Let’s Talk About the Future in 2026 with Kevin Kelly

Rule Breaker Investing

The Motley Fool

Business, Investing

4.4 • 959 Ratings

🗓️ 4 February 2026

⏱️ 63 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Kevin Kelly—founding editor of Wired magazine and a lifelong observer of technology in motion—returns to Rule Breaker Investing for a conversation about how the future actually shows up. We don’t trade in predictions here. Instead, Kevin shares ways of noticing long arcs, understanding why certain platforms and ideas compound, and staying optimistic without getting swept up in hype. From AI working alongside other AIs to the power of patience and perspective, this episode is an invitation to slow down just enough to see what really matters as change unfolds. Sign up for The Motley Fool’s Breakfast News here: ⁠⁠www.fool.com/breakfastnews⁠⁠ Order David’s Rule Breaker Investing book here: ⁠⁠https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1804091219/⁠⁠ Host: David GardnerGuest: Kevin KellyProducer: Bart Shannon Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	About this week's guest, founding editor of Wired Magazine Kevin Kelly, the longtime technology
0:05.7	journalist David Pogue had this to say, anyone can claim to be a profit, a fortune teller,
0:11.7	or a futurist, and plenty of people do. What makes Kevin Kelly different is that he's right.
0:18.9	Kevin has spent decades paying attention to what most of us rush past.
0:23.8	This week, he returns with that same calm, long-view perspective, unhurried, curious, quietly, provocative.
0:32.2	What does the future hold?
0:35.2	Only on this week's Rule Breaker Investing. It's the Rule Breaker Investing podcast
0:41.6	with Motley Full co-founder, David Gardner. Welcome back to Rule Breaker Investing. Well, I'm
0:50.3	absolutely delighted to welcome back Kevin Kelly to this podcast. I've had Kevin on a couple of times before, and each time it's such an enjoyable, well, for me anyway, I hope for our listeners too.
1:01.6	I don't know whether Kevin enjoys it or not, but it's such an enjoyable conversation.
1:05.7	And I do want to mention that Kevin started blogging again.
1:10.0	He's written so many things over the years, but on Substack in August of 2025.
1:14.6	And I noted that months ago. And I've just been reading each of his essays. As they come out every week or so.
1:21.7	And in conjunction with this week's podcast, I decide to be the guy who's not the cheap guy reading stuff for free on the
1:29.0	internet, which is what so many of us are. I'm actually now subscribing and paying at
1:34.5	Kevin Kelly.substack.com. And I truly believe, dear listener, that if you enjoy our conversation
1:41.0	this week, you should consider that as well. At least I would suggest read for free, but maybe it's worth subscribing to.
1:47.8	For me, it is.
1:48.7	Kevin Kelly is Senior Maverick at Wired Magazine, which he co-founded in 1993, where he served
1:54.3	as executive editor for its first seven years.
1:57.0	He's the author of multiple bestselling books about technology in the future, including, and I know we're going to go there once again here 10 years later, the Inevitable 2016 book. He's also a longtime board member of the Long Now Foundation, which is an organization dedicated to one of my favorite things, long-term thinking. And as of August 2025, as I mentioned, he's blogging again now on
2:19.3	Substack. And he is known for his radical optimism about the future. And that is also shared
	...

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