I think the actual timeline is:

VR
Self-driving cars
Crypto (blockchain)
NFTs (blockchain again)
Metaverse (VR again)
AI

My guess is the next thing will just be AI repackaged in several different ways.

agreed. we are drowning in tech critiques that don’t lead anywhere or propose an alternative future.

nearly every good, practical piece of advice i would, today, opt to pass down to my younger self is exactly the sort of thing i would have had absolutely no time for at that age.

little winter fragments

finding this piano so i can perform acoustic shepard tones on it

[New Blog Post] The Lo-Fi Art and Human Tools Era

pketh.org/the-human-to...

always open random cookbooks

paying someone to do the chugging harmonica thing behind me anytime I'm walking anywhere

LeGuin has so many good books, but Left Hand is really the best one. There's more good stuff in the Hainish Cycle. The Dispossessed is good, but I think her Hainish short stories are the next best sci-fi she wrote (A Fisherman of the Inland Sea is a favorite).

Earthsea is also remarkable.

the mist trail in winter, some years ago

Our classic handmade rabbit redesigned for Spring 2025. This edition is made with our classic cotton sherpa fabric hand dyed with black tea, resulting in the warmest, softest brown. This is the third edition of Aster and the first in earthy colors with a bright orange linen collar.

...that journalist perspective on all the things wrong with the tech industry is a severely limited perspective.

we're dying for a pragmatic and positive vision for the future of technology, which is something that only those who build things can provide.

i couldn't agree more. tech-critical journalism was late in coming and we (finally) now have an excess of good sources who are doing good work exposing the worst excesses of the industry (ed being probably the most apoplectic).

however...

the distinction between growth/cost-related skepticism winning out seems hard to distinguish from the outside.

if you think markets will be optimistic about huge hardware investments that are probably only useful in a broadly AI-driven future, you make that investment.

if not, then not.

rio grande, outside taos

the profiles of contact between a piano's capstan and whippen

This week marks a year since giving this talk in upstate NY.

A lot of the ideas I dig into here (especially in the really excellent q&a session) have developed in interesting ways in the intervening months and I'm really looking forward to sharing the results of it very soon.