Under immense pressure to prioritize engagement and growth, technology platforms have created a race for human attention that’s unleashed invisible harms to society. Here are some of the costs that aren't showing up on their balance sheets.
Why infinite scroll's inventor wants to kill his creation : The Indicator from Planet Money
We practically live on our phones these days. Scrolling and scrolling, endlessly. Entrepreneur Aza Raskin is responsible for creating this infinite scroll. He also testified against Meta, who have been under fire — and in court — charged with making their apps addictive to children. On today’s show: Raskin tells us about the changes he thinks platforms should make to help people take their attention back. Come see Planet Money live on stage! 12 cities. Details and tix here: planetmoneybook.com Related episodes: The Social Media Crisis How algorithms are changing the way we speak For sponsor-free episodes of The Indicator from Planet Money, subscribe to Planet Money+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org. Fact-checking by Cooper Katz McKim. Music by Drop Electric. Find us: TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Newsletter.
Can “Conscious Data Contribution” Help Users to Exert “Data Leverage” Against Technology Companies?
Tech users currently have limited ability to act on concerns regarding the negative societal impacts of large tech companies. However, recent work suggests that users can exert leverage using their role in the generation of valuable data, for instance by withholding their data contributions to intelligent technologies. We propose and evaluate a new means to exert this type of leverage against tech companies: "conscious data contribution" (CDC).
America's Digital Demand Threatens Black Communities with More Pollution
The collective costs of artificial intelligence and data centers are disproportionately harming Black households.
Is Big Tech's AI Gamble Starting to Look Riskier? - Slashdot
The Washington Post looks at giant tech companies "feeding every available dollar into the cash-incinerating maw of AI machines." They warn "Tech superstars that once had oodles of cash left over at the end of each year are now flipping into the red..." [While optimists expect] huge corporate p...
It’s Time to Dismantle the Technopoly
As technology accelerates, we need to stop accepting the bad consequences along with the good ones.
The Race to Allocate One Trillion Dollars in Philanthropic Capital
Frontier Lab IPOs are coming, and philanthropy isn’t ready
Don't Take the Black Pill - Andrew Kelley | SSW 2026
Digital dystopia: how algorithms punish the poor
In an exclusive global series, the Guardian lays bare the tech revolution transforming the welfare system worldwide – while penalising the most vulnerable
Microsoft reports are exposing AI's real cost problem: Using the tech is more expensive than paying human employees | Fortune
Companies are racing to incentivize employees to use AI. But as some companies are finding, the more employees that use the technology, the heavier the bill.
Appropriate Measures — Real Life
Changing the tech we use is not enough to mitigate the environmental and social harm of mass technology
Platformonomics - Dining Preferences of the Cloud and Open Source: Who Eats Who?
TL;DR: If the cloud didn’t eat Hadoop Inc., Pivotal and Red Hat, what explains their diminished prospects? Marc Andresseesssen’s “software is eating the world” has given rise to an entire technolog…
Big Tech’s A.I. Spending Is Accelerating (Again)
Despite the risk of a bubble, Google, Meta, Microsoft and Amazon plan to spend billions more on artificial intelligence than they already do.
Technology is Not Values Neutral: Ending the Reign of Nihilistic Design
We fail to take tech seriously when we do not grasp its full impact on humans
Liberatory Computing
We live under a capitalist mode of computing. The tools, languages, techniques, and assumptions of digital systems are structured by economic forces that shape not just what we can do, but what we can imagine doing. By separating production from use, producing inflexible software, and slicing up computing into siloed apps, your agency is held back by a tech industry that profits from a population rendered computationally passive.
Liberatory Computing
We live under a capitalist mode of computing. The tools, languages, techniques, and assumptions of digital systems are structured by economic forces that shape not just what we can do, but what we can imagine doing. By separating production from use, producing inflexible software, and slicing up computing into siloed apps, your agency is held back by a tech industry that profits from a population rendered computationally passive.
The internet has evolved to foster a fatal expectation: that the things we depend on every day are free. They aren't, but we're allowed to pretend they are with the help of ad-driven business models. The real cost is substantial, and can be measured in time, money, relationships, health, and more.
Fund Your Internet
fundyourinternet.org