Playing for Team Human today is Eli Pariser, author of The Filter Bubble , former director of MoveOn.org and current chief executive of Upworthy.com . Eli uses media to make what’s important popular, rather than the other way around. Upworthy.com is a story-driven website focused on magnifying meaningful conversations that encourage positive social change. On today’s episode, Eli and Douglas mine our reality tunnels, looking at how perspective shapes meaning and what strategies we might employ t...
May 30, 2018•1 hr 9 min•Ep 88•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for team human today is author, occult scholar, and wizard Jason Louv. Jason will be helping us see how the intentions we bring into the world of artificial intelligence could set something in motion from which it is hard to return. Jason’s latest book J ohn Dee and the Empire of Angels: Enochian Magick and the Occult Roots of Empire digs deep into the untold and often ignored occult history of Western thinking and empire. On today’s show Jason and Douglas bridge the gap from the E...
May 23, 2018•1 hr 4 min•Ep 87•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is Juho Makkonen, co-founder of Sharetribe . Juho is working on a vision of the “sharing economy” where people share value with one another instead of seeing it get syphoned off by companies like Uber and Airbnb. His company Sharetribe creates tools for individuals and local communities to decentralize and ultimately democratize ownership of the sharing economy. In this conversation, Douglas and Juho discuss platform cooperatives and the slow patient work of building...
May 16, 2018•1 hr 2 min•Ep 86•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is technology and society researcher Molly Sauter . Molly will be helping us see how stupid some “smart city” visions really are. Molly and Douglas discuss the extractive, “mining ethos” of the tech investment swarm, and how this mentality does harm to communities from Silicon Valley to Toronto, Canada. Is your city the next VC Guinea pig in the technocratic experiment to grow cities and extract their value? Check out Molly’s fantastic book on another type of “swarm”...
May 09, 2018•1 hr 7 min•Ep 85•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today, the economy’s equivalent of an outsider artist, Of Two Minds blogger and author of Money and Work Unchained , Charles Hugh Smith. Charles will be talking to us about the market, Universal Basic Income, and distributed prosperity. You can learn more about Charles at his website and blog Of Two Minds: https://www.oftwominds.com/ . Opening the show, Douglas considers the "Art of the Deal." Perhaps a truly artful deal is one that engages us in relationships of coll...
May 02, 2018•1 hr 2 min•Ep 84•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is designer, technology historian, and author of the new book Architectural Intelligence , Professor Molly Wright Steenson . Molly and Douglas share a wide-ranging conversation that begins by looking at the “weirdness” of AI. How do design metaphors such as “awesome mouth feel” and “uncanny valley” provoke deeper questions of human imagination, play, and meaning. Molly’s background in architecture and history offers listeners a unique grounding of digital in the phys...
Apr 25, 2018•1 hr 8 min•Ep 83•Transcript available on Metacast “Everyone wants to be a cowboy, but no one wants to ride the range.” A dream of unraveling the mystery of the birth of universe led astrophysicist and author Brian Keating to "saddle up" and head to a frozen ocean of snow at the bottom of the world. Keating joins Rushkoff to talk about science, religion, questions that lead to more questions, and the "background noise” of the cosmos that may just be the key to understanding how this all began. Rushkoff begins today's show...
Apr 18, 2018•1 hr 3 min•Ep 82•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is Jeremy Lent, author of The Patterning Instinct . Lent’s expansive research looks at the variety of ways cultures throughout history have patterned meaning into the cosmos. In excavating these patterns, Lent shares how humans might retrieve those metaphors that amplify altruism and shared intentionality. Together, Rushkoff and Lent explore the question of what makes humans unique and how we might leverage our patterning instinct to foster a future characterized by ...
Apr 11, 2018•1 hr 3 min•Ep 81•Transcript available on Metacast What can artists, musicians, magical thinkers and "weirdos" bring to machine learning and neural networks? What do we need to make the right kind of AI? Exploring these questions and more is Kenric McDowell, leader of Google’s Artists and Machine Intelligence program. In this conversation with Douglas, Kenric explains how his unique role at Google enables him to bring the artistic spirit into the very heart of technology development. Moving beyond the hype of AI, Kenric shares strategies fo...
Apr 04, 2018•1 hr 8 min•Ep 80•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is Suzanne Slomin, founder of Green Rabbit a small solar powered bakery located in the Mad River Valley of Vermont specializing in naturally leavened breads. Suzanne will share with us what it’s like being a “Real Person Doing Real Things” – an actual baker, farmer, employer and global citizen trying to operate as sustainably and humanly as possible across all the dimensions of her work. In this episode, we meet Suzanne having just “fed” her sourdough sta...
Mar 28, 2018•1 hr 13 min•Ep 79•Transcript available on Metacast Today on Team Human we conclude our series of live shows recorded at Gray Area Foundation for the Arts in the historic Mission district of San Francisco. Picking up where we left off last week and joining Douglas on stage are teammates Erik Davis and Josette Melchor. Erik Davis is the author of Techgnosis , Nomad Codes and host of The Expanding Mind podcast. Erik and Douglas start with the big question, “What the fuck is going on here?” What begins with a few laughs quickly digs into a mind-expa...
Mar 21, 2018•1 hr 15 min•Ep 78•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is interactive artist Lauren McCarthy . Lauren’s thought provoking work brings a unique and creative perspective on social interaction and the intersection of humans and technology. In this episode, Lauren’s app Crowdpilot becomes the first “advertisement” to be featured on Team Human. Crowdpilot is an app in which real time conversation advice is crowdsourced from online third-party monitors. In another crowdsourcing experiment titled Social Turkers , McCarthy...
Mar 14, 2018•44 min•Ep 77•Transcript available on Metacast This week we continue with part two of our special live recording of Team Human at Gray Area Foundation for the Arts in San Fransisco. Joining Douglas on stage is cyberculture pioneer, educator, artist, author, visionary, and shoe painter, Howard Rheingold. “Mind amplifiers,” “psychedelic signifiers,” and “the instrumental vs. the sacred” are just the tip of the iceberg in a conversation that explores how we got to this moment in technology and society... and ultimately where we hope ...
Mar 07, 2018•1 hr 10 min•Ep 76•Transcript available on Metacast This week's Team Human comes to you recorded live at the historic Grand Theater in San Francisco's Mission District, home to Gray Area Foundation for the Arts . We'll be sharing four installments of this live event, kicking it off with a conversation with Annalee Newitz , author of the mind blowing sci-fi novel Autonomous , as well as prior work Scatter Adapt and Remember: How Humans will Survive a Mass Extinction, founder of I09, and journalist for outlets such as Ars Technica among many others...
Feb 28, 2018•56 min•Ep 75•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is interdisciplinary thinker and technology philosopher Damien Williams. In this episode, Williams and Rushkoff look at the embedded biases of technology and the values programed into our mediated lives. How has a conception of technology as “objective” blurred our vision to the biases normalized within these systems? What ethical interrogation might we apply to such technology? And finally, how might alternative modes of thinking, such as magick, the occult, and the...
Feb 21, 2018•57 min•Ep 74•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today, cyber security expert Eleanor Saitta . Eleanor shares her deep knowledge on building secure and robust digital ecosystems. As Eleanor and Douglas converse on issues of privacy, encryption, and surveillance, a set of thought-provoking insights about online identity and human to human connection emerges. Does empathy scale across our cyber connections? Or is it confusion and distrust that are most apt to scale? Conversing over a shaky and intermittent VoIP conne...
Feb 14, 2018•1 hr 6 min•Ep 73•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is journalist, Boing Boing editor, Institute for the Future research director and recent Grammy Award Winning record producer David Pescovitz. Douglas spoke to David just days before he won the Grammy, with collaborators Tim Daly and Lawrence Azerrad, for best boxed or special limited-edition package for The Voyager Golden Record: 40th Anniversary Edition . The Voyager vinyl is an incredible artifact to hold and hear. The original Voyager Golden Records were launched...
Feb 07, 2018•51 min•Ep 72•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is world renowned social scientist and systems thinker, Merrelyn Emery. Emery, with her partner the late Fred Emery, advanced Open Systems Theory and applied it to management of organizations and government. Open Systems Theory, or OST is the idea that autocracies make for bad governments, companies, and organizations. In this conversation, Merrelyn and Douglas discuss the power of community and collective organizing. They also discuss the social environments conduci...
Jan 31, 2018•52 min•Ep 71•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is Danielle Butin , founder of the Afya Foundation . Afya collects and sends surplus medical supplies from the US to those who need them around the world. In today’s conversation with Douglas, Danielle shares not only stories of the good accomplished through Afya, but also a broader strategy for human intervention. How did Danielle, an occupational therapist and geriatric care provider, come to launch an organization that has shipped more than six million pounds of m...
Jan 24, 2018•59 min•Ep 70•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is immersion experience artist and pioneer, Ghislaine Boddington. Ghislaine joins Douglas for a conversation about the nature of immersive technologies and how we might bring our bodies with us into the digital realm. Rather than diminish the role of the physical body, Ghislaine’s work celebrates the body as an integral part of enhanced immersive experience. As Creative Director at body>data>space Ghislaine’s art and practice embraces technologies that amplify ...
Jan 17, 2018•1 hr 12 min•Ep 69•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is Stacco Troncoso of the P2P Foundation. Stacco brings with him deep knowledge and enthusiasm for the power of the commons. Stacco and the Commons Transition team put their faith in people, believing in the potential of diverse, empowered communities to address complex problems. Far from a utopian fantasy, P2P offers a wealth of resources including models from groups who have already successfully transitioned to a commons approach in governance, finance, and culture...
Jan 10, 2018•55 min•Ep 68•Transcript available on Metacast Genesis Breyer P-Orridge has been one of my dearest and most human friends for the past few decades. Gen’s a musician, icon, cut-and-paste artist, occultist, and pandrogyne with whom I’ve worked and played in many ways over the years. Gen founded The Coum Transmissions , Throbbing Gristle , and Psychic TV , with whom I played keyboards in the early 2000’s. Gen also embarked on a very personal cut-and-paste experiment with partner Jackie, where they both sought to unite through psychic and ...
Dec 20, 2017•2 hr 41 min•Ep 67•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today, occult scholar and author Mitch Horowitz . Mitch, the author of Occult America (Bantam); One Simple Idea: How Positive Thinking Reshaped Modern Life (Crown); and Mind As Builder: The Positive-Mind Metaphysics of Edgar Cayce (A.R.E. Press) joins Douglas for a conversation about the shared histories of magic, capitalism, and American political thought. It’s a conversation that asks questions about the nature of the mind and the ...
Dec 13, 2017•41 min•Ep 66•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is Erin Barnes co-founder of ioby . Ioby (in our backyards) is a “ crowd-resourcing” platform for citizen-led, neighborhood-focused projects. Rather than just raise money, ioby mobilizes civic engagement by putting resources in the hands of local leaders who want to steward positive change in their neighborhoods. Erin shares with Douglas how ioby harnesses the power of solidarity and real world connection. In doing so, ioby not only ignites civic particip...
Dec 06, 2017•40 min•Ep 65•Transcript available on Metacast What can we learn from a mere handful of dirt? For Nikki Silvestri, soil is both a metaphor and the literal “fertile” ground through which complexity and diversity thrive. Having worked on issues of food systems, sustainability, and public health, Silvestri describes soil as the link through which to engage in the work of building community, resilience, and social equity. Today, in her conversation with Douglas Rushkoff, Silvestri offers a unique approach to systems thinking, grounded in a deep ...
Nov 29, 2017•49 min•Ep 64•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today are Frances Moore Lappé and Adam Eichen from the Small Planet Institute . Lappé and Eichen are out on the road with a mission to reinvigorate “civic courage” and inclusive participation in democracy. Their latest book Daring Democracy Igniting Power, Meaning, and Connection for the America We Want offers a diagnosis of what has come to ail our democracy and recommends the necessary cures, offering concrete examples of ballot initiatives, reforms, and collective organ...
Nov 15, 2017•1 hr 4 min•Ep 63•Transcript available on Metacast Today on Team Human, we share a conversation with author, musician, humorist, and culture hacker Hugh Gallagher . Gallagher began his professional writing career thanks in part to a college entrance essay that went viral in the 90s, earning the distinction of being an early, if not the first, internet comedy meme. With lines like, “I am a dynamic figure, often seen scaling walls and crushing ice... I can pilot bicycles up severe inclines with unflagging speed, and I cook Thirty-Minute Brownies i...
Nov 08, 2017•50 min•Ep 62•Transcript available on Metacast Net impresario Tim O’Reilly now recognizes how the short-term focus of digital business is draining the real economy. Its algorithms have been programmed to extract value from us all. For O’Reilly, however, the solution is not to eliminate algorithms, but to write better ones. If there’s an argument to made for technosolutionism, O’Reilly makes as good a case as there is. Rather than confronting O’Reilly on their differences, Rushkoff engages him, pushes gently, finds common ground, and lo...
Nov 01, 2017•45 min•Ep 61•Transcript available on Metacast Playing for Team Human today is Neal Gorenflo from Shareable.net . Neal joins Douglas to spread the word about Shareable’s latest resource, Sharing Cities: Activating the Urban Commons . Sharing Cities is an inspiring collection of 137 case studies and policies across a wide spectrum of issues that show how empowered communities are building citizen-run, democratic solutions using commons thinking. Whether it be the grassroots artist organization Club Cultural Matienzo ( CCM ) that formed in Bue...
Oct 25, 2017•49 min•Ep 60•Transcript available on Metacast A high school basketball team organizes a canned food drive. A church volunteer group restocks the local pantry with donations from Walmart. Both examples are seemingly positive portrayals of American civic engagement… So what’s wrong with this picture? Playing for Team Human today is Andy Fisher, author of Big Hunger: the Unholy Alliance Between Corporate America and Anti-Hunger Groups . In the book, Fisher tackles the big question of why chronic hunger and food insecurity persist despite the e...
Oct 18, 2017•38 min•Ep 59•Transcript available on Metacast 
