Kevin Kelly

Kevin Kelly

Founding Editor, WIRED

Kevin Kelly

Kevin Kelly is Senior Maverick at WIRED magazine. He co-founded WIRED in 1993, and served as its Executive Editor for its first seven years. His newest book is The Inevitable, a New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller. He is founder of the popular Cool Tools website, which has been reviewing tools daily for 20 years. From 1984-1990 Kelly was publisher and editor of the Whole Earth Review, a subscriber-supported journal of unorthodox conceptual news. He co-founded the ongoing Hackers’ Conference, and was involved with the launch of the WELL, a pioneering online service started in 1985. Other books by Kelly include 1) Out of Control, the 1994 classic book on decentralized emergent systems, 2) The Silver Cord, a graphic novel about robots and angels, 3) What Technology Wants, a robust theory of technology, and 4) Vanishing Asia, his 50-year project to photograph the disappearing cultures of Asia. He is currently co-chair of The Long Now Foundation, which is building a clock in a mountain that will tick for 10,000 years.

The future with rays of light in the background.
30 min
Debunking doomerism: 4 futurists on why we’re actually not f*cked
Four visionaries—Kevin Kelly, Peter Schwartz, Ari Wallach, and Tyler Cowen—share their insights on the future, urging viewers to consider the impact of their actions on future generations.
Illustration of a spacecraft, an astronaut, and a planet against a dark purple background.
36 min
How should we be thinking about the future?
Kmele talked with a planetary scientist, a physicist, and a futurist, to understand how visionaries across disciplines are thinking about the future of our planet and humankind.
Illustration of a volcanic eruption with thick clouds of smoke, ash, and flowing lava rising from the volcano’s crater.
7 min
Stop chasing utopia. Create “protopia” instead.
Pessimism sounds smart. Optimism sounds dumb. Don’t fall for it, says Wired’s Kevin Kelly.
John Templeton Foundation
7 min
How we build the future
WIRED founder Kevin Kelly explains why progress often looks like dystopia to the untrained eye.