Speaking

I'm being very selective about speaking opportunities at the moment. If we don't already know each other, and it's not paid, I probably won't be able to do it. Thanks for understanding.

Upcoming events

• Shaping SF (December 4, 2024): "Refusing Silicon Valley" with Erin McElroy. More information here.

Podcast and radio appearances

• Tech Won't Save Us (December 15, 2022): on the current moment in the tech industry and how it differs from the 2010s.
• TrashFuture (April 22, 2022): on automated Keir Starmer and terrible startup billboards.
• This Machine Kills (January 11, 2022: recapping 2021 in the tech industry.
• Democracy At Work - Economic Update (August 23, 2021): interview with Richard Wolff about my book
• Bad With Money With Gabe Dunn (July 28, 2021): on my book
• This Machine Kills (June 22, 2021): on being fed up with the tech industry. With Jason Prado.
• Mandatory Redistribution Party (June 7, 2021): on my book
• Michael and Us (April 16, 2021): on the Hulu WeWork documentary
• Roads Less Taken (February 24, 2021): on my book
• Initiative for Digital Public Infrastructure (January 27, 2021): interview with Ethan Zuckerman on my book
• Time To Say Goodbye (October 16, 2020): on my book
• Rhythm Nation (October 8, 2020): on my book
• Upstream (September 18, 2020): on my book
• Reasons to be Cheerful (August 17, 2020): on my book
• Utopian Horizons (July 16, 2020): on Silicon Valley ideology, how capitalism limits the potential of technology, and more
• Against Everyone with Conner Habib (June 23, 2020): on my book
• General Intellect Unit (June 17, 2020): on my book
• WORT 89.9FM Madison (June 1, 2020): on my book, the recent protests, and how the same tech firms claiming to support #BlackLivesMatter work with the police, ICE, and US military.
• Parallax Views w/ J. G. Michael (May 22, 2020): on my book
• Plum Radio (May 19, 2020): on the dark side of Silicon Valley, and why tech workers should pay attention to labour history
• Science Disrupt (May 18, 2020): on meritocracy, entrepreneurship, and innovation beyond capitalism, with Lawrence Yolland and Gemma Milne
• Intelligence Squared+ (April 30, 2020): on my book, with Carl Miller.
• Tech Won't Save Us (April 20, 2020): on tech's response to coronavirus, WeWork, and how the labour market may change. With Paris Marx.
• The Arts of Travel (April 10, 2020): on Silicon Valley's response to coronavirus, and other things. With Matt Margosian and Edward Ongweso Jr. Part 2 here
• TrashFuture (April 9, 2020): on Silicon Valley's response to coronavirus, and my book. With the show's hosts. (The link is a preview - the full episode is only available to those who support TrashFuture on Patreon.)
• A Correction (April 1, 2020): on Abolish Silicon Valley, and the peculiar political economy of Silicon Valley. With Lev Moscow. No transcript yet.
• Death Sentence (March 31, 2020): on my journey into the darkness of tech industry and out into the blinding light of leftist critique. With the show's hosts. No transcript yet.
• Twink Revolution (January 27, 2020): on Abolish Silicon Valley. With the show's hosts. No transcript yet.
• Unpopular Front (November 18, 2019): on Abolish Silicon Valley. With the show's host. No transcript yet.
• General Intellect Unit (February 20, 2019): On tech worker organising. With Jason Prado & the show's hosts. No transcript yet.
• TrashFuture (December 26, 2018): On Sorry to Bother You. With Riley, Hussein, Nate, and Trevor Beaulieu. Transcript here.
• Future Left (November 26, 2018): On organising tech. With Ben Tarnoff, Casey Rogers, Adam Simpson. Transcript here.
• The Office Block (September 24, 2018): On unionising in tech. With Paul Dillon of the Financial Services Union. Transcript here.
• IPPR (September 12, 2018): On digital platforms in the modern economy. With Mat Lawrence. Transcript here.
• Techish (September 4, 2018): More Silicon Valley abolition, for a podcast aimed at people of colour in tech. Transcript here.
• TrashFuture (July 16, 2018): On abolishing Silicon Valley. With Riley, Hussein and Milo. Transcript here.
• Novara Media's Tysky Sour (July 2, 2018): On worker power in tech. With Ash Sarkar and Michael Walker. Transcript here.
• Politics Theory Other (May 31, 2018): On Silicon Valley ideology and the democratisation of technology. With Alex Doherty. Transcript here.
• Media Democracy (March 9, 2018): On democratising tech development ("Democratic Start-ups for the Public Good"). With Hettie O'Brien, Tom Mills and Dan Hind. Transcript here.

Written interviews

• Sun Magazine (April, 2024): interviewed by Finn Cohen
• Input Magazine (April 11, 2021): interviewed by Tom Maxwell about my book
• New Socialist (September 8, 2020): interviewed by Tom Gann about my book

Past events

• Tamarack (November 9, 2023): Luddite Tribunal, Bay Area Edition. A panel discussion with Brian Merchant, Paris Marx, Veena Dubal, and Safe Street Rebel. In person (not recorded).
• Red May (May 14, 2023): Virtual panel with Nick Chavez, Phil Neel, and Anette Ramos. YouTube livestream here
• Bay Area Book Festival (May 7, 2023): Book launch for Cory Doctorow's Chokepoint Capitalism, at Freight & Salvage in Berkeley, CA. In person. Possibly recorded but I don't know where. Details here
• Subtext Books (April 2, 2023): book launch event for Belén Gopegui's Stay This Day and Night With Me. Online only (not recorded)
• Tamarack (March 9, 2023): conversation with Nick Chavez, author of Technical Expertise and Communist Production (The Brooklyn Rail)
• Mrs. Dalloway's (February 16, 2023): book launch event for Malcolm Harris' Palo Alto. In person (not recorded)
• Left Book Club x The World Transformed (September 27, 2022): a discussion of socialist literature with writer Yara Rodrigues Fowler, facilitated by Elif Sarican. video available on YouTube
• The World Transformed (September 25, 2022): panel discussion about tech work. In person (not recorded)
• The World Transformed (September 24, 2022): book launch event for Jeremy Gilbert and Alex Williams' Hegemony Now. In person (not recorded)
• City Lights (June 21, 2022): book launch event for Ben Tarnoff's Internet for the People. In person and possibly recorded but I can't find the link.
• CCSF Collective (November 10, 2021): panel discussion on abolishing the tech industry for Build Abolition 101, video available on YouTube
• Haymarket Books (October 26, 2020): book launch event for Richard Seymour's The Twittering Machine, video available on YouTube
• PoliticsBooksToday (September 10, 2020): book discussion, video available on YouTube
• Mechanics Institute x Gray Area (July 1, 2020): book discussion with Owen Thomas, video available on YouTube
• Everyday Analysis (June 25, 2020): book discussion with Alfie Bown
• Quarantine Book Club (June 24, 2020): book discussion with Mike Monteiro
• CODE-CWA (June 23, 2020): Q&A with organizers from the Communications Workers of America, recorded with Periscope
• Haymarket Books x Left Book Club (June 22, 2020): discussion with Rob Larson on our respective books, livestreamed on YouTube
• Jacobin Stay at Home (June 8, 2020): lecture and Q&A with Ronan Burtenshaw, livestreamed on YouTube
• Red May Seattle (May 13, 2020): Zoom panel discussion with McKenzie Wark, Alexander Zevin and Jasper Bernes, livestreamed on YouTube
• University of Waterloo (May 11, 2020): interview with Peter Carr for the course 'Impact of Information Systems on Society'; video available here
• Common Wealth think tank (May 9, 2020): virtual discussion with Hettie O'Brien, livestreamed on YouTube
• Tenderloin Museum & DSA San Francisco (May 7, 2020): Zoom panel discussion with Emily Haddad, Matthew Torres, Anneka Citrin, Jenny Worley, Emma Erbach, and James Tracy
• Red May Seattle (May 6, 2020): Zoom panel discussion with Nick Dyer-Witheford, Elise Thorburn, James Steinhoff and Chris Natale, livestreamed on YouTube
• The World Transformed & Bristol Transformed (Apr 29, 2020): Zoom launch moderated by Kulsoom Jafri, livestreamed on Facebook
• City Lights Bookstore (Apr 23, 2020): virtual book discussion with Sasha Perigo, mostly discussing the ideology of the industry
• Data & Society (Apr 22, 2020): Network Power Hour: Labor, Tech, and Now, in conversation with Meredith Whittaker
• FUTURES podcast (Apr 22, 2020): hosted by Luke Robert Mason, livestreamed on YouTube
• Reboot (Apr 14, 2020): a discussion series on imagining better technological futures, aimed at students and recent grads. Hosted by Jasmine Sun (Stanford Sociology) and Jessica Dai (Brown CS) on Zoom. Sign up for future events in this series
• Conversation with Lizzie O'Shea at the Mechanics' Institute in San Francisco (Jan 30, 2020). About Lizzie O'Shea's recent book, Future Histories: What Ada Lovelace, Tom Paine, and the Paris Commune Can Teach Us About Digital Technology.
• Silicon San Francisco: The Impact of Tech Capital at the SFMOMA Public Knowledge Library (Feb 16, 2019). Some background notes in my blog posts, here and here.
• Media, Culture and Economy seminar at the London College of Communications (Nov 29, 2018): on platform capitalism (Nick Srnicek's 2016 book) and what it would mean to abolish Silicon Valley. Notes here.
• Tribune reading group in London (Nov 22, 2018): on the first issue of Tribune. Hosted by Wandsworth Young Labour. I talked about what motivated me to write the piece and summarised my argument.
• WorkerTech: Worker voice and empowerment in Bristol (Nov 20, 2018): on technology & unionising. Will shortly post notes or a recording or both.
• LSE Data & Society speaker series (Nov 14, 2018): on the link between critical data studies and recent stirrings of worker power in the tech industry. No notes, but I did suggest that anyone who believes tech companies should behave more ethically should 1) go work for them and 2) organise with their colleagues.
• Historical Materialism at SOAS (Nov 10, 2018): I'll spoke about worker power in tech for Notes From Below's stream. Recording and possibly notes coming soon.
• Open Web Conference in Coventry (Oct 25, 2018): I'll gave a talk on the political economy of the internet and why we should care about it when we talk about the "open web". Transcript here.
• DECODE symposium in Barcelona (Oct 16, 2018): I spoke on a panel about tech giants and monopoly power. Transcript here.
• Battle of Ideas at the Barbican (Oct 13, 2018): I spoke about why capitalism is bad, actually. May post notes.
• A London Young Labour event on sexism, masculinity & the left (Oct 3, 2018): no notes.
• The World Transformed and Labour Party Conference in Liverpool (Sep 22-25, 2018):
  • Occupy Fleet Street: How to Democratise the British Media at TWT. I chaired this panel on concrete proposals for democratising the media, featuring Laura Basu, Angela Phillips, Leo Watkins, Tom Mills, and Dan Hind. My notes and links to further reading here.
  • Tech Workers' Inquiry at TWT. I spoke at this small, collaborative session on building worker power in the tech industry, alongside Joe Corcoran and Jason Prado. We also had some great contributions from tech workers in attendance. I've posted an abridged transcript to New Socialist.
  • I'm Literally a Communist: Marx at 200 at TWT. I chaired this panel on the relevance of Marxism today, featuring Tithi Bhattacharya, Aaron Bastani, Vijay Prashad, and Lynne Segal. There's a recording of this session by TWT.
  • Taking on the Tech Giants at TWT. I chaired this panel on resisting the tech giants featuring Jason Prado, Lydia Hughes, Emma Back and Duncan McCann. No recording, but I've posted my opening remarks, questions, and recommended reading here.
  • The Big Ideas Debate with Ed Miliband (a Labour Party fringe event by IPPR). I talked about democratising the Internet. Other speakers: Maya Goodfellow, Tom Mills, Stephanie Boland, and Will Stronge. No notes.
• Derby Transformed (Sep 1, 2018): I spoke on two panels: media reform, and Corbynomics. Free-form notes and recording here.
• Byline Festival (Aug 25, 2018): An odd panel titled Digital Dominance and Digital Rights, where I spoke alongside a fairly baffling mix of people, most of whom are much more famous than I. Overall the festival was very weird and super liberal, and I wouldn't really recommend it.
• Logic Issue 5: "Failure" Launch (Aug 21, 2018): I read an excerpt from Freedom Isn't Free.
• Tech Workers Coalition event on contractor organising (Aug 8, 2018): I moderated this incredibly informative roundtable discussion on temps, vendors and contractors (TVCs) in Silicon Valley. Notes coming, hopefully.
• Labour Live (Jun 16, 2018): I spoke on a panel about tech/automation/etc, alongside Nick Srnicek, Aaron Bastani and Lara McNeill (chair). No notes.
• David Foster Wallace Conference (Jun 7-9, 2018): I spoke on a panel about diversity in the DFW community. I don't have any notes, but the panel was written about for The Outline.
• Left Forum (Jun 1-3, 2018): I organised two panels on tech workers, both of which have been transcribed: Towards an Organized Tech Industry, Part One and Part Two.
• John McDonnell's State of the Economy Conference (May 19, 2018): I delivered a talk challenging the predominant narrative around technological development as part of the digital breakout session. (The talk was directly after one by a representative of enterprise software company Sage.) Transcript available through New Socialist: Technological Development For The Many.
• New Internationalist Ethical Careers Fair (Apr 25, 2018): I spoke on a panel titled "The Future of Work" alongside Jamie Woodcock, Will Stronge, and Yohann Koshy (chair). Notes unlikely at this point.

Older

I used to occasionally give tech talks - some pedagogical, some extolling the virtues of my (now defunct) startup. I haven't done a good job of keeping track of these, but you can view some of my slides on Speakerdeck (source on GitHub).

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