Simon Shuster is a journalist with over 15 years of experience covering Russia and Ukraine, primarily as a TIME Magazine correspondent. Born in Moscow, he and his family moved to the U.S. as refugees when he was six. After graduating from Stanford University in 2005, Simon returned to Moscow, working as a reporter for The Moscow Times, Reuters, the Associated Press, and others, focusing on Russia’s political climate and leaders. He has profiled and interviewed Ukraine’s last three presidents and covered the Ukraine war extensively. Russia banned him in 2014 as a security threat.
Simon authored the 2024 book “The Showman: Inside the Invasion That Shook the World and Made a Leader of Volodymyr Zelensky” and wrote a TIME Magazine article, “How Ukraine Gamified Drone Warfare.” He is currently writing a new book on warfare’s future and the impact of Ukrainian conflict technologies.
On the podcast with Kevin Ball, they discuss drone warfare, AI targeting, drone combat gamification, innovation cycles, ethical dilemmas, drone proliferation, and shifting global power dynamics.
Kevin Ball, or KBall, is the VP of Engineering at Mento, a coach for engineers, a co-founder, and CTO of two companies, founder of the San Diego JavaScript meetup, and organizer of AI inaction discussions.
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