Being Curious in 2025
The Best Reports on the year ahead
In addition to this newsletter, I recommend some other great ones. All free. Check them out here.
Friends,
Welcome back to normality!
Are you ready for the year?
Is 2025 already feeling overwhelming?
Some of you may have already already read/skimmed my report that I shared on New Year’s Day. I did the obvious thing and got the audio discussed by two friends (who you may be familiar with!). Instead of skimming the report before deep diving, feel free to listen to this:
Or you can listen to this on the Box of Amazing Podcast on Spotify
I received feedback and questions about which reports I recommend. Based on your interests, below are 15 reports worth considering to stay ahead of the game.
This is great material for aspiring game changers, leaders, entrepreneurs, strategy leads, investors, MBA students, or anyone with a curious mind.
One of the reasons I keep doing this is curiosity. The world is moving faster than ever before - and if you’re not au fait with where the world is moving, you will, at some point, make the wrong decision. You may also miss the boat on where you should be. So while I’m a little bit of a nerd when it comes to trends, I think of it as a necessity for myself, and a service to y’all. Maybe you will pick up on something interesting from the list that will help you traverse the age.
Thes are the reports worth checking out - Worth forwarding to friends and family with a curious mind. Or to those you want to be curious!
The List of Best Reports on 2025
25 things we think will happen in 2025 - Vox
The Next Big Thing in 2025 - Next Big Thing
Big Ideas in Tech in 2025 - A16z
50 Themes to watch out for in 2025 - Rahim Hirji
2025 Trend Forecasts Narain Jashanmal
200 reports Curated by Amy Daroukakis et al
Tom Standage’s ten trends to watch in 2025 - The Economist
A few things I expect to see in 2025… Scott Belsky
Tech Trends 2025 - Deloitte
25 Tech Predictions for 2025 - The Pourquoi Pas
6 consumer trends to watch in 2025 - GWI
Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends For 2025 - Gartner
The Era of Initiative - Foresight Factory
Tech That Will Change Your Life in 2025 - WSJ
European Tech in 2025 - Sifted
Wish you a successful year in 2025!
Stay Curious - and don’t forget to be amazing,
Here are my recommendations for this week:
One of the best tools to provide excellent reading and articles for your week is Refind. It’s a great tool for keeping ahead with “brain food” relevant to you and providing serendipity for some excellent articles that you may have missed. You can dip in and sign up for weekly, daily or something in between -what’s guaranteed is that the algorithm sends you only the best articles in your chosen area. It’s also free. Highly recommended Sign up.
Now
52 things I learned in 2024 - Annual genius piece from Tom Whitwell covering a compendium of extracted facts from all over. Enjoy!
86 Stories of Progress from 2024 - Not everything that happened this year was terrible.
My default apps of 2024 - A good analysis of someone’s changing app usage pattern year on year. If only, this is good to check if you haven’t considered a specific app/workflow. Also, Fave AI Apps of the Year
How do you solve a problem like Elon Musk? - The “chameleon” tech billionaire is one of the most powerful politically connected people in the world. Europe’s governments are still working out how to deal with being on his bad side. He wields immense political and technological power, leaving European governments grappling with how to manage their reliance on his ventures while avoiding his ire. As the architect behind transformative companies like Tesla, SpaceX, and X, Musk’s influence spans critical industries, from green energy to space exploration and social media. His unpredictable behaviour, controversial public stances, and readiness to challenge regulators make him both an indispensable partner and a formidable challenge for governments seeking to balance cooperation with accountability. Europe continues to navigate this complex relationship, recognizing both the opportunities and risks of engaging with Musk's expansive empire.
The 50 most exciting TV shows for your 2025 watch list - The year is full of long-awaited returns and exciting new premieres. Apparently, there’s some excitement that Suits is back.
Next
By default, capital will matter more than ever after AGI - As artificial general intelligence (AGI) looms, this post highlights a potential societal upheaval: the growing dominance of capital over human labour. With AGI capable of replacing most human work, society's incentives to prioritise human welfare could diminish, leading to entrenched power structures and diminished human agency. While universal basic income (UBI) might alleviate material scarcity, the shift could stifle ambition, outlier success, and social mobility, cementing a static, unequal order reminiscent of feudal hierarchies. The optimistic vision of a dynamic post-scarcity utopia is tempered by the risk of AI-driven plutocracies, leaving us to ponder how to preserve human relevance and agency in a rapidly transforming world. The takeaway? The age of AI may be the last, fleeting moment to seize human ambition and dynamism before the sands of innovation settle into an unyielding mould. Dark times.
Thoughts on the eve of AGI - As we stand on the precipice of artificial general intelligence (AGI), this thread captures both the awe and apprehension of this moment. With rapid advancements like OpenAI's o3 models, capable of tackling complex reasoning and automating tasks at an unprecedented scale, Bryk paints a near-future where professions from mathematics to software engineering are redefined, and where AGI may even revolutionize science and robotics. Yet, amidst this technological upheaval, he warns of existential risks: societal instability, geopolitical misuse, and the erosion of meaning in human work. This era is an opportunity for collective progress rather than individual obsolescence, urging humanity to harness this transformative power responsibly to secure a spectacular future.
AI decodes the calls of the wild - Artificial intelligence could reveal how animals of the land, sea and sky talk to others of their species. AI is revolutionizing the study of animal communication, offering unprecedented insights into how creatures like whales, elephants, and crows interact. Researchers, aided by machine learning, are decoding complex vocal patterns, such as sperm whales' "codas" and elephants' rumbling calls, revealing unique identifiers akin to names and even cultural dialects. While breakthroughs like the discovery of a sperm whale "alphabet" promise deeper understanding, experts caution that AI is no shortcut to unlocking full comprehension of animal languages. The ultimate goal extends beyond communication to conservation, with hopes that this knowledge will foster greater empathy and more effective protection for endangered species.
Things we learned about LLMs in 2024 - In 2024, Large Language Models (LLMs) saw significant advancements, reshaping the field of AI. The dominance of GPT-4 was shattered as over 70 models surpassed its benchmarks, highlighting rapid innovation and competition among tech giants like Google, OpenAI, and Meta. LLM prices plummeted, driven by efficiency gains and competition, making these tools more accessible. Multimodal capabilities expanded, integrating text, vision, audio, and even live video, while longer context lengths enabled complex use cases like analyzing entire books or large datasets. The environmental impact of individual prompts improved due to efficiency, but the broader infrastructure buildout raised ecological concerns. "Agents" remained elusive due to challenges like gullibility and prompt injection. Meanwhile, synthetic training data and inference-scaling models emerged as game-changing trends. Despite these strides, LLMs became harder to use effectively, emphasizing the need for better user education and criticism.
Founder mode and the art of mythmaking - Brian Chesky’s recent reflections on Airbnb’s challenges and turnaround during the pandemic have reignited debates around “founder mode,” a leadership style championing hands-on CEO involvement. While Chesky credits his intense scrutiny and streamlining efforts for Airbnb’s recovery, critics like Charity Majors argue his narrative reeks of self-aggrandizement and dismissiveness toward employees. Majors highlights the dangers of glorifying founder-centric leadership, warning it fosters hierarchical cultures and stifles innovation. While Chesky’s insights on efficiency and leadership presence hold merit, his tone and refusal to acknowledge his own missteps raise concerns about the Silicon Valley “cult of the founder.”
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