The Technoskeptic Issue 4

Print Preview: Issue #4 | Fall 2019

Our fourth print issue—covering issues of identity, censorship, Internet infrastructure and more—is about to ship nationally.

The World Wired Web

Despite marketing imagery to the contrary, the “cloud” remains very much grounded in physical infrastructure, including unfathomable miles of wires.

Teton Dam Flood

The False Promise of Hydroelectric Dams

In part two of a series on dams, reservoirs and catastrophic failures displace and destroy whole communities and ecosystems.

Jonathan Taplin

Podcast #28: Jonathan Taplin on Internet Aggregators

Jonathan Taplin, former music and film professional, tells first-hand what the new rentier economy of Internet aggregators like Google and Facebook has done to the creative arts, journalism, and democracy.

Betsy Brunner

Podcast #21: Betsy Brunner on Circumventing Censorship

Betsy Brunner of Idaho State examines social media and social movements, particularly in China, where she’s looked at the creative ways people get around the limits of surveillance and censorship.

C-section

The Apex of Technological Birth

In many places, birth by emergency surgery–the C-section–is increasingly the norm. Part three in a series on technological childbirth.

Fingerprint

Genetic Testing Kits: Unprecedented Privacy Risks

Consumer genetic testing puts sensitive, irreplaceable data about you—and unwitting members of your family—in places you can’t control.

Tomaso Poggio

Podcast #16: Tomaso Poggio on the State of AI

After a long so-called winter, artificial intelligence has recently made amazing gains. Tomaso Poggio, Director of MIT’s Center for Brains, Minds, and Machines, explains why this success is still a long way from the dystopian fears of robot overlords, but that the threat to jobs is real.

Dr. David Greenfield

Podcast #15: David Greenfield on Internet Addiction

Psychiatrist, professor, and author David Greenfield, founder of the Center for Internet and Technology Addiction, was one of the first medical professionals to recognize and study the addictive qualities of the Internet. He explains what we know, what it means, and what can be done.