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Big Tech Companies treat humans like batteries. We are just there to power their profits
Manage episode 479855032 series 2810918
EP 383 - Jonathan MacDonald is back on the show and keener than ever to get you interested in Ethical Tech.
We discuss why now, more than ever, people need to be given the tools, and moral frameworks to inform their interactions with increasingly opaque technology. How things like social media are seemingly set up to keep us amused, distracted and rob us of our critical thinking faculties and what that means for humanity in the long term.
Jonathan isn’t an anarchist in a tin foil hat (or a cryptoevangelist in a blonde wig come to that) but he is very compelling on why we need to question whether Big Tech algorithms and the people who control them actually have our best interests at heart.
He’s pretty convinced that they don’t, or at least don’t care about us beyond what we can do for them. Which is why he has set up SELF - a personal privacy filter - and also ETHICS TV to help people discuss, understand and control their own moral choices around tech.
We also chat about the Roman Empire and its attitude to analogous situations. We know plenty of you like to think about that kind of thing quite a lot.
*For Apple Podcast chapters, access them from the menu in the bottom right corner of your player*
Spotify Video Chapters:
00:00 BWB with Jonathan MacDonald
02:23 Meet Jonathan
03:18 The Mission: Alternative Future for Technology
04:44 Humans Are Batteries
05:05 The Reality of Free Services
05:58 The Normalisation of Surveillance
06:29 The Impact of Social Media on Society
07:33 The Coercion of Media and Politics
08:37 The Evolution of SELF: Personal Privacy Filter
09:50 The Demand for Privacy in AI Tools
10:50 The Future of Privacy: Self-Sovereign Mechanisms
11:47 The Physicality of Data Privacy
12:37 The Ineffectiveness of GDPR
13:09 The Dark Side of Data Exploitation
14:53 The Post-COVID Awareness Shift
34:02 Ethics in Technology
37:28 The Problem with Modern Democracy
39:18 The Importance of Critical Thinking
39:58 The Role of Media in Critical Thinking
42:30 Education and Critical Thinking
46:15 Ethical Issues in AI and Media
46:41 The Dystopian Future of AI
53:37 Building Ethical Technology
01:04:36 Personal Reflections and Advice
01:11:08 Quickfire - Get To Know Jonathan
Watch and subscribe to us on YouTube
Follow us:
If you'd like to be on the show, get in contact - [email protected]
BWB is powered by Oury Clark
388 episodes
Manage episode 479855032 series 2810918
EP 383 - Jonathan MacDonald is back on the show and keener than ever to get you interested in Ethical Tech.
We discuss why now, more than ever, people need to be given the tools, and moral frameworks to inform their interactions with increasingly opaque technology. How things like social media are seemingly set up to keep us amused, distracted and rob us of our critical thinking faculties and what that means for humanity in the long term.
Jonathan isn’t an anarchist in a tin foil hat (or a cryptoevangelist in a blonde wig come to that) but he is very compelling on why we need to question whether Big Tech algorithms and the people who control them actually have our best interests at heart.
He’s pretty convinced that they don’t, or at least don’t care about us beyond what we can do for them. Which is why he has set up SELF - a personal privacy filter - and also ETHICS TV to help people discuss, understand and control their own moral choices around tech.
We also chat about the Roman Empire and its attitude to analogous situations. We know plenty of you like to think about that kind of thing quite a lot.
*For Apple Podcast chapters, access them from the menu in the bottom right corner of your player*
Spotify Video Chapters:
00:00 BWB with Jonathan MacDonald
02:23 Meet Jonathan
03:18 The Mission: Alternative Future for Technology
04:44 Humans Are Batteries
05:05 The Reality of Free Services
05:58 The Normalisation of Surveillance
06:29 The Impact of Social Media on Society
07:33 The Coercion of Media and Politics
08:37 The Evolution of SELF: Personal Privacy Filter
09:50 The Demand for Privacy in AI Tools
10:50 The Future of Privacy: Self-Sovereign Mechanisms
11:47 The Physicality of Data Privacy
12:37 The Ineffectiveness of GDPR
13:09 The Dark Side of Data Exploitation
14:53 The Post-COVID Awareness Shift
34:02 Ethics in Technology
37:28 The Problem with Modern Democracy
39:18 The Importance of Critical Thinking
39:58 The Role of Media in Critical Thinking
42:30 Education and Critical Thinking
46:15 Ethical Issues in AI and Media
46:41 The Dystopian Future of AI
53:37 Building Ethical Technology
01:04:36 Personal Reflections and Advice
01:11:08 Quickfire - Get To Know Jonathan
Watch and subscribe to us on YouTube
Follow us:
If you'd like to be on the show, get in contact - [email protected]
BWB is powered by Oury Clark
388 episodes
All episodes
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