We as users of technology also have choice in how we use it. Exhibit A: A New Zealand community developed on Twitter in the midst of gamergate & other toxic behavior. They annually conducted a secret Santa gift exchange w/in the community via Twitter. We don’t have to buy into the dopamine behavior
I work in tech now only because of my love of how computers used to connect real people - now I'm so defeated and depressed at how 'money men' are seeking to use tech to replace those connections with something they can profit off of.
The immediate (geek male) response is to want to propose solutions - but the idea that there is a single, fixed, "right" way to solve these things is mistaken.
Better is to grow the critical muscles to identify failures and challenges, and to grow the environment where many answers can proliferate.
I bought into the big tech hype as a young teenager just as Facebook was going mainstream, and the reporters who told me these companies were ushering in utopia should have known better. My techno-optimism was leveraged against me. Thank you for using your platform to call this shit out.
I'm not sure if I've ever responded to one of your posts, but thank you for highlighting how bad things have gotten and emphasizing how much better things could be. Your newsletter and podcast are essential documents of the decline of our online experience.
There are many who will agree with this sentiment. Looking forward to reading the rest of your take. It’s a great travesty how the algorithm was allowed to weaponize social media and online communications and hurt the most vulnerable of our society.
As someone deeply interested in consciousness but with no meaningful knowledge of tech, your sardonic rants are the sublime descant to a visceral suspicion I’ve always had that these algorithms aren’t & never will be conscious, they’re just clever counting sequences that lazy ‘intellectuals’ wank to
I really admire your reporting. I want to also be a writer and report what I'm seeing, someone has to not only archive the daily horror but also share what can be done. I would love to learn more about your writing process, if you'd be willing to offer some tips I would greatly appreciate it!
It's very validating to know that someone smarter than me and an experienced and knowledgeable professional in his field is angry about the exact same things as me. Love your essays, keep it up.
If you perceived all these problems on your own, give yourself a little more credit. It’s complicated, sure, but it’s honestly not as complicated as one might assume. We all have the simple natural capacity to look at these things critically, and recognize when 2+2 doesn’t make 5.
To bridge off of this: i do not sit there thinking i am smarter than anyone and doing so would never serve me or my readers/listeners. Like Lloyd said, if you're noticing these things, you're plenty smart and aware. Talk to your friends. Help them see it too. Tell them who's responsible.
I’m consistently amazed, as I come to understand things that are admittedly very complicated at surface, how simple they often are at root. Whatever people are lying about today, the motivation for the lie is virtually always the same. And the lies, ultimately, are quite alike themselves.
one of the things that has always been most distasteful to me is the liberal assertion that there is no time in history that was better than the present. tech robber barrons have finally made that idea untenable but few are willing to admit that the deal they offer us sucks
Can't thank you enough for expressing on a large platform what I feel is the appropriate amount of anger about this shit, it's been extremely cathartic for me to hear it
This is why we need tech journalists like you Ed. There are way too many that are unwilling to truly gaze into the abyss, see it for what it is, and speak the truth.
I’m on an A.I. “task force” at my university, and you have definitely fueled my growing reputation as the departmental heretic who is always challenging everyone’s “but it’s going to be a revolution” takes. And I thank you for this.
Comments
Better is to grow the critical muscles to identify failures and challenges, and to grow the environment where many answers can proliferate.
It’s a challenge but doable. And they just don’t.
how do we change that
Not sure if they would though, haha.
🤝