Article URL: https://www.scottrlarson.com/presentations/overcoming-surveillance-capitalism-with-awareness/ Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48984231 Points: 86 #…

This is a personally driven community presentation from my work experience on the effects of current forms of technology. In it, I argue that big players like Google and Facebook build predictive profiles that are then sold to advertisers who then attempt to influence individual behavior for commercial/political gain. These business models have quietly reshaped society without public knowledge or consent. Surveillance Capitalism is not an inevitable feature of modern life, but a specific and correctable situation, one that requires informed and persistent civic engagement to reverse. Vistor’s Note: I presented this in person here in my area in July of 2026. I also plan to host a zoom presentation of this material. See the bottom of this page for links to the material and to sign up for any future zoom or in person presentations. You are free to download and use this material to bring awareness to the harmful effects of Surveillance Capitalism. I do ask that you attribute me as the original author. Much of this presentation is about slightly altering our thinking. How we think can have a big impact on what we wish to see in the world. It has frequently been noticed that the surest long-term result of brainwashing is a peculiar kind of cynicism - an absolute refusal to believe in the truth of anything Why did I include this quote? I see divisiveness of not wanting to believe in anything. Can we agree that the world needs healing right now? [!Warning] In my attempt to make the argument that unrestricted surveillance capitalism can be used as a tool to usher in a movement of Authoritarianism, some of this material might be psychologically disturbing. Under the right conditions, like the conditions we are seeing today, destructive concentration of power can happen in any political party, though it may take on different forms. About 20 years ago, I read an article from a Hip Hop blogger that received an anonymous letter about a clandestine meeting between music industry executives and promoters. The author of the letter was thrown out of the meeting for expressing hostility to a plan of artificially elevating gangster rap over other hip-hop music with the goal of creating a prison pipeline that some of the top music execs we’re invested in.