What should a civilization remember—and what should it be allowed to forget? You are reading an old article. It mentions a report. A photograph. A website. Another story. The words are still there. So is the link. You click it. 404. Page Not Found. Something used to be there. Maybe it was unimportant. Maybe another … Read more

If attention is part of your life, what does it mean to spend it deliberately? You pick up your phone to check one thing. A message. The weather. An email. Something that should take a minute. Twenty minutes later, you look up. You are nowhere near the thing you originally opened the phone to do. … Read more

What happens when a tool can do something that fewer and fewer people understand? A child points at something and asks: “How does that work?” Maybe it is a car. A television. A phone. An airplane. The internet. An adult gives a perfectly reasonable answer: “I don’t know.” Then the child asks: “Who does?” That … Read more

How much freedom do we have when leaving means losing years of our digital lives? “If you don’t like it, just leave.” It sounds simple. Delete the app. Close the account. Find another service. Nobody is forcing you to stay. And sometimes it really is that simple. You try something. You do not like it. … Read more

When should a decision remain open to reconsideration? Your application has been denied. Why? You did not meet the criteria. Which criteria? The decision was made automatically. I think some of the information is wrong. The decision is final. Maybe the decision was correct. Maybe the criteria were reasonable. Maybe every piece of information was … Read more

What happens when someone else decides what deserves your attention? Imagine walking into a bookstore looking for a particular book. You know what you came for. You find the right section and begin walking toward it. Then another title catches your attention. You stop. Pull it from the shelf. Read the back. Maybe you put … Read more

When does something helpful become something we can no longer do without? You are driving somewhere you have been dozens of times. You know the destination. You recognize the roads. You have made the trip before. And yet, almost without thinking, you enter the address into your phone. Turn right. Continue for three miles. Take … Read more

What does ownership mean in a digital world? Look around your home. A book on a shelf. A photograph in a frame. A watch in a drawer. A record, a painting, a chair. We understand what it means to say: That’s mine. The digital world makes that sentence more complicated. We buy books that live … Read more

What are we really exchanging when a service is free? Some of the most useful things on the internet cost us nothing. We can search billions of pages in seconds. We can communicate across the world. We can store photographs, watch videos, navigate unfamiliar cities, publish our work, learn new skills, and maintain relationships across … Read more