about the numerous 'Privacy & Data' breaches in 2018 that compromised the personal information of millions of people around the world.Some of the biggest victims in 2018 include T-Mobile, Quora, Google, and Orbitz. Facebook dealt with a slew of major breaches and incidents that affected more than 100 million users of the popular social network.Matt helped us understand how companies can manage this privacy & data risk before they face significant GDPR fines.We also discussed my idea of Company Directors needing a license to start and run a company. We don't allow people to drive a car or speed boat without a license but we do allow any Tom, Dick or Harriette to start a company for less than £100.Just knowing what your fiduciary duties are as a director and what you need to file before you start on your next big idea would seem sensible. Equally refreshing the license every few years would allow Directors to keep abreast of the latest developments.

Sam talked with Sarah  about the recent announcements from Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, namely foldable phones from Samsung, Huawei and numerous phones launching/claiming to support 5G already! We also talked about the recent trend in companies helping us take back ownership and control of our data such as Sir Tim Berners-Lee's Solid and Sarah's company Digi.me Will Web 4.0 be all about unlocking/reclaiming our data from silos like Facebook & Twitter. Will we get paid for our time and attention in bitcoin tokens like the Brave browser by Brendan Eich? 

Sam talked with Benjamin about Governments v GAFA (Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon). Will governments take back control or will they lose all control?From the potential new EU tax link & copyright filtering laws, fake news removal, through to the new proposed social media taxes, the GAFA's are under attack for more EU regulation.The UK parliament even issued a damning verdict today on Facebook and said, "Companies like Facebook should not be allowed to behave like ‘digital gangsters’ in the online world, considering themselves to be ahead of and beyond the law"We will also discuss Kevin Kelly's new article in Wired called MirrorWorlds 'the dawn of the third internet platform’ which is the one I am most excited about.

Sam talked with Charlie and Thomas about what is a blockchain and why you might need it? We also talked about what apps sit on the blockchain, such as cryptocurrencies, tokens and smart documents.We talked about what is an ICO and is it a better way for startups to raise money using tokens instead of equity shares? We also talked about the newly announced bank backed STO's. And finally, when will this securely distributed ledger (web 3.0) finally go mainstream?If you want to learn everything about the blockchain and cryptocurrencies, then this podcast will break it all down for you and piece it altogether to describe how we are going to build the distributed web 3.0 and the dark web in this coming decade.

Sam talked with Raj about Machine Learning (AI). We took a deep dive focus on the role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the future of home/work. We discussed the differences between narrow, general and super AI.We also discussed the 'big nine' corporations--Amazon, Google, Facebook, Tencent, Baidu, Alibaba, Microsoft, IBM and Apple--who are the new gods of AI and how they are short-changing our futures to reap immediate financial gain.

Sam talked with Lucy about the changing role of HR, employee activism, speak up culture, social responsibility of companies and corporate ethics and much more about the future of work!