Category: Backchannel

We should not be creating conscious, humanoid agents but an entirely new sort of entity, rather like oracles, with no conscience, no fear of death, no distracting loves and hates. Syndication Source

If you had visited the Cambridge University Library in the late 1990s, you might have observed a skinny young man, his face illuminated by the glow of a laptop screen, camping out in the stacks. William Tunstall-­Pedoe had wrapped up his studies in computer science several years earlier, but he still relished the musty aroma […]

Sheila Advento was not feeling well. It was July 6, 2003, and her mother’s house in northern New Jersey was filled with people. Sheila and her mom were there, along with Sheila’s boyfriend, sister, and brother-in-law—a slice of a huge extended family, many of whom, like Sheila and her parents, had immigrated to the US […]

We are building a 1-to-1 map of almost unimaginable scope. When it’s complete, our physical reality will merge with the digital universe. Syndication Source

Direct democracy! Universal basic income! Fascism!? The inside story of Italy’s Five Star Movement and the cyberguru who dreamed it up. Syndication Source

In the video, a preposterously cute grey squirrel monkey named Dalton bonks his head against a computer screen in front of him. Wide-eyed and muttonchopped, Dalton has quite the set up—the screen, wide in squirrel-monkey terms, displays dots of varying sizes and colors. Below that is a monkey-sized basin, like a sink in a dollhouse […]

When Todd’s psychiatrist suggested he start taking psychedelics, he figured it was a joke. It wasn’t. The former corporate executive from Colorado retired in 2006 after an MRI revealed his spine was riddled with a dozen tumors called hemangiomas, which later spread to his brain. Todd was told he would die before the end of […]

In 1972, a photo of a Swedish Playboy model was used to engineer the digital image format that would become the JPEG. The model herself was mostly a mystery—until now. Syndication Source

Along the way, he contributed to America’s painkiller epidemic and got involved with North Korean methamphetamine manufacturing, Somali pirates, and murder-for-hire. Syndication Source

Dominique McLean has been winning fighting-game tournaments since his early teens—but now SonicFox, as he’s known, has turned a knack into a dynasty. Syndication Source

David Carroll has been locked in a legal war to force the infamous company to turn over its files on him. He’s won a battle, but the struggle continues. Syndication Source

The all-seeing Amazon, Google, and Facebook have every incentive to help the national security state undermine privacy, free speech, and democracy. We’ve read this book before. Syndication Source

Weedmaps doesn’t sell pot itself. It’s just a tech platform that provides visibility for those who do—apparently, whether or not they follow state rules. Syndication Source

A few days before the 2016 election, journalist Andrew Sullivan wrote this about Donald Trump: “He has no concept of a nonzero-sum engagement, in which a deal can be beneficial for both sides. A win-win scenario is intolerable to him, because mastery of others is the only moment when he is psychically at peace.” I’m […]

When Sonia Vallabh lost her mother to a rare disease, she and her husband, Eric Minikel, set out to find a cure. Syndication Source

The glass company can’t just melt silica. The process involves glass soot particles and a grain silo of sorts. Syndication Source