Category: Internet

  • Scarier than Skynet: AI and Persuasion

    Most dystopian fantasies concern monsters we can see conquering us, but with new technologies will we even know if we’ve been conquered? You can tell a lot about a culture by its dystopias: its fantasies of fear. When you have dueling fantasies, you can tell even more by what they agree on and what they…

  • A New Scam: The “Middle of the Night” Call

    One of the most popular things I’ve ever written is “Beware the Words with Friends Scammers” about how predators were targeting lonely older women who played this online equivalent of Scrabble.  Here’s another scam to watch out for: the “Middle of the Night” call. We were having dinner with my parents when my Dad mentioned…

  • The End of Cheap Scale?

    More important than who owns Twitter is whether anybody can create a massive new social networking service. Also, what would a non-profit version of Twitter—let’s call it Quack—look like? As I wrote last time, I’m taking a break from the endless hand-wringing around Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter. The more interesting question is whether anybody can do anything to…

  • Social Media and the Banality of Evil

    Max Fisher’s new book “The Chaos Machine” shows the downside of what happens when companies pursue growth at all costs. In her 1963 book about the trial of Adolph Eichmann, one of the chief architects of the Nazi murder of six million Jews during the Second World War, Hannah Arendt coined the phrase “the banality…

  • Industry Evolution by Meteor Strike

    Two recent developments in the world of comic books have lessons for all businesses in the age of digital transformation. From the “Big Story You Haven’t Noticed” department: this month, two things happened in the world of comic books that combine to make a huge inflection point. My friend Peter Horan calls this sort of thing…

  • Why Musk is Stalling

    Elon Musk seems to have accepted that he will have to do what he promised and acquire Twitter, but now he is delaying the close of the deal. He has a good reason, but it’s not the one you think. The late Steve Jobs was so persuasive that people said he had a “reality distortion…

  • Misinformation & “Prebunking,” Experience Stacks & Physical Objects

    A study suggests that inoculating internet users against misinformation might be more successful than fact checking later, but I’m not so sure. Plus, a price sticker triggers a trip down memory lane. The Limits of “Prebunking” in the Fight Against Misinformation A new study in the journal Science Advances, “Psychological inoculation improves resilience against misinformation on…

  • Surveillance Capitalism Bedtime Stories…

    … if you don’t want to get much sleep. Although the privacy issues are paramount, another problem with companies compiling vast amounts of information about us is that we don’t know what they know. Companies spying on Americans for our entertainment and their profit is nothing new. How else can we understand Candid Camera, the show…

  • Why Walmart Should Buy Paramount

    Note: I wrote and first published the following column on Sunday, August 14, before the rumors came true the following day: Walmart had signed an agreement with Paramount. You can find a review of that news here. However, nothing about the news changes my argument that Walmart is missing a bigger opportunity, which is the topic of what follows. …

  • What Twitter should do next (after Musk)

    Now that the Tesla CEO is riding off into the sunset, the social media company needs to skip the protracted court battle and focus on what’s important. On Friday, Elon Musk made official his desire to wiggle out of his Twitter acquisition. Many Dispatch readers kindly and gratifyingly reached out or posted saying “Brad, you called this one!”…