Bonus post this week: While digging through my archives, I rediscovered a piece of mine from 2018. At the time, the technology industry was just nearing the end of a highly-abstract intellectual turf war on the topic of artificial intelligence. Will it kill us all? Will it bring about utopia? Really what we were discussing, I argued, was human nature. Today, I’m realizing how similar this projection is on the topic of blockchain. There are many interesting critiques of Web3, but they have nothing to do with socialism (as defined by TikTok influencers) or equity (as defined by culture war zealots). These are simply the things with which our politicians and intellectual luminaries are presently obsessed.

Rereading Rorschach, I was reminded of how ambitious conversations in tech used to be, and how recently. Thought it worth sharing.

Merry Christmas.