GamerGate has laid bare a fundamental fault line for online discourse. A. Words matter. Anyone dismissing tweets threatening violence along the lines of “sticks and stones can break my bones but words will never harm me” is trivializing the power of words. We all know that words can cause immediate emotional harm. And beyond that immediate effect, words lead to thoughts and thoughts (can) lead to actions. I am not claiming some deterministic causality between a specific tweet and a specific a...

GamerGate has laid bare a fundamental fault line for online discourse. A. Words matter. Anyone dismissing tweets threatening violence along the lines of “sticks and stones can break my bones but words will never harm me” is trivializing the power of words. We all know that words can cause immediate emotional harm. And beyond that immediate effect, words lead to thoughts and thoughts (can) lead to actions. I am not claiming some deterministic causality between a specific tweet and a specific a...

Here on Continuations I have covered a lot of seemingly disparate topics such as the end of work, government surveillance and the digital balkans. They are, however, all part of my fascination with the transition from the industrial age to the information age. While that latter term was coined all the way back in the 1960s, there is reason to believe that the transition is beginning to happen now. Today I want to provide a large scale historical context, taking us all the way back to hunter g...

Here on Continuations I have covered a lot of seemingly disparate topics such as the end of work, government surveillance and the digital balkans. They are, however, all part of my fascination with the transition from the industrial age to the information age. While that latter term was coined all the way back in the 1960s, there is reason to believe that the transition is beginning to happen now. Today I want to provide a large scale historical context, taking us all the way back to hunter g...

My blog post on Monday about privacy and DRM was read by some as suggesting that we abandon any and all notions of privacy over night. That was not the point I was trying to make so let me try again, this time with an analogy. We secure our homes by closing and (generally) locking the front door. That serves as a demarcation and keeps out a completely opportunistic thief. It does not, however, prevent anybody even remotely determined from entering. For that we rely on some combination of soci...

My blog post on Monday about privacy and DRM was read by some as suggesting that we abandon any and all notions of privacy over night. That was not the point I was trying to make so let me try again, this time with an analogy. We secure our homes by closing and (generally) locking the front door. That serves as a demarcation and keeps out a completely opportunistic thief. It does not, however, prevent anybody even remotely determined from entering. For that we rely on some combination of soci...

I have written before that it is OK to worry about the effects of automation on work. One frequently encountered response is that this worry is wrong, that having it is committing the Lump of Labor fallacy. Marc in particular has been bringing it up a lot, including on Twitter, in a blog post, and a recent interview. But this is a red herring. One can legitimately worry about the transition even if one believes that the Lump of Labor fallacy is in fact a fallacy. So let me posit for a moment ...

I have written before that it is OK to worry about the effects of automation on work. One frequently encountered response is that this worry is wrong, that having it is committing the Lump of Labor fallacy. Marc in particular has been bringing it up a lot, including on Twitter, in a blog post, and a recent interview. But this is a red herring. One can legitimately worry about the transition even if one believes that the Lump of Labor fallacy is in fact a fallacy. So let me posit for a moment ...

I have been blogging less recently. One reason is that I have been working on talks such as the one I gave recently at Techonomy in Detroit and the one I am preparing now for TEDxNY. The other reason though is that I have been reading a lot about buddhism, hinduism, neuroscience and physics. I don’t yet have a lot to say about my new insights as I am still learning and digesting but I wanted to share what motivated my interest. Unbeknownst to me it started with a blog post I wrote a while bac...

I have been blogging less recently. One reason is that I have been working on talks such as the one I gave recently at Techonomy in Detroit and the one I am preparing now for TEDxNY. The other reason though is that I have been reading a lot about buddhism, hinduism, neuroscience and physics. I don’t yet have a lot to say about my new insights as I am still learning and digesting but I wanted to share what motivated my interest. Unbeknownst to me it started with a blog post I wrote a while bac...

Last week I was in Detroit to speak at Techonomy’s one day conference there. I had never been to the city before and enjoyed meeting Mike Duggan, the mayor, Beth Niblock, CIO, and many other people working hard to turn things around. It is a fascinating window into challenges I believe we will face more broadly going forward. Here are the video, the slides and a transcript of the talk. (Transcription by RA Fisher Ink) Kirkpatrick: Good job, thanks so much. You know, like I said before, in the...

Last week I was in Detroit to speak at Techonomy’s one day conference there. I had never been to the city before and enjoyed meeting Mike Duggan, the mayor, Beth Niblock, CIO, and many other people working hard to turn things around. It is a fascinating window into challenges I believe we will face more broadly going forward. Here are the video, the slides and a transcript of the talk. (Transcription by RA Fisher Ink) Kirkpatrick: Good job, thanks so much. You know, like I said before, in the...

I wrote about Russell Brand’s call for an unspecified revolution this past Friday. I liked his eloquent and indignant dismissal of the current political and economic system but he did not provide a vision of what a revolution should aim for. I have been struggling to wrestle down my own ideas on this and while I am still not quite there I feel like an outline is emerging. Let me start by describing the goal. It is nothing short of humanity coming together on a global scale to eradicate povert...

I wrote about Russell Brand’s call for an unspecified revolution this past Friday. I liked his eloquent and indignant dismissal of the current political and economic system but he did not provide a vision of what a revolution should aim for. I have been struggling to wrestle down my own ideas on this and while I am still not quite there I feel like an outline is emerging. Let me start by describing the goal. It is nothing short of humanity coming together on a global scale to eradicate povert...

A couple of years ago I wrote about our need for an “opposing view reader” that would intentionally show us commentary from people with opinions different from our own. As far as I can tell relatively little progress has been made on this front. Twitter, for instance, will generally recommend to me that I follow people who are like the people I am already following. So I was happy to see that there is at least some academic research on this topic. The Technology Review mentions a paper titled...

A couple of years ago I wrote about our need for an “opposing view reader” that would intentionally show us commentary from people with opinions different from our own. As far as I can tell relatively little progress has been made on this front. Twitter, for instance, will generally recommend to me that I follow people who are like the people I am already following. So I was happy to see that there is at least some academic research on this topic. The Technology Review mentions a paper titled...

Russell Brand helped edit the latest issue of New Statesman. He leads off the magazine with an epic rant that is worth reading in its entirety. If you need some motivation, watch this 10 minute clip of him. Essentially, Brand is calling for a revolution. It would be easy to dismiss Brand as a slightly lunatic comedian who lives a very comfortable life. But I think that would be a mistake. Aside from having a wonderful way with words, I find that Brand gives expression to a sentiment that seem...

Russell Brand helped edit the latest issue of New Statesman. He leads off the magazine with an epic rant that is worth reading in its entirety. If you need some motivation, watch this 10 minute clip of him. Essentially, Brand is calling for a revolution. It would be easy to dismiss Brand as a slightly lunatic comedian who lives a very comfortable life. But I think that would be a mistake. Aside from having a wonderful way with words, I find that Brand gives expression to a sentiment that seem...

At DLD earlier this week I gave a talk that’s an illustrated and expanded version of my recent blog post about Entering the Information Age. And here are the slides, including a final slide with image credits (most images come form flickr are CC licensed): Looking forward to comments and suggestions. I am planning to expand this material over the coming weeks and months.

At DLD earlier this week I gave a talk that’s an illustrated and expanded version of my recent blog post about Entering the Information Age. And here are the slides, including a final slide with image credits (most images come form flickr are CC licensed): Looking forward to comments and suggestions. I am planning to expand this material over the coming weeks and months.