Plutopia News Network

Don Norman has been a professor, industry executive, consultant, keynote speaker, and author. He’s worked in electrical engineering, cognitive psychology, cognitive science, computer science, and design. He’s the author of several books, among them Design for a Better World, his latest; also including The Design of Everyday Things, Living with Complexity, , Emotional Design and The Des...

Conceptual media artist, activist and educator Patrick Lichty joined the Plutopia Live show for a wide-ranging discussion of current events and the future. We explored migration and borders, climate change, AI and art, and the techno-tsunami of new ideas. Patrick Lichty: When we think of the idea of the future, I think something that’s a relatively new thing I think is really, really interes...

Cory Doctorow has a problem with corporate bullies. In his latest book, The Internet Con, How to Seize the Means of Computation, Cory details how monopolies have taken control of much of the tech sector and are unlikely to give it back without a fight. Cory Doctorow: Corruption arises out of monopoly, so we know what our marching orders should be, and obviously it’s much harder under monopol...

Journalist John Schwartz joins Plutopians to discuss journalism and climate science. After two decades at the New York Times, John has joined the faculty at the University of Texas School of Journalism as a professor of practice concentrating on climate science. UT has been very good to me and it turns out that I love teaching, and the students are great. And it’s also not a bad thing to be...

Karen Levy is an author, associate professor in the Department of Information Science at Cornell University and associated faculty at Cornell Law School. Her research focuses on the legal, organizational, social and ethical aspects of data-intensive technologies, particularly in contexts that are marked by conditions of inequality. In her book, Data Driven: Truckers, Technology, and the New Workpl...

Technologist, thought leader and podcaster Tom Parish joins the Plutopia Podcast as we explore developments in artificial intelligence, privacy, the Internet of Things, and job security. Tom Parish: The difference about AI is there’s so much Hollywood myth associated with gloom and doom and what’s going to come in – the end of the world and all that. And a lot of worry about how...

Journalist and educator Jeff Jarvis, who believes we have entered the post-print age of communication, joins Plutopians to discuss his book The Gutenberg Parenthesis: The Age of Print and Its Lessons for the Age of the Internet. Jeff created and edited Entertainment Weekly and wrote about media for TV Guide, People Magazine, and The Guardian. He’s a blogger at buzzmachine.com. He holds the L...

Marjorie Ingall and Susan McCarthy are co-authors of the book Sorry, Sorry, Sorry, The Case for Good Apologies, where they draw on a deep well of research in psychology, sociology, law, and medicine to explain why a good apology is hard to find and why it doesn’t have to be. They also have a website called SorryWatch, where they track bad apologies and occasionally good apologies as well. In...

Plutopia Live was on vacation hiding from the heat – but last week the weather was lowered from molten lava to merely hellish so we resumed our regular Thursday show on YouTube (9/21/2023). Join us now for a rebroadcast of that show where we discuss the former president who shall not be named, fascist takeovers, social media, brain implants, and much more. And we’re not mentioning Dona...

December 8th…1980 A deranged young man assassinated John Lennon. That same day an RKO Radio crew recorded what would prove to be Lennon’s final interview. RKO’s Dave Sholin and Laurie Kaye interviewed John Lennon and Yoko Ono in their apartment at the Dakota in New York. On December 8th 2023, Laurie Kaye’s memoir Confessions of a Rock N Roll Name Dropper is set for release. Laurie joins the...

Educator and author Amy Bruckman joins the Plutopia podcast this time. Amy is Regents’ Professor and Senior Associate Chair in the School of Interactive Computing at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Contributing Editor Wendy Grossman joins Jon and Scoop as we discuss Amy’s book “Should You Believe Wikipedia? Online Communities and the Construction of Knowledge.” We also explo...

Rob van Eijk, the Future of Privacy Forum’s Managing Director for Europe, joins Contributing Editor Wendy Grossman, Jon, and Scoop in this wide-ranging discussion about data privacy and advertising technology. We explore digital advertising, cookies, ad blockers, privacy law, AI and ads, and we ask the question, “What the heck is hyper-nudging?” Rob van Eijk: The fact that you in...

Hugo Campos’ efforts to liberate health data from implantable medical devices has drawn widespread praise and recognition. He joins e-Patient Dave deBronkart, a cancer survivor and an international keynote speaker on healthcare, on the Plutopia podcast. Hugo Campos: I think the trend has been from being passive patients to become engaged in participatory medicine, and the more, I think, tool...

Wagner James Au thinks there may be a metaverse in your future! He joins the Plutopia podcast as we explore the various incarnations of the metaverse, including Second Life and Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta. We also discuss the birth of the metaverse in Neal Stephenson’s novel Snow Crash, and its appearance in many sci-fi books and movies. Wagner James Au: Military veterans started meeting wi...

Climate scientist Michael Tobis returns to join Plutopians as the planet continues to bake and burn. We discuss the Canadian wildfires, climate change, and political roadblocks to finding a solution. I think most of the members of the so-called conservative party here are going to be climate deniers, too. Especially since many of them – the bulk of them – are from Alberta, which is the...

Geologist and geoscience writer Andrew Alden joins Plutopians to discuss his book Deep Oakland, inspired by the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. Andrew gives us a guided tour of Oakland’s history and geology. Andrew Alden: It’s a new kind of book. Any of you, if you wanted to, you could write a book like that for your own city. I’m not declaring a franchise, but I’m saying Deep...

Climate activist, former hippie flower salesman and politician Max Nofziger returns to the Plutopia podcast. We discuss Max’s political career in Austin, his environmental activism, his in-progress memoir and much more. Max Nofziger: You know, I led those campaigns to stop fossil fuel plants. And nobody wants to do that now, you know why? Because it’s really hard. When we campaigned ag...

Zen Buddhist priest Renshin Bunce joins the Plutopia podcast to discuss Buddhism and Renshin’s life as a priest. Renshin received dharma transmission in 2013. She worked as a hospice chaplain from 2010 until she retired in 2022. Renshin Bunce: Soto Zen is no gaining idea. We don’t practice, and practice – there are a few words, like practice, like God, like love, like life &#8211...

Alan Chamberlain aka Axon explains his music and his journey to recovery. We explore country music, songwriting, the power of music in recovery, and the 12 Step process. Axon plays a few songs in the process. Alan is a singer/songwriter in the “herban” cowboy tradition. His songwriting examines the Western mythos in defiance of the popular image created by an atavistic mass media. He s...

Dave deBronkart and Doc Searls take aim at the American healthcare system. They discuss empowered patients, medical technology, electronic medical records, and much more. Dave, known on the internet as e-Patient Dave, is a blogger, health policy advisor and international keynote speaker. Dave beat stage IV kidney cancer in 2007. Doc is an American journalist, columnist, and a widely read blogger....

Howard Rheingold joins Jon and Scoop for a discussion that includes virtual communities, social media, AI and chatbots, media education, good vs bad on the Internet, cultural evolution, and tools for thought. Howard is a writer, critic, and teacher, former editor of “Whole Earth Review” , and author of several books including Virtual Reality, The Virtual Community, and Smart Mobs. Howa...

In this Plutopia podcast, we’re joined by Joanna Bryson, an academic expert in intelligence, both natural and artificial. In a conversation led by Wendy Grossman, we explore intelligence, both artificial and natural. Bryson has experience in programming and systems administration in several commercial sectors, and degrees in both psychology and AI from Chicago, Edinburgh, and MIT. She has be...

Writer, blogger, and author Wendy Grossman, author of net.wars joins Plutopians for a conversation about hacking with Bruce Schneier, an internationally renowned computer security professional and author. Bruce’s latest book, A Hacker’s Mind: How the Powerful Bend Society’s Rules, and How to Bend Them Back, is an expanded view of hacks and hackers beyond computers to other kinds...

Plutopians talk to Claire Fitch, a PhD candidate in the Department of Geography and the Environment at the University of Texas at Austin . Her research contemplates the role that simulated natures in virtual reality (VR) play in shaping trajectories of human-environment relations. In order to unravel the current forms and functions of this medium, she investigates various ways in which VR is used...

This time on the Plutopia Podcast, we feature a presentation about the OAUTH protocol, delivered at the May meeting of EFF-Austin. Due to the visual nature of the demo portion of the session, we have posted the entire video of the OAUTH presentation on our YouTube channel. For the audio podcast, we present an edited version. Plutopia’s Jon Lebkowsky introduced the session. If you wish to view the...