Astra Taylor

One connection I see between the work I did on philosophy and my work on technology is that both communities tend to…

— Astra Taylor

“wealth and power are shifting to those who control the platforms on which all of us create, consume, and connect. The companies…

— Astra Taylor

It's very complicated. There's been this broader mechanism, an industry, which wants people to use free services, from the old days of…

— Astra Taylor

“Though it’s hard to believe now, newspapers were once the envy of the business world. Through the eighties and nineties, 20, 30,…

— Astra Taylor

Those who applaud social production and networked amateurism, the colorful cacophony that is the Internet, and the creative capacities of everyday people…

— Astra Taylor

“The rub is that over the intervening years we have somehow deceived ourselves into believing that this state of insecurity and inequity…

— Astra Taylor

There's something odd about telling people, artists, that they need to work for free to be pure while you're sitting there getting…

— Astra Taylor

“Instead of distinct old and new media, what we have is a complex cultural ecosystem that spans the analog and digital, encompassing…

— Astra Taylor

Art and culture are nonetheless vital, essential even, to what it means to be human, yet digital abundance has diminished our sense…

— Astra Taylor

First we need to rethink the terms and recognize that we've imported this language from the technocratic class, from Silicon Valley, that…

— Astra Taylor

I'd go to conference after conference and it would essentially be the talking points. Either pro or con. It's amazing how polarized…

— Astra Taylor

We've been criticizing these superficial aspects, like whether we are all more distracted. We really need to articulate a defense, a critique,…

— Astra Taylor

I try to look at the evolution of these utopian claims. In the late '60s there was an assumption that the wealth…

— Astra Taylor

The market won't let us treat all data equally because there's a potential to make huge gobs of money not doing that.…

— Astra Taylor

My point, though, is that if lines have indeed shifted, it's not so much that the younger generation just doesn't care, it's…

— Astra Taylor

Advertisers are happy to see the stuff they've branded out there for free, they don't care about scarcity, they want any message…

— Astra Taylor

Giving people what they want reduces us to consumers instead of treating us like citizens, consumers who are on the prowl for…

— Astra Taylor

To go from the vision that we would all be free to express ourselves creatively because our material needs were being met,…

— Astra Taylor

There's also the issue of tech titans throwing their weight around in Washington and lobbying. There was just a Reuters poll that…

— Astra Taylor

Technology isn't simply addictive - it's addictive because it's a servant to business incentives. There are huge departments in these companies that…

— Astra Taylor

New media companies look remarkably like the old ones they aspire to replace: male, pale, and privileged.

— Astra Taylor

One sad consequence of this is that people don't feel permitted to try understand Internet infrastructure, so I'm really grateful to groups…

— Astra Taylor

Not to be to be a vulgar materialist or be too reductive, but all of that was completely absent from the conversation.…

— Astra Taylor

Early on, America took one path and went down the advertising road, and in the UK they founded the BBC and developed…

— Astra Taylor

And of course the things that get the most attention online tend to be similar to those that succeeded under the old…

— Astra Taylor