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In 1992, a writer named Douglas Rushkoff signed a contract for Cyberia, his book about the internet subcultures of the West Coast. The next year, his publisher canceled it, according to Rushkoff’s recollection, on the grounds that “by the time the book came out the Internet was going to be over.” (He later found a different publisher, and the book came out in 1994.) Since then, Rushkoff has been one of the most entertaining and pointed futurists (though he prefers “presentist” these days) chronicling Silicon Valley’s effects on culture and communications. His books include Present Shock, Throwing Rocks at the Google Bus, and Survival of the Richest: Escape Fantasies of Tech Billionaires. His Team Human podcast is required listening for skeptics of artificial intelligence.
Emily Bell, the founding director of the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia Journalism School, and Heather Chaplin, the director of the New School’s Journalism + Design Lab, ask Rushkoff about what lessons we can draw from the anarchic free-spirited origins of Web publishing that can be applied to our present moment of techno-authoritarianism and the dominance of Silicon Valley.
As for what Rushkoff’s outlook is for 2050, “the worst case is we will have ceased to be”—a bleak scenario. But the more optimistic case is that we will see a stratified media ecosystem emerge, with a number of large global players collaborating on complex stories, and a vibrant network of smaller local and niche outlets.
Further reading and listening:
- “‘We will coup whoever we want!’: The unbearable hubris of Musk and the billionaire tech bros”
- Team Human podcast
- John Perry Barlow: “A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace”
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