Ian KhanHello, friends, this is Ian Khan and Today is August six. It’s a Thursday, and I’m super excited to be on this future readiness live stream with a really good friend of mine, Dr. Jonathan Reichental. Today is when his new book smart cities for dummies future debuts on on in the Canadian market. And there’s a lot to talk about. There’s tons of people registered for this. And we’re going to get started and talk about the emergence of smart cities. What do they really mean for us? Why should we care? Why Jonathan wrote that book? And we’re going to ask him some personal questions. Why did you write the book and there’s a ton of great questions that are coming along. If you’re watching this, then you’re probably either on YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn, live, or Twitter. And please keep your comments coming. I can receive them here at the back end. And we’ll take questions as we go on. And we’re super excited to to be here. Let me do this. Let me introduce Jonathan, as I know him, and and how we met and and how he came into the picture and how I came into his into into the picture as well. So Jonathan, and I, we’ve worked on some really amazing initiatives. Over the last few years, we’ve done some work with the government of the UAE, United Arab Emirates, the Prime Minister’s office in the UAE. And one thing led to the other. And here we are collaborating on on a podcast on a live stream. When Johnson wrote started writing this book, I was really excited, because the industry does not have a book like this. Yes, we have a lot of information about smart cities, but nothing that explains it to us in a way that he’s done in smart cities for Dummies. And that’s it. That’s really it. Without any further ado, let me bring Jonathan on board. And we will take it from there. Jonathan, welcome to econ show. And this is the future readiness live stream. And we are debuting two things today we’re debuting a series that I’m calling the future readiness live stream. This is all about future readiness. What do you do in your business, career life, and so on. And also, we’re doing the Canadian launch for your book, which my friend we have right here as well is smart cities for Dummies. There you go. All our viewers, this book is incredible. You’ve got to buy it. And I’ll send you a link on this in the next few minutes. Jonathan, tell me about yourself. Where did you come from? Like Where? Who are you give me a background.

Jonathan ReichentalThank you. And hey, it’s so great to see you at the chat with you. Yeah, I consider you such a great friend and a mentor and an inspiration for me. So it’s great to be talking with you today. Last time we spoke I had you on my little podcast drinking wine talking tech and that that was wonderful. You were talking about your your new documentary that you’re working on regarding artificial intelligence. So thanks for the question. I’m, I’m, by the way, just thrilled to be launching smart cities for dummies in Canada today. One of my favorite places in the country that I go to often. I go to Toronto a lot, and many other places. So it’s just a thrill. And I hope that I get to see many of my friends there again and colleagues. So some people the first thing they recognize with me is my accents, right? Where they kind of try to figure it out. They think you know, there’s an American accent there. But is there English or South African in there? And I’ll tell you, I was born in Ireland, in Ireland and Dublin City, and grew up there. I came to the United States as a young adult with a suitcase and a green card. And that was it. No job. No one I I did when I got here. I did stay with some second cousins in Florida. But I was starting life a new and it was just you know,