Keen On

On yesterday’s show, Keith Teare mourned the scarcity of utopian thinking in Silicon Valley. But maybe Keith was looking on the wrong coast. Robert Wolcott, who teaches at the University of Chicago and is the chair of the World Innovation Network, recognizes the value of utopian idealism in his co-authored new book, Proximity: How Coming Breakthroughs in Just-in-Time Transform Business, Society and Life. As he told me, the just-in-time tech revolution of generative AI, 3D printing, lab-grown meats, renewable energy, and virtual reality is going to change everything. But what Wolcott can’t predict, he confesses, is whether all this radically disruptive new tech will lead us to utopia or to dystopia. Robert C. Wolcott is Adjunct Professor of Innovation at the Booth School of Business, University of Chicago, and Adjunct Professor of Executive Education at the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University. From 2010 – 2019, he served as Clinical Professor of Innovation and Entrepreneurship at Kellogg. Wol