20 dez The tech industry is paved with good intentions

Technological innovations are, in principle, driven by two basic goals: making life more comfortable for people and making their creators and/or investors richer. Don’t be fooled—idealism alone isn’t strong enough to push through the Herculean effort needed to develop a new idea. As with anything else in human history, if there’s no financial incentive, most people won’t lift a finger to innovate. It’s not worth the trouble. Breaking patterns is too uncomfortable and risky to do just for kicks or ideology. That’s a job for the people Apple once called the “crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers. Round pegs in square holes”.

Back in my advertising days, I saw plenty of outrageously talented creatives abandon their typewriters or pencils (yes, there was life before computers) to become agency owners. At the time, it was pretty obvious to me: they’d discovered that making money is way more fun than creating.

But, when you think about it, does it really matter why people invest in new ideas for humanity’s sake? The results are what count. Especially when we’re talking about health-related innovations like nanotech-driven medicines, electronic prosthetics, smart wheelchairs, synthetic organs, or even brain implants to treat mental disorders like Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, or… an inexplicable love for Luan Santana (a brazilian corny singer).

Let’s take a moment to remember one of the most inspiring periods in human history: the Renaissance. It blossomed only because it was heavily bankrolled by the wealthy of the time. And I believe that, from then until now, it takes more than a couple of nerds in a garage to change the world. If you dig into the stories of these “geniuses” who allegedly leapt straight from their garages to the Nasdaq, you’ll find they’re closer to soap opera scripts than entrepreneurship manuals. Sure, many of them started in garages—but let’s not forget those garages were probably bigger than your entire house, if you catch my drift.

Because of the high financial stakes tied to technology, its pace of evolution has grown exponentially. But that’s not necessarily good news. A quick glance shows us that the so-called Digital Renaissance isn’t just about comfort and solving society’s problems. Most of the time, it’s catering to consumers, not humans. It couldn’t care less about people—it just wants them to keep spending. Whether a product or service is actually useful is, at best, a side effect. Even the young idealists aren’t aiming for mid-sized businesses to help educate your kids, buy a house, and travel every year. They want monetization. Scalability. Big investments. Translation: they want to get rich. If, along the way, they change the world—great.

In another article, I called this phenomenon Tech Obsession Disorder, or TOD for short. Just as we’re getting used to one innovation, another, shinier version hits the market, leaving us with that nagging feeling that we’re missing out on something essential. Something that will make us better, prettier, or happier. Spoiler: this isn’t an accident.

The Digital Renaissance is so sly it convinces us we need things we don’t even know how to use. Frivolity morphs into necessity before we realize it, and—bam—we’re hooked. It’s a carefully orchestrated anxiety-fest. After all, emotionally balanced people don’t feel the uncontrollable urge to consume. They create anxiety to sell happiness. Go ahead, throw the first chip if you’ve never met someone with an iPhone who doesn’t even know how to turn on the flashlight.

Speaking of iPhones, the mastermind behind TOD was a guy named Steve Jobs. When he was alive, he’d show up online every week to mess with our heads, introducing some new tech gadget we didn’t know we needed—but were sure we’d buy soon enough. Worse still, we’d just bought the gadget he convinced us to get the month before! Thankfully, nothing lasts forever. When Jobs passed away, we finally got a break. Today, praise the tech gods, Apple has settled for being Samsung with better design.

Let’s not deny Jobs’s ideological drive or his vanity, but I doubt he was indifferent to the mountain of cash he piled up over the years.

We’re living in a human-meat grinder, slowly being processed into hamburgers. And as time passes, this machine gets more sophisticated, leaving us increasingly fragmented—ironically, more disconnected from the world, other people, and ourselves. It’s a contradiction worthy of an episode of Black Mirror. To fill this bottomless void, there’s only one solution: more tech consumption. Want tech? Show me the money!

Originally written for Próxxima, Meio & Mensagem, in 2018.