For example, instead of being asked to write an article, suddenly editors wanted me to make super-short videos. The assumptions of those video gigs was that kids don't read as much news and basically need to be read to, which I found really problematic and kind of insulting. I thought, Isn't it just that you don't have any money and that's why you want me to make some crappy "content" for your website?

On the one hand, I'm a kind of crazy anarchist-sympathizer with a hippie background, so this sounds pretty good to me. Make something for the love of it! But the reality is so much more complicated.

Basically political economy - that you have to look at how funding structures shape the media landscape. You have to look at commercial interests, consolidation - the economy structures are experience.

Ultimately, the current argument is "not having net neutrality will hurt innovation," and you can make that argument, but I would rather make the public good argument, which is not just about innovation or nurturing new companies that will add to the nation's GDP, it's actually about creating a democratic public sphere.

One thing that struck me about going to those tech conferences was all the enthusiasm for free culture, and remixing, and social media, but people's greatest ambition was to be sponsored by Chipotle or something equivalent to that. It was this weird mix of collaborative, utopian claims and this total acquiescence to commercial imperatives.

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

One connection I see between the work I did on philosophy and my work on technology is that both communities tend to mystify and create an atmosphere of complexity.