Kickoff For March 15, 2021

Welcome to this week’s edition of the Monday Kickoff, a collection of what I’ve found interesting, informative, and insightful on the web over the last seven days.

Let’s get this Monday started with these links:

Environment

The Planet Needs a New Internet, wherein Maddie Stone looks at the current state of the internet and concludes that to make it sustainable we’ll need to harden and relocate the infrastructure we’ve built, find cleaner ways to power the web, and reimagine how we interact with the digital world.

The Climate Crisis Is Worse Than You Can Imagine. Here’s What Happens If You Try, wherein we learn about Peter Kalmus and how his obsession with climate changes has changed his life and that of his family, sometimes not in a good way.

Can the Internet Survive Climate Change?, wherein Kevin Lozano looks at how the internet is likely to face changes to its basic infrastructure that will be both sweeping and hard to predict.

Work

Why self-compassion – not self-esteem – leads to success, wherein we learn that beating ourselves up after making mistakes doesn’t drive us to improve, but quite the opposite.

The Intentional Precarity Of Gig Work In America, wherein Hillel Aron looks at the gig economy and learns the feeling of not knowing whether a night’s work will cover your bills is a common one among gig workers in America.

The Silicon Valley Economy Is Here. And It’s a Nightmare., wherein we’re introduced to the idea that the so-called gig economy is a window into a nightmare vision of what the world would look like if it were run by our digital overlords.

Ideas

Decelerate Now, wherein Gavin Mueller argues that slowing down so-called technical innovation not only benefit workers affected by new technologies but also all of society.

The high price of broadband is keeping people offline during the pandemic, wherein Eileen Guo ponders whether the digital divide exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic is one that can be fixed with more infrastructure, or one that requires social programs to address affordability and adoption gaps?

A Simple Way to Reduce Cognitive Bias, wherein we learn that paying attention to the details of your environment can make you a little more rational.

And that’s it for this Monday. Come back in seven days for another set of links to start off your week.

Scott Nesbitt