Why I’m joining Public Interest Technology
And welcome to my Substack!
Jan 7, 2022
Hello, this is my first post!
I’ll be writing semi-regularly about tech, design, and whatever else is on my mind. Smash that subscribe button if you’re interested in reading more.
One of the interesting things about social trends is that you, the individual, don’t initially realize you’re caught up in one. You plug along, under the illusion that your subjective experience is unique, until you zoom out and realize you’re a data point in a much larger graph.
I've experienced this sensation many times over the course of the pandemic in particular, typically during moments of impulsive consumption. I go online to buy some dumbbells for my home workouts and realize that they’re sold out. Everyone is under the same conditions I’m under, making the same choices I’m making.
And so it went with my decision to switch jobs. The so-called Great Resignation, or Great Reassessment, is upon us and either these news stories influenced me or I influenced them (it can be hard to tell which). All I know is I was feeling burnt out at work — which turns out to be another trend of which I’m a part — and in response to this feeling of depletion, I went looking for more fuel in the form of new work.
A couple weeks ago, the UX Collective released its State of UX in 2022 trends report. The theme is “reimagining what it means to be a designer” and it touches on a few relevant themes, including new forms of design education and the negative externalities of tech products. The report strikes a tone of pragmatic cynicism that has entered our industry’s discourse as a result of the pandemic and the many crises of the last ~5 years. It’s refreshing to see this clear-eyed, if pessimistic, analysis of tech and design by industry insiders. The reckoning reminds me of tech mogul Tim O’Reilly’s exhortation from some years ago to work on stuff that matters.
I was surprised and disappointed, though, by the report’s response to this question. It concludes that “design is business” and that “the vast majority of designers work for for-profit companies…design is not philanthropy.” That’s of course true, but what about design opportunities that aren’t profit-driven? There must be viable alternatives to simply acknowledging the compromise inherent in private sector work and moving on, which is the route the report’s authors seem to take. A more optimistic response to the question of technology’s role in solving the many urgent issues of our day might be to look beyond Silicon Valley and the traditional tech environment. If software is eating the world, that includes spaces outside the conventional bubble.
I recently read Work, a book by anthropologist James Suzman about human history and our relationship to work as a concept. One question Suzman tries to answer is why increased automation has not resulted in decreased levels of labor, as the economist John Maynard Keynes predicted in the early 20th century. Suzman leverages Kenneth Galbraith’s philosophies in Affluent Society to assert that we haven’t stopped working because we consume more than ever. The industry of advertising spun up to buoy the economy of production and consumption, long after most of our material needs had been met. In other words, we’re working more than ever to create value so that consumers can continue purchasing things they probably don’t need.
I claim no authority on this subject. Maybe this is an overly-simplified view, with countervailing theories that are more supportive of our current economic system. Or maybe I’m just late to the party, and this is an unfortunate and obvious reality to most people. But reading this stuff during this moment of global upheaval, as we start to rethink our consumption habits and our relationship to work, spurred me to action and got me thinking honestly about how design and technology could fit into a new way of doing things – a new way of working, consuming, and building.
I discovered the term “Public Interest Technology” (PIT) during my job search. It seems to have originated in academia, where a cluster of universities coined the phrase to describe a blend of humanities and technology. The New America Foundation and Ford Foundation have contributed to its development. NYU recently hosted a PIT career fair, and Cornell Tech launched a PIT program for its students. There are many emergent communities of PIT-oriented technologists, and many organizations that do this type of work, from Code for America, to US Digital Services, to Coforma – where I’m excited to be joining in 2022.
I am writing this from my personal perspective of discovery, but of course this work has been going on for a while. Code for America was founded in 2009. Much of the federal digital services work was initiated during the Obama Administration. I’m reading Cyd Harrell’s A Civic Technologist’s Practice Guide, among other things, to help familiarize myself with the history of “civic tech”, its promises and constraints, and the humility required to contribute to this field in a meaningful way.
We are clearly at a moment in history when well-meaning people across the country and world are questioning the real impact of their work. Within the tech industry, our historical idealization of tech’s influence has been tempered by a forceful techlash. As evidenced by the UX trends report, we are asking the right questions but, in my opinion, not landing on the right answers.
It’s been said many times that this global pandemic has revealed the ways in which we all rely on one another. I’m hoping to extend this rationale into my work life with a turn towards the public sphere. Given all we have collectively endured over the last half-decade, I’m hopeful that 2022 and the years to come will see a renewed spirit of civic-mindedness and, in the tech sector, a reassessment of how we value the fruits of our labor. Here’s hoping I’m one data point among many.