Ian Bogost
The Curse of an Open Floor Plan
A flowing, connected interior—once a fringe experiment of American architectural modernism—has become ubiquitous, and beloved. But it promises a liberation from housework that remains a fantasy.
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Jill Kitchener / Reuters Why Is There a ‘Gaming Disorder’ But No ‘Smartphone Disorder?’
The World Health Organization has proposed a behavioral addiction pathology for excessive video-game playing. But maybe the problem is in the economy more than the mind.
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Josh Cochran What Petty Nextdoor Posts Reveal About America
The hyperlocal social-media platform highlights small grievances—and proves that neighbors have more in common than they think.
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Marcio Jose Sanchez / AP Apple's Airpods Are an Omen
The company’s slick, wireless earbuds work great, but they foreshadow startling changes to the social fabric.
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Chip Somodevilla / Getty The Senate Votes Against the Net-Neutrality Rollback
But it was just a resolution to “disapprove”—a far cry from stopping the repeal.
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Robert Daly / Caiaimage / Getty Why 'Stories' Took Over Your Smartphone
The format, made popular by Snapchat and Instagram, is the native genre of glass rectangles.
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Daniel Stolle Alexa Is a Revelation for the Blind
Legally blind since age 18, my father missed out on the first digital revolution.
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AP / Joe Marquette / Reuters / Leah ... The Dot-Coms Were Better Than Facebook
Twenty years ago, another high-profile tech executive testified before Congress. It was a more innocent time.
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Ben Margot / AP Silicon Valley 'Has No Words'
After a shooting at YouTube’s corporate campus, technology CEOs offer platitudes. Shouldn’t they have more to say?
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Justin Tallis / Getty Images Autonomous Cars Are Almost Here. Are Cities Ready?
The window to regulate driverless vehicles is still open, but not for much longer.
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Hulton Archive / Getty Enough With the Trolley Problem
A 50-year-old philosophical thought experiment has been central to the debate about autonomous vehicles. It’s time to give it up.
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Reuters / Tami Chappell One of the Biggest and Most Boring Cyberattacks Against an American City Yet
A recent ransomware attack on Atlanta’s computer systems is disruptive, but so ordinary.
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Cow Clicker / Ian Bogost / The Atlantic My Cow Game Extracted Your Facebook Data
The Cambridge Analytica scandal is drawing attention to malicious data thieves and brokers. But every Facebook app—even the dumb, innocent ones—collected users’ personal data without even trying.
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Tempe Police Department / AP Can You Sue a Robocar?
A pedestrian killed by a self-driving Uber in Tempe shows that the legal implications of autonomous cars are as important, if not more so, than the technology.
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Piaggio Fast Forward / NinaMalyna / Shutterstock / ... The Cute Robot That Follows You Around the City
Piaggio, the Italian company that makes Vespa scooters, is building cargo droids for city pedestrians.
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Minnesota Historical Society When Malls Saved the Suburbs From Despair
Like it or not, the middle class became global citizens through consumerism—and they did so at the mall.
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Thanh Do / The Atlantic All Followers Are Fake Followers
A New York Times exposé of a “black market” for online fame diagnoses the symptom of social-media despair, but misses its cause.
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Thanh Do / The Atlantic Sorry, Alexa Is Not a Feminist
It’s disingenuous to celebrate building “feminism” into a product after giving a robot servant a woman’s voice.
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Kyla Gifford / U.S. Air Force / Reuters The Internet Broke Emergency Alerts
America’s emergency notification systems were first built for war, and then rebuilt for peace. A false alarm in Hawaii shows that they didn’t anticipate how media works in the smartphone era.
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The Atlantic HQ Trivia Is a Harbinger of Dystopia
What do you get from a live game-show app?
a. Fun b. Money c. Social collapse -
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Baz Ratner / Reuters Net Neutrality Was Never Enough
The internet is as much the enemy as it is the hero of contemporary life.
