Escaping Screens: A Tech-Free Travel Quest, Part II
A stranded American tourist shares the story of a six-month screen-free quest through India and Nepal just as the coronavirus explodes. Part II.
Escaping Screens: A Tech-Free Travel Quest, Part I
An American tourist stranded in India shares his story: six months traveling without a screen, only to pick one up again just in time for the global meltdown.
E. M. Forster’s The Machine Stops (excerpts)
Excerpts of E. M. Forster’s 1909 futuristic dystopia The Machine Stops
The Prescience of E. M. Forster
Compared to 1984 or Brave New World, E. M. Forster’s 1909 futuristic novella The Machine Stops was, in some ways, the most eerily accurate prediction of our current technological milieu.
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.
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.
Computo Ergo Sum: Should AI Be Self-Aware?
Artificial intelligence is often portrayed in fiction as having consciousness. In reality, making AI self-aware may not be useful. Unfortunately, that doesn’t preclude things from going horribly wrong.