Tech Won't Save Us - Celebrating One Year of Tech Won’t Save Us!

Episode Date: April 29, 2021

Paris Marx is solo this week, providing an update on the podcast, the series of guests planned for May, and what’s coming next for Tech Won’t Save Us!Tech Won’t Save Us offers a critical perspective on tech, its worldview, and wider society with the goal of inspiring people to demand better tech and a better world. Follow the podcast (@techwontsaveus) and host Paris Marx (@parismarx) on Twitter, and support the show on Patreon.Find out more about Harbinger Media Network at harbingermedianetwork.com.Also mentioned in this episode:Paris wrote about the future of the internet, why Elon Musk is planning for climate apocalypse, the problems with Jeff Bezos’ space future, and why a socialist future won’t look like a capitalist one.Paris was recently on the Digital Void podcast.Support the show

Hello and welcome to Tech Won't Save Us. I'm your host, Paris Marks, and this week I will be the only voice in your ear. As I said last week, I had planned to have Richard Barbrook on the show to talk about the Californian ideology and how that has kind of evolved over the decades since he first wrote about it with his colleague Andy Cameron. But unfortunately, we ran into some scheduling difficulties. So we're going to reschedule that episode for the future. You're still going to get that conversation. It just won't be this week. And unfortunately, by the time I found that out, there simply wasn't enough time to find a new guest to come on. So I'll make up the missing episode in the future, but I figured this would still be a good opportunity for me to record something quick and to kind of reflect on the first year of Tech Won't Save Us and kind of what's coming next, what I have planned for the future. I think I want to start, though, just with kind of reintroducing myself. I know that, you know, if you're a regular listener to the show, you hear

me talking to you every week. You know that my name is Paris Marks, but I don't know, maybe you don't know much more than that if you haven't taken any time to look anything up about me. So just briefly, in addition to hosting this podcast, I am a freelance writer. That's kind of my main thing outside of this. And I write pretty regularly for NBC News, for CBC News, for Jacobin Magazine in the US, for Tribune Magazine in the UK, and for Passage in Canada. I write a lot about tech from a critical perspective, obviously. If you listen to the show regularly, you know that I have a lot of opinions on that. But I also write about other political issues from a left-wing perspective, you know, on climate, on inequality, lot of opinions on that. But I also write about other political issues from a

left-wing perspective, you know, on climate, on inequality, and other things like that. But then on top of the writing and the podcasting, I'm also still working my way through the university system. I have a master's degree in geography from McGill University in Montreal, Canada. And I also recently started a PhD program at the University of Auckland in New Zealand. But unfortunately, because of, you know, COVID border restrictions and things like that, I haven't been able to move back to New Zealand yet. So I'm still in Canada for the time being. And with that, I'm hoping to do some more research on the way that powerful figures in the tech industry kind of position the future and lay

out these visions of the future that are in many ways self-serving, but promote them in a way that makes a lot of people believe that they will bring broad-based benefits when that often does not seem to be the case. And I've written a bit about this in the past for Jacobin and probably some other publications. But that's something I want to work a bit more on in the future. And I'm sure that will mean that I'll end up doing some more interviews on those topics on the show as well. This past month has been a really busy one for me. On top of holding the one year anniversary campaign for the show, and the other work I've been doing, I've also been

finishing up a draft of a book. Now you won't see that until next year. And I won't really go into much detail about it. But just to say that it's been a really busy month on my end. And I think one of the things that I learned from that is that I want to, in the future, make sure that I have episodes recorded a little more in advance so we don't run into the kind of situation that I'm dealing with today where I don't have a guest. But you know, I think that's just things that you learn as you keep going with this thing as you do it more often. And after a year, I'm sure that there are a ton of things that I learned that I didn't know when I first started this thing last April, when we were still in, you know, the first lockdown. And I finally said, Okay, I'm going to try this podcasting thing. So I think before I reflect a bit on the

past year, I want to give you a preview of what's coming in May, since you don't actually have a guest this week. And I'm really excited about the slate of guests that I have lined up for the next month and the topics that we're going to be exploring. You know, recently, I've been really interested in, I guess, the history of the tech industry, but in particular, the evolution of, you know, the internet and network technologies. I think I often hear that, you know, the internet is fantastic, it's great, but there are some issues with it, and we need to fix those things. And, you know, I'm not sure if this is true or not, but recently I've been wondering, like, is that actually true? Like, is the internet actually great? Or could networks and the way that we are connected to one another

and communicate with one another have been built in a different way that might have facilitated a different means of communication that would have been better than the network that was actually built and kind of the incentives that were behind it to create it in a certain kind of way. I know that's really abstract, but hopefully these conversations next month will maybe help to try to answer that question and at least give me and us, if you are interested in this as well, kind of a direction to think about in the future and some other things to explore on that topic. And so with that said, my guest next week is Margaret O'Mara. And Margaret is the author of The Code, Silicon Valley and the

Remaking of America. One of the things that I'm interested in exploring with Margaret is the history of Silicon Valley, and in particular, the role that the government and the public sector played in creating this industry that today kind of promotes itself as needing to be outside the control of the government and being like very free market oriented and like, you know, don't regulate us or don't regulate us very much because then you'll stifle innovation. And it's like, well, if you really look back at the history, you know, the government has been very involved in the creating of this industry in the first place, like without all of this government money and these incentives and these

investments in universities and industries, like you would not have Silicon Valley in the way that it exists today. And so I'm really looking forward to exploring that with Margaret. So hopefully we can get kind of a broader perspective on Silicon Valley, where it came from. And I think that will also help us to kind of challenge some of these narratives that still pervade in the Valley. And I think in the kind of wider perceptions that we have about technology, because, you know, the powerful people in that industry have successfully made us believe that these things are true, right? That we can't interfere with technology because then we'll get in the way of progress and all of these

like grand ideas, right? And I think that's false. And so I'm really looking forward to having that conversation. And then the following week, I'll be talking to Kevin Driscoll. Kevin Driscoll is the co-author of Minitel, Welcome to the Internet, along with his co-author Julian Mayand. Now, Julian won't be joining us for this interview, but Minitel was a network that was created in France before, you know, the internet as we know it today was rolled out. You know, it was this consumer network that connected people with these Minitel terminals to a bunch of services that were,

you know, available in a way that really did not exist in other countries at the time. You know, one of the things I found fascinating when I was reading back through some of Richard Barbrook's work was that he said when he visited France in the 80s, he expected that the UK, which is where he's based, would import technology from France, the Minitel system, instead of what actually happened where it kind of imported the internet from the US. So I thought that was really fascinating. And so I'm looking forward to exploring with Kevin, you know, what this network was actually like, the way it was designed, how it kind of differs from the internet, and if it can teach us any

lessons about different ways that networks could be constructed and might have different outcomes as a result. Then after I speak to Kevin, the next week I'll be speaking with Eden Medina. And Eden is the author of Cybernetic Revolutionaries, Technology and Politics in Allende's Chile. This is obviously a fascinating case because, you know, if you're familiar with left-wing history, with Latin American history, if you're in particular focused on technology and the role that that might have played in some of these things, you know, the case of Chile and Allende and the cyber sin system that they created, I think is a really interesting one to explore. You know, if you're not really familiar with this, Salvador Allende was,

I believe, the first Marxist elected president in Latin America. This was in the 1970s. But then in 1973, Allende was overthrown in a coup d'etat by Augusto Pinochet, who really kind of led the charge on the neoliberal model that we are familiar with today and that, you know, we often talk about as something that came from Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, but it was really Pinochet who started many of these policies. And so, you know, while Allende was in government, they built this network system, which, as I understand it, I haven't read the book yet, but it was designed to help manage the national economy. it also potentially gives us an idea of how networks could be used for different goals or could have been used for different goals if, you know, Allende had not been overthrown and if all these things had not happened in the politics of Chile. So I think this one will be really

interesting to explore, especially, you know, where it is in quite a different context in Latin America. So I think this will end up being a fascinating episode. And then the final episode of next month will be with Ben Peters. And Ben is the author of How to Network a Nation, The Uneasy History of the Soviet Internet. And so in the book, Ben kind of goes over the attempts to build a network in the Soviet Union and how, you know, as the United States was kind of building out the early infrastructure of what would later become the Internet, the Soviet Union was running into trouble as various ministries were kind of fighting with each other and blocking the creation of this kind of a network because it could potentially take away the power of some of these powerful ministries and ministers within the state. You know, there's a fascinating point that Ben makes that part of the reason the US was successful in doing what it did was because, you know, the internet was largely created by the public sector or like, you know, the early part of it to prove that it could be

a workable thing, you know, to actually invent the pieces of it that would be necessary to make it what it is today. But in the Soviet Union, they struggled because there was this competition, not between economic actors, but actually within the state that kind of held up the ability for this thing to actually be built out, even though there were several different proposals at different times for this kind of thing to be built. And the idea, of course, behind these Soviet networks was that they would obviously manage production in the planned economy instead of having, you know, so many bureaucrats and managers and people like that having to kind of manually plan everything that was going on and all the production that was happening.

And this obviously threatened certain powerful interests within the state who did not want to see their power and influence taken away by a network system, by computers. So, you know, I think this whole series of interviews with Margaret, with Kevin, with Eden, and with Ben will be really fascinating to give us some more insight into the history of how things did develop in the case of Silicon Valley, but how things could have potentially developed in a different way. If some of these other network infrastructures had, I guess, continued longer than they did, or had challenged the US internet in a way that it didn't, or maybe if the United States wasn't as successful as it ended up being, you know, there were different paths that could have been taken that potentially could have ended

up with our communities and our workplaces being networked in a different way and with different incentives kind of driving that networking and the ultimate way that those networks work so that we could have been communicating in a very different way than we are today. And so I think that's a really fascinating thing for me, at least to explore. And I think these interviews are going to be really instructive in, you know, helping us figure this out and maybe come to some kind of better understanding on those questions, but also understanding these particular examples better than we do today. And, you know, unless you're obviously an expert in these things, and maybe you already know all this stuff. And then I won't say yet when the episode

with Richard Barbrook will end up dropping just because I haven't decided that yet. And we're still kind of setting another date to record it. But I can certainly let you know that when we figure it out, it'll probably end up being after this kind of series in May, maybe to kind of cap it off or something like that. But you know, I'll let you know. So then on top of that series, you know, I have ideas for other series in the future as well. I won't talk about any of those now just because you know, I haven't confirmed guests or decided on when they would actually be I'd prefer to wait until there's something more concrete for discuss any of that stuff. But I'm also really excited about other things that are coming down the track that obviously I've been talking about this month.

We have had this member drive this month. I set a goal at the beginning of the month to get 30 new members at $5 a month or more. And we have completely blown that out of the water. At last count, we had 63 new supporters sign up on Patreon to support the show. The monetary support for the show has almost doubled this month, which is just so fantastic. And there have been some other people who have also increased their support throughout the month. So I'm not going to give any thanks or name any names this week, just because I don't really see this as, you know, like a real episode of the podcast.

It's not an interview episode. So I'll hold on to those names until next week to thank those people. If you want to shout out as well, just make sure to check your Patreon messages where I simply check to make sure that you're okay having your name right out on the show. And obviously, if you want to join those people, you can go to patreon.com slash tech won't save us where you can become a supporter. And if you join at $5 a month or above, you will get stickers if you want those. And at any tier, you also gain access to our discord server. And so because of this support that the show has received this month, I'll be able to do more to kind of expand what I do with tech won't save us and hopefully to get these critical perspectives to more people. You know, the first piece of that, as the goal was all about, was to start a weekly

critical tech newsletter. And so my goal with that is to start at some time in mid-May. It might be late May, but that is kind of the goal for that. So now that my book draft will be done at the end of this month, I'll have more time to put into these projects. And so the goal for early May is to decide on a format for the newsletter, decide on, you know, what kind of newsletter service I want to use, you know, make all those decisions, because I don't want it to be like a sub stack newsletter, where it's basically like a blog, but going directly to your email. I don't really want to do that. But I also

don't just want it to be like a list of links. So I'm going to figure out a format that I think is really good. And that highlights important things, but also gives you some sort of a perspective on what has happened the past week in kind of tech news with a critical slang. But then on top of that, the goal is also to get a new website made for the podcast and transcripts to go on that website. So you know that people can read back the interviews that I've done on the show, if that is what they want to do, or cite them in some way or pull out quotes, you know, however they want to use it. But I think, you know, the goal is to make the interviews and the content more accessible to more people. And so first, you know, I need to find someone to create the website. And so hopefully sometime in May, I'll identify that person.

I have some really interesting ideas for how it could look. But again, I don't want to say too much until things are set in stone. I don't really have a timeline on when the website will be ready yet, simply because that will depend on, you know, who I get to put it together and what their schedule is like. So again, I'll provide updates on that again in the future. And then the transcripts, once I figure out what's happening with the website, then I'll start putting things together to start getting those made. So you know, I think there are some really exciting things coming for the podcast, even though I don't have an interview for you today.

Obviously, we have this great series of interviews coming next month. The newsletter should also be launching next month. And then we'll also have a new website sometime in the next few months to keep making Tech Won't Say What's Better to reach more people. And in part, you know, I see it as doing right by the guests, you know, who grant me their time to speak about their work. And so obviously, I want as many people as possible to learn about their work, you know, to buy their books, if they have a book available, and just to hear the perspectives that they have on these tech companies and these technologies. So hopefully more people will be, you know, enlightened by their perspectives, I guess.

And so I wanted to kind of reflect on the past year, and what has happened with the show, you know, the ultimate goal that I had when I started Tech Won't Save Us was really to provide people with more critical perspectives on technology, to challenge this general narrative that kind of exists about tech, you know, on so many tech news websites and tech blogs that, you know, I think really have this kind of often techno deterministic or techno utopian perspective on technology that kind of assumes that we just need to embrace every new thing that comes out of Silicon Valley or, you know, any of these other tech sectors that have kind of bubbled up around the world over the years trying to copy the Silicon Valley model. But I really think that's not the case. You know, I really think that we need to take a more critical perspective on all of these technologies that get released to the world, that get announced, and to consider whether they are really providing public benefits and whether what they are proposing to change about the way that we live and the societies that we live in are really things that we want change. Like, why should these people in the tech industry be making all of the

decisions about the world that we live in and the lives that we lead? Why should we not have power over that power to make those decisions? And, you know, I think it's easy to say, like, oh, you know, you're a consumer, you can choose to buy what you want or drive what kind of vehicle you want. But I think what we see is that so often when these technologies and these tech products are integrated into the systems that kind of govern the way that we live, eventually it becomes hard not to use them, right? It becomes hard to opt out because they become so normalized. Like, you know, consider the case of facebook for so many people like facebook is not just a social network it it's kind of like you need to be on there to know what people are up to to get

invitations for events you know i i think this has decreased a bit in recent years but for a while it was like if you weren't on facebook you didn't exist right and i think as i've talked to with a number of guests on the show i'm worried that as these technologies get rolled out more into the physical environment, that they start to regulate and control our abilities to access different services. the Amazon Go stores and how all of a sudden there's this store that is like promoted as this kind of ultimate convenience. You just walk in, pick up what you want and walk out. But really, that convenience creates a barrier at the door. So if you don't have a smartphone, if you don't have a data plan, if you don't have an Amazon account with a means of payment that can automatically be charged when you leave, you know, you can't enter this area. And so all of a sudden, this thing that is supposedly really convenient is really only convenient for the particular group

of people who can access it. But then everyone else who does not have these prerequisites are not allowed in, like poor people won't be allowed in in many cases, some seniors won't be allowed in, there's a whole group of other people who then cannot access these services. And so I think that there's not enough critical thinking about these things in the popular conversation about technology. And so, you know, that's kind of part of the goal with this podcast is to, you know, give a space for these perspectives to kind of push back on it as little as we can here and simply to call into question these things that are taken as like obvious or natural when they really aren't. So yeah,

I went off on a bit of a tangent there. But you know, I think the ultimate goal is that we need control over these technologies and the way that they are rolled out in our lives. You know what that control looks like. I think that we can debate that, right? Does that come from workers and companies having unions that allows them to push back against it? Does that mean having democratic power to decide, you know, what is happening with these technologies and how they're being implemented, whether it's on a local level, you know, a regional level, a national level? You know, I think that those are things that we can discuss and try to figure out what the best way for this to work would be. But ultimately, Silicon Valley should not be able to set the path for how we live. And I think that is, you know, kind of the goal. And I

think many of you would agree with me when I say that. So I was thinking about going through some of the episodes that I did throughout the year to give some thoughts on, you know, things that I learned throughout. But I have a really hard time picking out specific episodes because I feel like I learn from every single one, you know, being able to pick the minds of such intelligent, such brilliant people every single week is just a complete joy. So I have trouble saying like, you know, I liked a particular one over another one. I can't really do that. I think I would just say that it was fascinating to me to be able to learn about so many different subjects, so many different angles of technology and how it

affects different aspects of our lives. You know, whether it's the ways that technology is implemented in cities and what kind of effects that can have, whether it's the ways that technology is implemented in cities and what kind of effects that can have, whether it's the way that technology and its implementation affects the way that people work, you know, whether it's in the gig economy or how it's been deployed in other areas over many years to de-skill the workforce and other things like that. And, you know, I think we can see the effects of that today with the gig economy, but also, you know, its effects in many other workplaces. And, you know, there's also kind of the questions of our online experience, how that has evolved over the course of time, the way that different platforms kind of shape the way that we interact with one another, the way that

we use them. I think those questions are incredibly fascinating and how those things are changing continually. And, you know, one of the particular aspects of some of the shows I did in the past year that I really enjoyed was getting to get outside that kind of North American, even European perspective and explore what's been happening in other parts of the world. You know, unfortunately, I haven't done that as much as I think I would like to. I certainly have a bias toward things that are happening in North America, simply because, you know, I'm from Canada, it's what I'm most familiar with, it's the things that I read about most. And of course, working on the book for the past few months, it's kind of limited my

ability to seek out things beyond that, just because I've been so focused on that, right? I've been really limited in being able to explore anything further than that. But hopefully now with some of that work behind me, there will still be, you know, rounds of edits and things like that. I'll be able to explore a bit more about things that are happening internationally to hopefully have some more of those conversations. Like, you know, I was able to talk about things that are happening in rural China and to Foxconn workers in China. I had some conversations with guests about things happening in Latin America. You know, I spoke with Riddha Khadri about what was happening with gig workers in Indonesia. Very early on in the podcast, I did an episode on techno-fascism in India. So, you know,

there have been times when I've been able to explore some of those international issues, but I would say it's not been as much as I would like to. And that is one of the things that I really want to try to expand on going forward. So the past year of making this podcast has just been really fantastic. And, you know, I think especially when you consider that, you know, we have been in this pandemic year for me, I've been kind of stuck in Eastern Canada for the past year. And so being able to speak to all of these really fantastic people, you know, certainly helped me get through the year, you know, just being able to speak to people who I wouldn't normally speak to and to have these really intelligent conversations

about issues that I really care about. I would obviously say thank you to all the guests who took the time to come on the show to speak with me about the topics that they are interested in and, you know, have been working on for a while so I could learn from them, but also so that you could learn from them. And obviously, a big thank you to the people who listen to the show, because, you know, without you, there'd be no point to even do this at all. I'm just kind of continually floored by the number of people who are interested in listening to this every week in listening to me chat with these intelligent people on these topics. And I feel like I hear more and more from people who tell me that they have learned things from the show, that they really like hearing it, that it gives them a perspective that they never had before. And so that makes me feel really good as well, because, you know, hopefully that tells me that it's not just, you know, fellow socialists who are tuning in every week, but it's also reaching a wider audience of people who maybe might not be as familiar with these

kind of perspectives, but are open to them and are really wanting to learn about the impacts of technology, you know, on our lives and our societies and things like that. And so that is just so great for me to hear. And obviously gives me a reason to want to continue making the show and growing the audience so we can reach more of those people. Because as I've said multiple times now, you know, that's kind of the goal, right, is to reach people with these perspectives to make people think more critically about technology. So yeah, that's fantastic. And I would also have to say a special thank you to the people who support the show on Patreon because I have always been committed to ensuring that the show would be free for anyone,

regardless if they could pay. It never felt fair to me if I had recorded episodes with guests and they were kind of behind a paywall and only certain people who could pay for them could hear them speak, right? I don't think that's fair after they are giving me their time in that way. But I also want the show to reach as many people as possible. So it never made sense to me to put it behind a paywall. And so the reason I can do that is because people who are able to pay

to chip in a few bucks a month, at least to support the show and the work that I do, then make it possible for me to keep making it free for everyone, for people who can't pay, especially when I've really been trying to cultivate an international audience for the show. And so, you know, some of the people who listen in countries that aren't, you know, in North America and Europe and Australia won't be able to pay for the show in any kind of significant way or chip in, right, just because their currencies are not strong enough to really be able to do that. And that's obviously one thing I've been super happy to see is that, you know, every episode of the show that comes out usually has listeners from 70 to 80 countries around the world. And I

want to keep reaching more of those people. And obviously, as I talked about the goal of getting more episodes on international issues, I hope that that will eventually help to bring in even more people from different countries around the world, you know, not just the US, Canada, the UK, but to listen to the show. And when we have transcripts, you know, even if they don't speak English, maybe they can go onto the website and use Google Translate or something to check it out in that way. And so naturally, I'll end the show or this episode, which is not really a show, but you know, is my kind of update, I guess, by saying, you know, thank you again for supporting the show for listening to the show. If you are able to, you know, please consider going over to patreon.com slash tech won't

save us and becoming a monthly supporter so I can continue doing this work and expand what I do with tech Won't Save Us. If for some crazy reason you still want to hear me speak into your ear a little bit more this week, I did recently do an interview with the Digital Void podcast talking about, you know, kind of how I developed this critical perspective on technology, where that came from, and some of my thoughts on certain issues that they were interested in. So I'll put a link to that in the show notes if that is something that you are remotely interested in at all. No pressure, don't worry about that. But I will be back next week with a guest discussing these important issues. So until then, thanks for listening. Thank you.