"As the arc of innovation becomes a branching, radical network rather than a cutting edge, we don’t need to look to the future anymore, but to our unfolding interfaces for things that already exist.
We might call this “the uncertain ethical implications of atemporality.” In only a few years, the span of history and the calm, orderly narratives it wove were effectively collapsed into a multi-dimensional space most closely modeled by Google Instant results after typing a single character in to the search bar."

"Without self-revealing, easy-to-use tools, the benefits of technology are only extended to technologists. If you want a world where only the clued-in get to reap the benefits of technology, you are a technocrat, not a geek. What’s more, as you age, and your ability to stay current on technical subjects is eroded, you will become a serf along with your poor neighbours."

"while it’s true that geeks can get around this sort of thing – and other bad network policies, such as network-level censorship, or vendor locks on our tablets, phones, consoles, and computers – this isn’t enough to protect us, let alone the world. It doesn’t matter how good your email provider is, or how secure your messages are, if 95% of the people you correspond with use a free webmail service with a lawful interception backdoor, and if none of those people can figure out how to use crypto, then nearly all your email will be within reach of spooks and control-freaks and cops on fishing expeditions."

"The algorithm, called Darwin (that’s Decision Algorithm Rating What Ingredient’s Next), determines how snack portions are sorted into punnets, how customised Graze boxes are labelled, and how they are packed directly into Royal Mail vans. It also records the customer’s order history and preferences, monitors stock levels and tracks the location of workers on the factory floor (stock replenishers wear wireless devices on their wrists). “It’s possible to get 4.9 million different combinations of snacks in a Graze box,” says Jones. So the 250-person company uses data — including over 50 million snack ratings — to personalise each customer’s snack selection. “If you bin all the things unsuitable for vegans, we’ll learn that,” explains cofounder Edd Read, 26, the AI specialist who developed Darwin. “Then, if we launch a product that’s unsuitable for vegans, Darwin knows not to send it to you."

"The strongest impacts of an emergent technology are always unanticipated. You can’t know what people are going to do until they get their hands on it and start using it on a daily basis, using it to make a buck and using it for criminal purpose and all the different things that people do."