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I'm not sure any of this is exclusive to tech and so abandoning tech in hopes of something else isn't going to change much. For instance, you bring up how much

I'm not sure any of this is exclusive to tech and so abandoning tech in hopes of something else isn't going to change much. For instance, you bring up how much of it is about ads and how pervasive they are, this exists outside of tech as well. Billboards everywhere, posters on apartments and buses, this is what happens without strict regulations. Another point you bring up is not trusting computers because of their complexity, but that's everything. We don't trust car engines because we understand them, we instead have regulations in which when things do fuck up (and then inevitably do), creators are punished for them and learn not to do it again. You might say car engines are tech, in which case let's talk food! You trust eating some place not because the chef is some talent blessed by god or your sixth sense, but because the restaurant would have shut down when health inspectors came around. I don't have to talk about slave labor here, it's obvious. Rushkoff doesn't even agree with the idea tech is rotted and we should try something different, but rather the primary focus of each innovation should be humans and not money. Which isn't happening currently in a majority of fields, tech is just one of these where it's exacerbated due to how little it's been regulated. Again something Rushkoff brings up in his potential solutions.

Syonyk 3y ago
Advertising is as old as humans, certainly. But there's also a general difference, as I see it, between "the same for everyone" sort of broad advertising (billboards and the like), vs the "customized for each person, to the benefit of the payer" sort of thing we see on the internet - and have seen regularly abused for all sorts of nasty ends (see any time politics and Twitter or Meta end up in the news). As for engines... yeah. We're just going to have to disagree there. I understand engines pretty well, and am familiar with roughly the last 100 years or so of them in various forms. I work on them, can reason about them, and they're generally a fairly simple set of electrical and mechanical systems. I'm not sure what your point about regulations actually is - I don't believe we have reliable engines because of regulations, but because "the companies who figured out how to build reliable engines" rather outsold those who built 100k mile engines. And if you trust health inspectors and restaurants, well, you probably don't know many people in food service. I also don't eat out that often. What's obvious about slave labor, though? That literally every bit of consumer tech has aspects of that somewhere in the supply chain? I agree! It probably means we shouldn't be using the stuff.

Syonyk 3y ago

Advertising is as old as humans, certainly. But there's also a general difference, as I see it, between "the same for everyone" sort of broad advertising (billboards and the like), vs the "customized for each person, to the benefit of the payer" sort of thing we see on the internet - and have seen regularly abused for all sorts of nasty ends (see any time politics and Twitter or Meta end up in the news). As for engines... yeah. We're just going to have to disagree there. I understand engines pretty well, and am familiar with roughly the last 100 years or so of them in various forms. I work on them, can reason about them, and they're generally a fairly simple set of electrical and mechanical systems. I'm not sure what your point about regulations actually is - I don't believe we have reliable engines because of regulations, but because "the companies who figured out how to build reliable engines" rather outsold those who built 100k mile engines. And if you trust health inspectors and restaurants, well, you probably don't know many people in food service. I also don't eat out that often. What's obvious about slave labor, though? That literally every bit of consumer tech has aspects of that somewhere in the supply chain? I agree! It probably means we shouldn't be using the stuff.