Recent Posts

Silicon Valley: A Living History

Googlers Against Genocide, several dozen of whom were fired recently after some inspiring protests mounted in and against their venal employer.

Malcolm Harris’s remarkable book, Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism and the World, is not only one of the best histories of California anyone has written, he’s also a fantastic writer. […]

General Ludd to General Intellect

The Luddite Tribunal held at Oakland’s Tamarack Cafe on November 9, 2023. (l to r) Brian Merchant, Safe Street Rebel, Wendy Liu, Paris Marx, and Veena Dubal.

I’ve been called “Luddite” from time to time, though I have always refused the category of “technology” as having any particularly useful reference point. Criticizing technology, […]

Post-Pandemic Melancholia . . . Same As It Ever Was?

First days of August on the beach in Mexico, eating coconut pie, pretty far from melancholic!

Dark times will always spur retrospection, but we need to look backwards not simply to track either progress or decline but rather to open our eyes wider to the crosscurrents, contradictions, and eerie resonances of history. (p. […]