The Uplift Podcast

Trust is the social glue which holds our communities together and once it’s diminished there are profound consequences for culture, society and economies. Author Rachel Botsman contends that we are at the beginning of the biggest trust revolution in history. Where we once placed our trust in institutions like banks, media and government, we’re now likely to place more trust in strangers via technology. The rise of multi-billion-dollar companies such as Airbnb and Uber, whose success depends on trust between strangers, is a clear illustration of how trust can now travel through networks and marketplaces. But she argues that we’re also beginning to lose trust in the new companies, like Facebook and Uber, which replaced the old ones. How (do) we actually preserve this very precious asset that enables us to do things and take risks, and place our faith in remarkable people and places and things where we don’t know the outcome. She’s urging us to take a ‘trust pause’ and examine the relationships and technologies