After 20 years of what appeared to be unstoppable growth, America’s tech industry has spent the past year underperforming the rest of the economy. Product failures in new industries like virtual reality and cryptocurrency, layoffs across the board, lower stock prices, and the failure of Silicon Valley Bank create a teachable moment to talk about the tech industry’s culture and direction.
To an increasing degree over the past dozen years, the tech industry exploited the trust of consumers and policymakers to change the game. Rather than empowering users, many new technologies have exploited human weakness. They have used data and application design to manipulate the choices and sometimes the behavior