Optimism and pessimism
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I wrote in Monday’s newsletter about some app makers’ complaints that Apple has too much control over what iPhone apps people can download and charges unfairly high fees on some app purchases. Your Lead Support for Apple’s control over apps That calls for more humility and bridges across the optimism-pessimism divide from people who make technology, those of us who write about it, government officials and the public.
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Technology is not something that exists in a bubble it is a phenomenon that changes how we live or how our world works in ways that help and hurt. The tech downers and the “Iron Man”-loving optimists need each other more than ever. But I sometimes think tech companies also need to give more voice to chief pessimism officers who ask, what if this technology doesn’t work? Who might be harmed by this technology, and how can we prevent that? And do we need this at all? Give those Eeyores a corner office. We need tech optimists to shoot for the moon - literally, in Musk’s case. Sometimes the doubters are right about Musk.
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His companies have also helped advance electric cars, enabled commercial space travel and forced the entire auto industry to rethink what cars combined with computers can do. Musk has repeatedly promised technology that doesn’t pan out or that seems pointless. I can’t predict what happens with Musk’s Neuralink company. And other people say that Musk’s promises are unproven and unoriginal hype.
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Musk is a master showman, and every time he does an act about an underground car tunnel in Los Angeles or bulletproof electric pickup trucks, there is the same reaction: Some people say he is making amazing and life-changing innovations. You could see that in reactions to Musk’s flashy demonstration on Friday of brain-implanted computer chips that he hopes may someday help combat serious health conditions like strokes and spinal cord injuries. Both “The Circle” and “Iron Man” encompass some form of reality, but it’s easy to see technology as either one or the other. Those downers sometimes drown out the ways that we know technology has made many of our lives immeasurably better. He didn’t put it quite this way, but I imagined he wanted less fiction like “ The Circle,” about a surveillance-state corporate cult, and more like “ Iron Man,” in which a tech nerd cobbles together a suit that saves his life and gives him superhero powers. Sriram Krishnan, a technology executive whom I respect, tweeted a few days ago asking for more optimistic descriptions in movies and television of people building technology. I’ve been thinking about this gray zone because of two things: a tweet and Elon Musk. I know nuance is rare these days, but please join me in the vast zone of complexity between “wow, cool!” and “that won’t work” or “that’s evil!” I want to live in those shades of gray. When I consider something new bubbling up in technology, I have vowed not to get overly excited about either its potential benefits or its downsides. I recently made a promise to myself, and I would like you to join me. You can sign up here to receive it weekdays. This article is part of the On Tech newsletter.