I mostly talk about things like Networked Mortality (what happens to your digital assets when you die / how to handle death in a networked age), Weaponized Social (the network effects of unhealthy social scripts), geek humanitarian efforts, gender+sexuality, and hackerspaces and education. I have also organized and facilitated a *lot* of hackathons. The majority of further pontification on manifesto-like things are filed under that tag. Random bits are further down this page.
It’s easy to see the sorts of work I do as being disjointed. Hackerspaces, humanitarian efforts, education. But to me it is all deeply connected. Let’s take a look at my outlook on life, shall we?
Humanitarian response and hacking both deal with the extremes of people. The very worst and the very best. It’s easy to flux between extreme joy at the wonders and extreme horror of the awfulness humanity does to itself. Our species is in on the constant verge of complete destruction and amazing possibility. We are terrible at seeing the long-term impacts of our actions, and allow a single-lifetime single-demographic viewpoint to steer our decisions.
That is balanced with an incredible ability to wing it. We can fix just about any problem as it happens. We will figure it out. I have hope this also means being responsible to the rest of the organisms on this planet (a possibility of evolution being that other things might become sentient if they aren’t already) even if we ourselves aren’t going to make it, or end up elsewhere.
Taking a multi-generational viewpoint means I have a limited time to impart what I can to get us on that long-term goal. The best thing I can possibly do with my energy is help the greatest number of people obtain the most empowerment. I simply have to trust that doing so in a way which encourages mutual aid, transparency, adaptability, and emergence will ensure whatever comes next will be handled responsibly. Well made technology and systems can’t solve the problems of humanity, but they can bring out the best in us.
I believe that we should be dedicating our energy into building new systems. Systems which are inclusive. Systems which transparent and consensual. To me, this means it’s ok to make compromises with other groups which also exist in the current system, if it can be done in such a way which the benefits far outweigh the understood (and stated, and discussed) risks. For example, currency is a good indicator of intent and simplifier of transaction, it is the systems in which it is used that are broken.
I choose the hacker community because it sees the world for the information it is, and how malleable and flawed and amazing that is. I choose the maker community because it takes an active role in participating in the world, and a joy in introducing the unconverted to involvement. I choose humanitarian response because it connects people globally to the consequences of intertwined systems in a way that is so fresh we can easily learn. And I chose education as a vector for these changes – it is the one thing which everyone interacts with and everyone agrees is broken.
We can do incredible things, with intent, before we have to.
Other random bits:
Write Ups:
On the Prezi blog
Video
At CyborgCamp MIT 2014
Social Scripts for cyborgs to be kind and inclusive.
Unrecorded:
Awesome Foundation Seattle : Guest Trustee
Journey to the End of the Night : Organizer Support (San Francisco Halloween 2011, Berlin New Years 2011), Organizer (Seattle 2011)
just wondering why the Transhumanism at Gnomedex “video was made private by the owner!” i mean, it sounds interesting and i’d love to see it. so what’s up with that, especially when Ethan is espousing “intellectual” “theft” in the other linked video? i feel betrayed by the present, let alone the future.
Weird! I’ve poked the video owner about why it’s been marked as private.