In the Notes tab, you'll see the notes I'm taking, whether on specific sources or from my general reading. Not all of them are fully formed thoughts, so they're flagged as drafts.
2026-06-05 · Relationships · Values · Feelings
Clerks identified upward
From early on, clerks identified upward, with the partners they hoped to become, not sideways with other wage-earners. That's why they petitioned politely instead of striking. This anxious, status-conscious, identify-with-management posture became the template for white-collar workers ever since (C. Wright Mills' White Collar, 1951, is the classic statement). Identifying upward meant a strike felt like betraying your future self. Even later, white-collar unionization mostly failed in the US (it never took hold the way industrial unions did). So a one-off 1840s clerks' strike probably wins shorter hours short-term but doesn't create a lasting clerical labor movement, because the identity works against solidarity.
From early on, clerks identified upward, with the partners they hoped to become, not sideways with other wage-earners. That's why they petitioned politely instead of striking. This anxious, status-conscious, identify-with-management posture became the template for white-collar workers ever since (C. Wright Mills' White Collar, 1951, is the classic statement). Identifying upward meant a strike felt like betraying your future self. Even later, white-collar unionization mostly failed in the US (it never took hold the way industrial unions did). So a one-off 1840s clerks' strike probably wins shorter hours short-term but doesn't create a lasting clerical labor movement, because the identity works against solidarity.
Sources: Saval, Cubed · Mills, White Collar
2026-06-03 · Objects & space
The office built the skyscraper and the gym
The clerks refused to unionize the way factory workers did. They dressed well, shared the partner's office, looked up to him, wanted to be him. Because the office shaped the body, they went to the gym. What emerged with the office: skyscrapers and the gym.
The clerks refused to unionize the way factory workers did. They dressed well, shared the partner's office, looked up to him, wanted to be him.
Because the office shaped the body, they went to the gym. What emerged with the office: skyscrapers and the gym.
Sources: Saval, Cubed · Mills, White Collar
2026-05-21 · Its negatives · Values · draft
The Turing Trap
Brynjolfsson's choice: AI built to substitute for human labor concentrates wealth and power, because workers lose bargaining leverage and codified knowledge becomes alienable. AI built to augment keeps people indispensable and spreads the gains. The most original move: historically, knowledge stuck in human heads forced power to spread. AI removes that natural floor on concentration.
Brynjolfsson's choice: AI built to substitute for human labor concentrates wealth and power, because workers lose bargaining leverage and codified knowledge becomes alienable. AI built to augment keeps people indispensable and spreads the gains.
The most original move: historically, knowledge stuck in human heads forced power to spread. AI removes that natural floor on concentration.
2026-05-17 · Values · Needs
Work and Dignity
For most of history, dignity came from the content of the work. The person was at the center of the work they chose, and it was built over a lifetime, through mastery, authorship, and recognition. Then new technologies began to set the terms of the economy. The worker stopped being the subject of the work and became something the technology of the moment moved around: electricity, the factory, the codebase, AI. When a job is dictated by demand and machinery, the old passion and dignity are harder to find in it. So we asked workers to find dignity in the life the work made possible instead. A steady wage, the eight-hour day, a community, a retirement. Now the dignity enabled by security and lifestyle is eroding too. Job tenures shorten, skills depreciate before people are even able to train for them. The communities and structures that once held a working life together are giving way to the gig economy and the personal brand.
For most of history, dignity came from the content of the work. The person was at the center of the work they chose, and it was built over a lifetime, through mastery, authorship, and recognition. Then new technologies began to set the terms of the economy. The worker stopped being the subject of the work and became something the technology of the moment moved around: electricity, the factory, the codebase, AI. When a job is dictated by demand and machinery, the old passion and dignity are harder to find in it.
So we asked workers to find dignity in the life the work made possible instead. A steady wage, the eight-hour day, a community, a retirement.
Now the dignity enabled by security and lifestyle is eroding too. Job tenures shorten, skills depreciate before people are even able to train for them. The communities and structures that once held a working life together are giving way to the gig economy and the personal brand.