The World We Want · 25 essays · about 6 hours
The Series
A three-part blog series explaining how to go from where we are to the world we want.
The world we want
What we want, and the three changes it takes to get there · 9 essays
Start hereThe AI Industry Has Never Told You What’s In It for YouHalf of Americans are more worried than excited about AI. That isn’t a technology problem. It’s a pitch problem.5 min read
Part 1Machines Can Make Us Both Free and Safethe case that machine labor can make us both free and safe, and a map of the series that shows how.10 min read
Part 2If a Human Wants to Do a Job, a Machine Shouldn’t Take Itwhat machine labor on demand is, why it should fill gaps instead of replacing people, and what the AI industry plans instead.12 min read
Part 3Point the Machines at What’s Scarcewhy things are scarce, and how machine intelligence can break those scarcities, one bottleneck at a time.8 min read
Part 4Quests Should Replace Corporationswhy the corporation won’t survive machine labor, and the two organizations I think replace it.15 min read
Part 5Every Town Can Own Its Own Power Plant and Chip Fabwho should own the machines once things are abundant, and why the answer is every community, not a company or a central planner.10 min read
Part 6UBI Won’t Work. Universal Basic Goods Will.why a check can’t do what the things themselves can, and what money is still for.10 min read
Part 7We’re Less Than a Decade From the Next Economic Systemwhat every past transition between systems of power had in common, and why the next one is less than a decade away.14 min read
Part 8AI Will Kill Packaged Meaning. Let It.Sam Lessin is right that AI ends the industrial story of why we strive, and what replaces it should be built on the two things no machine can automate, curiosity and care.16 min read
Living in it
What life, work, culture and meaning look like in the world we want · 8 essays
- Part 9The Earth Should Be a Garden, Not a MineBe abundant in flows and conserve the stocks: what’s actually scarce in 2026, where machines already help, and why the money keeps flowing to your inbox instead.23 min read
Part 10A Floor for Everyone, a Frontier for AnyoneThe future after machine labor won’t be socialist or capitalist, but something new, and the people building it are Worldbuilders.18 min read
Part 11Remix Will Kill the Copy, Not the CreatorMoney, media and status are all packages of belief, and when AI can rewrap any package, value moves from the copy to the source.14 min read- Part 12Your First Party Member Should Be an AI You OwnBefore the robots and before the fleet, everyone should get one companion that carries their context, answers to them, and never makes the final call.18 min read
- Part 13Pokémon Already Showed Us How Machine Labor Should WorkFor thirty years, kids have grown up in a world of companions who are also workers, free healthcare, and help on demand. It’s the best rehearsal we have for an economy of AI agents.16 min read
- Part 14You Won’t Have a Career. You’ll Have a Skill Tree.Once machines cover the work nobody chooses, a profession stops being a lane you’re stuck in and becomes a skill you can climb, collect, or play for love.16 min read
- Part 15The Olympics, but for EverythingCompanies shouldn’t compete for profit: every trade should have a league table, promotion and relegation, and a world championship, and losing should never cost anyone their home.15 min read
- Part 16Above Self-Actualization Is the UniverseMaslow’s pyramid didn’t stop where the textbooks say it does, and once machines take care of the base, the top is bigger than any one of us.14 min read
Building it
The mechanics and the path from here: universal basic capital, taxes, law, the safety net, and the first steps · 8 essays
Part 17Keep Money, Add a Second LedgerMoney can’t see what a world of abundance needs to manage, so here’s how surplus actually moves between towns: resource accounts, a market run like the power grid, and rules borrowed from things that already work.24 min read
Part 18Every Spending Bill Should Show Up on Your PaycheckMy first flat-tax sketch, rebuilt around a formula: one rule sets the rate, capital pays more than labor, hiring is never taxed more than automating, and here’s the honest math on paying off the debt.19 min read
Part 19Plan for the Bad TransitionThe road from here to the world we want, in five stages: what to build, what to watch, and a safety net switched on by data instead of dates, for the years before universal basic goods exist.23 min read- Part 20Get Paid to Train the Robot That Takes Your JobPeople are already strapping cameras to their heads so robots can learn their work, and a Data Foundry is the version where you say yes on purpose, own the footage, and keep a share of what the robot earns.14 min read
- Part 21The World We Want Is Mostly ConstitutionalWith California’s billionaire tax on the ballot, here’s how my proposals stack up against the Constitution and the Enlightenment, including two lines I learned I had wrong and have since rewritten.17 min read
- Part 22Five Takes the AI Industry Needs to IngestGenerative AI is really remix AI, consumer AI belongs on your own machine, and the machines themselves should belong to places, not companies.13 min read
- Part 23Emad Mostaque and I Agree on the Destination, Not the RoadWe both think checks fail, corporations fade and machines should belong to the places they work, but we split on what the floor is made of, how big the owner should be, and whether you can sell it.15 min read
- Part 24Doom or Foom, the Answer Is the Same: Own the MachinesThe AI debate is a fight about speed, but whether the takeoff is slow, fast or deadly, the design that holds up is the same: many owners, local machines, and rules that switch on with the data.13 min read
Futurespective
The AI industry has had years to tell you what’s in it for you. They failed. Here’s my attempt...
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