THE BIG FLAT NOW: Power, Flatness, and Nowness in the Third Millennium
The outcome of such algorithmic gatekeeping is the pervasive flattening that has been happening across culture. By flatness I mean homogenization but also a reduction into simplicity: the least ambiguous, least disruptive, and perhaps least meaningful pieces of culture are promoted the most. Flatness is the lowest common denominator, an averageness
... See moreKyle Chayka • Filterworld
Today’s revolution has been defined by a set of very specific values: boundarylessness; speed; universal accessibility; an allergy to hierarchy, so much so that the weighting or preferring of some voices or products over others is seen as illegitimate; seeing one’s own words and face reflected back as part of a larger current; a commitment to grati... See more
Alana Newhouse • Everything Is Broken
In medieval society, the successful and rich concentrated in certain areas, but cyberspace doesn’t require this. Instead, you can keep pushing out the boundaries and claiming new frontiers, and in doing so, pulling more resources away from governments and the physical world and into cyberspace.
James Dale Davidson • The Sovereign Individual: How to Survive and Thrive During the Collapse of the Welfare State
From my perspective, this wasn’t the beginning of the Internet Revolution, but the end. We were starting to care less about how this technology could augment humanity and more about how it could bolster a flagging stock exchange.