The Correspondent

A week ago, I dropped Facebook/Instagram. (I booted my Twitter account over the summer.) I feel nice about this. I have enjoyed many parts of social media, but have zero trust regarding the companies themselves and, generally speaking, feel that social media has done more harm to society than good, in aggregate. I try to be a responsible consumer in other areas of my life and feel that responsibility should extend to social media.

Next is to try to disentangle from Google, which seems Herculean and isn’t technically social media but is an technosystem powered by the same society-warping ethos. These actions aren’t based upon a fear of technology. I’m a technologist by trade. These actions are ones people should take in order to affect a change – social media companies don’t have to operate the way they currently do. They can be a force for good in the world (and oftentimes, great movements begin with social media only to get subverted by opposition forces using downward-dragging emotional tactics which social media favors for purposes of end user engagement.) Only we can force social media companies to do better in the world.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/jun/30/new-dark-age-by-james-bridle-review-technology-and-the-end-of-the-future
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/13/books/review/jaron-lanier-ten-arguments-for-deleting-your-social-media-accounts-right-now.html
https://slate.com/technology/2018/10/facebook-data-breach-2018-victims-cybersecurity.html
https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/8/17951914/google-plus-data-breach-exposed-user-profile-information-privacy-not-disclosed
https://news.slashdot.org/story/18/10/15/2135254/most-americans-cant-tell-the-difference-between-a-social-media-bot-and-a-human-study-finds
http://calnewport.com/blog/2018/10/28/the-mona-lisa-doesnt-tweet/

Take care with your time and your attention. They are precious and finite.

Preu’s Wager

October 16, 2018 jdoublepclimate change, global warmingLeave a comment

A rational person, or collective of persons, should live as though human-caused climate change exists and seek to reverse human-caused climate change. If human-caused climate change does not actually exist, such a person, or collective of persons, will have only a finite loss (some pleasures, luxury, convenience, etc.), whereas they stand to receive infinite gains (as represented by the perpetuation of the species) and avoid infinite losses (extinction).

Huron Cemetery Poems IX

August 28, 2018 jdoublepHuron cemetery, kansas city, poems, poetry, writingLeave a comment

August 22, 2018

It’s too hot to sit with the dead today
     so I float above them,
     hanging on for dear life to the strings
     of a bunch of many-colored balloons.
Up high, where the air is much cooler,
     the oxygen less dense.
The vacuum of space waits hidden above me;
     a black, gaping maw poised to chomp.

Death above, death below, dying in between,
     one hand gripping balloon strings,
     the other trying to choke down a mustard-soaked sardine sandwich.
In the distance, beyond the curve of the earth,
     a thing so monumental its name cannot fit into a human ear.
In the distance, all lived pasts and livable futures.

There may be a mustard stain on my crisp, white shirt
but I’m afraid to look.
Perhaps the dead have asked me to stay away today.
It’s probably not so hot outside after all.