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On Attaining European Technological Sovereignty
Europe is in a bind. While we posses advanced manufacturing and research, we have somehow been unable to adequately transform these advantages into a prominent tech industry1. With the large investments in large language models (LLMs) since the release of ChatGPT a number of years ago there are increasing pushes for Europe to do something, to the extent that Europe can be considered a single entity. What exactly to do is of course in contention, otherwise it would likely already have been done, but the discussion regarding the lack of a European tech industry compared to the USA has been occurring for much longer — especially since China has proven it is possible to build such an industry without American help.
Continue ReadingDesigning Business Cards
I usually always carry a few business cards. This is quite uncommon in this day and age, with the need for remembering phone numbers having disappeared and with the ubiquity of social media for creating, sharing, and maintaining contact. But I reject the use of mainstream social media, partly for ideological reasons but also for practical ones1. This inevitably requires making certain sacrifices when it comes to what events I can participate in, on how learning about what people I know are up to, and on how I can communicate with the people in my life around me. There are some drawbacks that you might expect — you can not DM someone on instagram if you do not have instagram yourself — but there are hidden drawbacks that may not be immediately obvious.
Continue ReadingEmail as social media
It is apparent to everyone that social media is distinctly a different experience today from how it initially developed. It has become a form of mindless consmption instead of a social space where one interacts with other genuine individuals. The concept of content, once merely used on Madison avenue, has become so ingrained in the social media environment that those who would otherwise call themselves enternainers, artists, or journalists have now come to regard their field as mere content creation, as producing things merely meant to get you hooked so that you will look at more advertisments. This has been accelerated due to LLM’s ability to quickly create things that are “good enough” to look at, read, or otherwise consume. Consumption has become the only reason to interact with social media. But it is becoming increasingly clear that alternatives are not only necessary, they are already here.
Continue ReadingWhat is Technique?
In recent time I have noticed a considerable number of academic, policy, and popular works that have all covered parts of the concept of technique, without naming it as such. At the same time I have encountered numerous older writers and thinkers who were very much aware of the concept. I believe this is because of a lack of knowledge on the topic, and I have written this as a sort of “introduction” to thinking about problems of a technical sort.
Continue ReadingDon't Prioritise What to Learn
I’ve recently read not just one, but two different blog posts arguing for roughly the same thing. To summarise them; You have a finite amount of time to learn new things, and so you should not only focus that time toward learning things that actually matter, but you should also only try and learn things that are easy to learn. I fundamentally disagree with both of these two things, but think they are prevalent in “productivity” sphere, especially in those targeting people at the intersection between policy and technology, where I happen to find myself right now.
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