21 Experts on the Future of Expertise

The generative intellectual environments that academic institutions house and foster are being recreated or entirely rethought online, outside of the brick walls of a university. Internet salons, writer collectives, open-source software, fellowships, and cohort-based courses are providing modern alternatives to those institutions. You don’t need an... See more

Hollis Robbins: Most people focus on the vast reserves of content now available online, but few people ask: “Is this a good teacher?”

Youyang Gu: I was an untrained data scientist with zero prior experience in infectious diseases, but I became known as an “expert” in COVID-19. Not that I did it alone — my model was a crowdsourced effort, because I received help and advice from countless individuals on social media. Advancements in technology and dismantling barriers to communicat... See more

Matt Clifford: The internet prizes showing, not telling, whether via a GitHub profile, YouTube channel, a Substack newsletter, or even a timestamped tweet that makes a prediction. Don’t tell me you’re an expert, show me.

Auren Hoffman: It used to be that “who you know” — not “what you know” — held the most value. But in the last 15 years, it has become much more important to build something than to know people.

Tamara Winter: While most experts acknowledge the importance of seeking input from people like this — that is, those with skin in the game — when making decisions, it happens so rarely in practice. It’s not hard to think of examples of this phenomenon across very different industries, from education to healthcare, to city planning and administratio... See more

Fadeke Adegbuyi: The command and deep understanding of a subject has been decoupled from credentialism. Experts can be born and brought up on the internet, bypassing post-secondary institutions and other centralized forms of education and knowledge dissemination….Additionally, the rate at which the internet allows for information to be generated an... See more

Patrick Wyman: We’re not dealing with a crisis of expertise itself as much as a crisis of explanation. Far too many disciplines (most notably, epidemiology and public health over the last year) have run face-first into their inability to make the general public understand what they’re saying and why. .. All disciplines have their own technical lang... See more

Holly Liu: By changing the economics of expertise in gaming, virtual game worlds today can impact the real world, for the first time. With trends such as play-to-earn games, the rise of livestreaming, and the growing contingent of esports pros, players — not just game publishers! — can now create value for the entire community and get paid. Experti... See more