You might get hit by "Musk droppings," but there's still reason for hope
One of my favorite places in the world is Providenciales, part of the Turks & Caicos Islands. The Caribbean water, a brilliant shade of turquoise, laps on fine white-sand beaches just meters from a coral reef teeming with tropical fish.
A few days ago Providenciales was hit with parts of a SpaceX rocket that exploded after takeoff. Debris rained down on houses and yards, and in the water, with pieces of rocket washing up on beaches.
Let’s call these “Musk droppings”:
Turks & Caicos isn’t the only place dealing with Musk’s space junk. Earlier this month Australian Aviation reported that Qantas flights are being delayed to avoid SpaceX rocket debris. Just another travel disruption to live with. “Sorry I’m late, honey, we had to wait for the Musk droppings to pass.”
But I repeat myself. Just a few weeks ago I wrote Musk’s space junk is a threat to us all – including a warning about debris falling into airliner airspace. Now it’s here.
It’s hard not to feel a little discouraged at a moment when tech billionaires are visibly aligning themselves with political power (and all of the government contracts and deregulation it will bring about). Every day, it seems, the oligarchs increase their power and influence – while citizens are an afterthought.
For example: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, one of the oligarchs who attended the inauguration, just launched ChatGPT Gov for government agencies. Was this at the request of citizens? Or many government employees? Do we believe this tool, known for its plagiarism, hallucination, and security risks, will be a net benefit to government operation? Is anyone, outside of the tech oligarchs, really in favor of this?
I devoted my entire Techtonic episode this week to these sorts of questions. Welcome to the oligarchy: on Big Tech's government takeover (Jan 27, 2025 Techtonic) covered the concentration of Silicon Valley power displayed at the inauguration, and what form of government that leaves us with.
In the apocryphal words of Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis: “We can have a democratic society or we can have the concentration of great wealth in the hands of a few. We cannot have both.” (Brandeis never said these exact words but would likely have agreed.)
Maybe we know what the word “democracy” means. But how about democracy vs. oligarchy vs. plutocracy vs. kakistocracy? I cover all of these on the show (click “Pop-up player” to listen). What I do know is that this, from the inauguration, is not the image of a government giving power to the people:
We’re not just in danger of Musk droppings. We’ve also got to contend with Zuck droppings, Bezos droppings, Altman droppings, and other oligarchs’ excreta. As I wrote in the space junk essay:
My advice? Reinforce your roof, buy a stronger umbrella, and pack a parachute.
Yet there’s still reason for hope. The billionaires may perceive that they’re in control, but that’s not the only way things get done.
Tech for the people
Hope is still alive, despite the oligarchs, and it comes from people taking charge of their relationship with technology.
One of the more inspiring conversations I’ve had recently was with Kirk Pearson, who runs Dogbotic and recently wrote Electronic Music from Scratch, a friendly guide to making “homegrown audio gizmos.” Kirk was on the January 20 Techtonic and spoke movingly about the joy that comes from building your own electronics – experimenting, learning, even repairing it when necessary. (With a simple breadboard assembly and some editing, Kirk was able to create this homemade version of the Techtonic theme song. Worth a listen.)
Another bright spot this week came in the New York Times, which published an update on the Luddite Club. Now in College, Luddite Teens Still Don’t Want Your Likes (gift link, Jan 30, 2025) revisits the group of teenagers who have sworn off smartphones in favor of flip phones, print books, and face-to-face conversation. Last fall I hosted a Techtonic episode with an interview of three of the members, and I wrote a column about them: A Gleam of Hope: Meet the Luddite Club (Nov 15, 2024).
Whether we’re building our own electronics, or opting out of Big Tech surveillance devices altogether, we do have the ability to resist the tech oligarchs. Doing so is a political act – especially now, as the oligarchs attempt to take over politics. Any act of resistance is evidence of our alignment in the main political battle. As I’ve written before:
The fight ahead isn't about traditional left vs. right differences, it's about Big Tech versus the rest of us.
I want to emphasize how important it is for us to have a community, and a place to gather and share our thoughts. Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and the rest are designed for the benefit of the oligarchs: where are the services for “the rest of us”?
Federated platforms are our best bet, as I discussed in the second half of my Techtonic show this week (starting here, if you want to jump to it). Services like Mastodon, Pixelfed, and others are decentralized, open-source, non-profit platforms that don’t surveil users and don’t employ manipulative algorithms. In every respect they’re the opposite of Big Tech – and they are available right now, for free, to everyone. They show that there is a future outside the reach of the grasping, devouring platforms of Silicon Valley. This should give us hope.
I have one other community to recommend: Creative Good. What you’re reading is the public, non-member version of this newsletter, subsidized by members of Creative Good. Join us and you’ll support my work on the newsletter, and you’ll get access to our Creative Good Forum, where we post articles, essays, columns, games, memes, and more – all to build a community, and a shared resource, that offers a healthy alternative to the toxic sludge now spreading throughout the internet.
I’ve been at this since 1997, trying to encourage people to create something good online – but now the stakes are much, much higher. I hope you’ll support what we’re building together, by joining Creative Good.
Until next time,
-mark
Mark Hurst, founder, Creative Good
Email: mark@creativegood.com
Podcast/radio show: techtonic.fm
Follow me on Bluesky or Mastodon
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