Thread · 6 tweets · 14 Sept 2019

This is an amazing piece by @mariafarrell. The parallel between emotional labour and attentional labour struck me as particularly but the entire piece is worthy of your time, *especially* if you think it unlikely to be a good lens on the issue.

The one thing I would add is that I think this ties into the dearth of innovation we are going through in tech. Power imbalances lead to static social orders, which in turn are naturally hostile to innovation.

Sure enough we keep getting shiny gadgets, but what really is new? It's all innovation theatre. Even the blockchain is 10 years old. Mobile 20, the Web 30, the Internet 50.

We're stuck because almost everything new coming out of tech is a stream of user-less products designed for no purpose other than to maintain the imbalance while tricking users into thinking they're in a great relationship.

Not to mention pervasive user-blaming under the so-called privacy paradox, well beyond phones. "They say they want privacy but they keep coming back. Stupid users are asking for it!"

I wonder if we should have "userism" as a concept. Either way thank you @mariafarrell!