True or not, this is a good origin story.
Buying and Dying: How Online Shopping Grew from a Small Weed Deal into a Global Environmental and Societal Disaster
(Episode 62 of Crazy Town)
By Asher Miller, Rob Dietz, Jason Bradford, originally published by Resilience.org
June 30, 2022
Talk about cascading consequences: when a few nerds wanted to get high and orchestrated a small exchange of cannabis, they kicked off the age of ecommerce. Now that online shopping and the technology supporting it have ramped up commercialization and supercharged consumerism, we’re facing existential crises. Exactly what nefarious internet innovation might lead Jason to unbox a trebuchet? Why would Asher consider having an Amazon truck deliver his kid to school? What’s the most efficient way for Rob to get his plastic packaging to the ocean so it can choke the most marine mammals? Get online, order a must-have product (perhaps that pair of fentanyl-laced blue jeans you’ve been eyeing), and take part in the end times of capitalism. Or consider canceling that Amazon Prime account, shutting off the computer for a spell, and getting busy prioritizing community over consumption. For episode notes and more information, please visit our website...
...This is producer Melody Travers. In this season of Crazy Town, Jason, Asher, and Rob are exploring the watershed moments in history that have led humanity into the cascading crises we face in the 21st century. Today’s episode is about online shopping and how it has put consumerism into hyperdrive while undermining communities. The watershed moment took place in 1972. At the time, the estimated carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere was 326 parts per million, and the global human population was 3.85 billion....
...Rob Dietz
Okay, well, let’s take this accumulation of money and playing around on the Internet back a few years. I want to take you guys back 50 years ago. So this is way before Ryan’s time.
Asher Miller
This is back when I was wearing diapers maybe.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, this actually happened right around the time when I was born at the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory or SAIL. for short. This is kind of a wonky place. As you might imagine you had computer scientists and students all working together at Stanford and creating this hacker culture, sort of anti-authoritarian. All the rooms are named after stuff from Lord of the Rings. You know, it’s about as nerdy as it can get. Well, so the thing that happened in this SAIL. place is basically the start of ecommerce or online shopping. So what these guys did, though, they arranged a purchase of marijuana with some students at MIT.
Jason Bradford
Across the country? How do they ship it? That’s dangerous.
Rob Dietz
I don’t know. But to me it’s awesome that basically the original incidence of ecommerce was a drug deal.
Jason Bradford
That is good.
Asher Miller
That’s the origin of the dark web right there.
resilience.org |
