Welcome back to our regular Friday feature, The Future in Five Questions. Today we’ve got Nick Clegg, Meta’s president of global affairs and former Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. Read on to hear his thoughts on — you guessed it — the potential of the metaverse, the open internet and the war in Ukraine. Responses have been edited for length and clarity. What’s one underrated big idea? You’d expect me to say this, but I really do think the social and economic potential of the metaverse is huge. Imagine for a moment what the next generation of internet technologies — things like virtual reality or augmented reality — could mean for education and training. We will be able to learn by doing, from just about anywhere. A student in Singapore could attend a seminar hosted by a professor in London. A school class in Omaha could take a field trip to Stonehenge or the Pyramids. Med students could practice surgeries without risk to patients. First responders could train without being put in dangerous situations. To say we’ve barely scratched the surface of the opportunities these technologies create is an understatement of epic proportions. What’s a technology you think is overhyped? Space tourism. I’m not against space exploration at all, but when I read some of the hyperbole about our future lives beyond planet Earth, I just worry it’s a form of techno-escapism. It’s the here and now on terra firma we should be focusing on. What book most shaped your conception of the future? I don’t know about most shaping my conception of the future, but I recently read The Wake Up Call by John Mickelthwaite and Adrian Wooldridge. It’s a really insightful essay about the decline of the West versus the East, how it was exposed during the pandemic and some of the ways it could be reversed. It has lots of food for thought for policymakers, and they propose a number of very sensible reforms — housing, pensions, R&D investment, political reform, a more entrepreneurial approach to education, etc. But it’s very much a snapshot in time that captures the global landscape during the early stages of the pandemic. It looks like they may have overstated how well things were likely to pan out for China. What could government be doing regarding tech that it isn’t? Defending the open internet. The borderless and largely free internet that you and I use every day is under threat in a way it never has been before. The rise of China’s authoritarian internet model — with citizens segregated from the rest of the global internet and subject to extensive surveillance — is taking hold elsewhere. Russia was already moving in this direction before the internet clampdown that accompanied its invasion of Ukraine. Others, like Turkey, have made moves to build digital walls at their national boundaries. And a worrying strain of digital nationalism has crept into the debate in democratic societies too. But we can’t just sit and watch as the character of the internet changes to one which is fragmented, heavily censored and weaponized towards cyber-warfare. Democracies must do much more to actively promote and defend the idea of the open internet. What has surprised you most this year? The unity of the Western response to Russian aggression in Ukraine. I’ve been a huge champion of European and transatlantic cooperation throughout my career — not always a popular stance in British politics — but I was surprised by just how forceful the response has been and how quickly leaders rallied together behind Ukraine. I just hope that momentum and unity survive in the crucial months and years ahead.
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