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Dr Mark van Rijmenam, CSP

Dr Mark van Rijmenam, CSP

Dr. Mark van Rijmenam is a strategic futurist known as The Digital Speaker. He globally ranked as the #1 futurist. He stands at the forefront of the digital age and lives and breathes cutting-edge technologies to inspire Fortune 500 companies and governments worldwide. As an optimistic dystopian, he has a deep understanding of AI, blockchain, the metaverse, and other emerging technologies, blending academic rigor with technological innovation.

His pioneering efforts include the world’s first TEDx Talk in VR in 2020. In 2023, he further pushed boundaries when he delivered a TEDx talk in Athens with his digital twin, delving into the complex interplay of AI and our perception of reality. In 2024, he launched a digital twin of himself, offering interactive, on-demand conversations via text, audio, or video in 29 languages, thereby bridging the gap between the digital and physical worlds – another world’s first.

Dr. Van Rijmenam is a prolific author and has written more than 1,200 articles and five books in his career. As a corporate educator, he is celebrated for his candid, independent, and balanced insights. He is also the founder of Futurwise, which focuses on elevating global knowledge on crucial topics like technology, healthcare, and climate change by providing high-quality, hyper-personalized, and easily digestible insights from trusted sources.

Below, you can read all his articles.

GPT-4.5: A Pricey Upgrade or a ‘Nothingburger’?

AI just got an update… but is GPT-4.5 more evolution than revolution? OpenAI’s latest model is bigger, costlier, and ‘a little bit better,’ but not where it really matters.

The AI Speed Race Just Got Interesting

Forget slow-loading AI responses. Text diffusion models just rewrote the rulebook. Mercury Coder, a new diffusion-based AI, generates text 19x faster than GPT-4o Mini. But can speed alone redefine AI, or are we just trading accuracy for acceleration?

China’s AI Champion: DeepSeek’s Meteoric Rise

China’s AI ambitions just took a giant leap forward. DeepSeek is spreading faster than ChatGPT in a Silicon Valley boardroom, but is this AI revolution real, or just a state-backed PR push?

AI-Powered Surveillance: The Game No One Admits Playing

Turns out, AI isn’t just making deepfakes and writing poetry. It’s also debugging surveillance tools that governments conveniently pretend don’t exist.

Innovation Economy: The New Hard Skill Era

The knowledge economy is dead. Welcome to the innovation economy, where soft skills become the new hard skills.

The End of the Engine: Why Ford’s Rock Stars Are Being Replaced by Coders

For a century, engineers were the rock stars of the auto industry. Now, they’re being replaced by chemists and coders. As Ford pivots to EVs, engine specialists are expendable, their intricate craft reduced to a modular, software-driven process. Is this progress, or is the aut...

AI, Oil, and Power: Why Jürgen Schmidhuber is Betting on Saudi Arabia

AI is the new oil, and Saudi Arabia is determined not to miss this boom. While the West debates ethics and China refines existing models, Saudi Arabia is pouring trillions into AI research, aiming to leapfrog traditional tech powers.

Innovate, Imitate, Regulate - Pick Your Poison

The future isn’t built—it’s fought over. In 2025, nations aren’t just developing technology; they’re waging a war of strategy: The U.S. races ahead, China copies and refines, and Europe lives in regulatory purgatory. But here’s the catch: none of these paths guarantee success.

Liquid Metal? No, Just Shape-Shifting Robots

The Terminator T-1000 isn’t here (yet), but scientists have built robots that can flow like liquid, solidify into tools, and even hold a human’s weight. Welcome to the next era of robotics, where machines don’t just move, they morph.