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vgr's profile
Venkatesh Rao
Venkatesh Rao
Venkatesh Rao
@vgr

Tweets

Venkatesh Rao

@vgr

Conversational account. For work follow @ribbonfarm, @breaking_smart, @artofgig. Tweets are 90% vacuous views, apathetically held. Mediocritopian. IKEA builder.

Los Angeles, CA
venkateshrao.com
Joined August 2007

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    1. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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      Where it gets really powerful is when you figure out a science-based technical trick that doesn’t just solve a problem, but solves a problem that has others stuck, in even a small way. Then when someone uses your solution and gets unstuck? That’s the feeling of political power.

      1 reply 1 retweet 14 likes
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    2. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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      It’s the big brother of the lesser feeling of someone merely buying your product or service. That’s just money, and there’s many non-exotic, non-real-problem ways to make money. The power of tech lies in getting people unstuck. That’s not just political power but the deepest kind

      1 reply 2 retweets 14 likes
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    3. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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      You expand the equation, write new political actors on to the stage, old ones off the stage, and do so without being mired 100% in pure other-directed social cognition. Half your mind is oriented in a non-human direction. You’re outside the game in a powerful way.

      1 reply 0 retweets 11 likes
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    4. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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      It’s a weird puppet-master or wolf > sheep feeling. Even in small doses it can go to your head. It also seems to scare people off. I’ve seen talented engineers back off from that feeling by dialing down either the exoticism, or the real-worldiness of what they’re doing.

      1 reply 1 retweet 9 likes
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    5. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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      In part because when you see through the lens of exotic, but real and political consequential agency, that’s a kind of god-like/superhuman perspective. And if you tend to normalize yourself as “human” it induces the uncomfortable sense of seeing others as subhuman.

      1 reply 0 retweets 9 likes
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    6. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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      There’s a stack of fulfillment/meaning types here, with each higher level being richer, but also requiring more imagination and nerve to reach and *tolerate* Staying with non-exotic/real feels safe and offers a domestic kind of satisfaction many engineers don’t want to leave.

      1 reply 2 retweets 8 likes
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    7. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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      OTOH exotic/non-real is safe in a different way: it is stimulating in a mentos-in-coke way but with no risk of disturbing the political peace with tech levers.

      1 reply 1 retweet 3 likes
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    8. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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      2x2: Non-exotic, non-real: hobby crafts like model building. Relaxing and safe. Exotic, non-real: geewhiz tech. Stimulating in a mid way, and politically safe. Non-exotic, real: adult satisfaction, politically safe. Exotic+real: god-feeling, politically destabilizing

      1 reply 2 retweets 16 likes
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    9. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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      Most of the hatred in the tech backlash is due to techies wandering into the exotic+real quadrant and awakening new Promethean forces, but then being unwilling to exercise the political agency unleashed. Those who want the agency can’t exercise it, those who have it don’t want it

      1 reply 2 retweets 20 likes
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    10. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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      As a result, the political agency gets downcycled to mere economic agency, often of a banal (eg advertising) or criminal variety.

      1 reply 1 retweet 7 likes
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      Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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      Not sure where I’m going with this, but something to do with the general air of NPCness around a lot of tech tinkering that feels consciously self-chosen. Which is funny because of the “doer” and “maker” self-images that go with it. Agency as a hobby that avoids turning real.

      11:13 AM - 29 Aug 2020
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      • Matt Kent Warren Koch Kyle Mathews bane says wear a mask bigWombat Herr Dr Mr Modern Major General brrr Seitz
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        2. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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          To non-techies this seems like “not working on real problems”. Really they mean “real but not exotic so you help out in ways we want you to, but otherwise shut up and stay in your lane” Try real+exotic and you’ve bought yourself a political fight whether you want one or not.

          1 reply 0 retweets 5 likes
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        3. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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          This is partly why startup techies love “disruption” in a limited business sense. It’s a sort of deactivated political agency that disturbs just the economic peace and makes more money than power.

          1 reply 1 retweet 3 likes
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        4. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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          But if business disruption is the limit of your political vision you’re still in hobby mode. A big, lucrative hobby but short of dent-in-the-universe ambitions you might pretend to. The most interesting techies embrace the political consequences of what they do.

          1 reply 2 retweets 10 likes
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        5. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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          Which doesn’t mean turning into a politician formally or haunting DC. That’s just selling tech short for a shot at cronyism with existing political equilibrium. It means letting the tech find full expression and accepting the consequences, including any hate.

          1 reply 0 retweets 6 likes
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        6. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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          It’s saying — this is a legit way of being human and the rest of you have to deal. Not apologizing for the impacts of tech or going through ritual contrition and penance. You moved the equation and created an imperative for others to either adapt or suffer being left behind.

          3 replies 0 retweets 8 likes
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        7. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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          It feels cruel to say this, but if others don’t feel a responsibility to keep up, and try to impose on others the burden of maintaining a changeless state, you need feel no responsibility to bend over backwards maintaining an equilibrium you don’t need.

          2 replies 1 retweet 12 likes
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        8. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Aug 29
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          Change is natural and inevitable, changeless stability is what takes unnatural force to maintain. A world that makes those who lean into change feel apologetic towards those who resist it is backwards.

          5 replies 2 retweets 14 likes
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        9. End of conversation
        1. Kyle Mathews‏ @kylemathews Aug 29
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          Replying to @vgr

          this all reminds me a lot of your "Arendtian action" newsletter which has had a powerful effect on me

          0 replies 0 retweets 1 like
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