Keen On America

Andrew Keen
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Jan 26, 2024 • 39min

Why today's internet is simultaneously autocratic and plutocratic: Ehud Shapiro on the egalitarian architecture necessary to build genuine digital democracy

EPISODE 1944: In this KEEN ON show, Andrew talks to Ehud Shapiro, a computer scientist at the Weizmann Institute of Science, about the egalitarian architecture necessary to build genuine digital democracy Ehud Shapiro is a multi-disciplinary scientist, artist, entrepreneur and a Professor of Computer Science and Biology at the Weizmann Institute of Science. With international reputation, he made fundamental contributions to many scientific disciplines. Ehud was also an Internet pioneer, a successful Internet entrepreneur, and a pioneer and proponent of e-democracy. Ehud is the founder of the Ba Rock Band and conceived its original artistic program. He is a winner of two European Research Council Advanced Grants. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
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Jan 25, 2024 • 33min

Why Writing a Book is an Act of Free Will: Kevin Mitchell on free agency and how evolution gave us free will

EPISODE 1943: In this KEEN ON show, Andrew talks to Kevin J. Mitchell, author of FREE AGENTS, about how evolution gave us free willMitchell is a neurogeneticist interested in the relationships between genes, brains, and minds. He is a faculty member at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, in the departments of Genetics and Neuroscience. He writes the Wiring the Brain blog (www.wiringthebrain.com) and is on Twitter @WiringtheBrain He received an AM and a PhD in economics from Harvard University. His research focuses on contract theory, organizational economics, law and economics, and political economy. He has written on topics including: network capital, political districting, the boundary of the firm, incentives in organizations, mechanism design, voting rules, and blockchain. Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
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Jan 25, 2024 • 42min

Why Does Everything Need To Be About Race? Keith Boykin on Claudine Gay, Nikki Haley, Tim Scott and why the real function of racism is distraction

EPISODE 1942: In this KEEN ON show, Andrew talks to Keith Boykin, author of WHY DOES EVERYTHING HAVE TO BE ABOUT RACE, about  Claudine Gay, Nikki Haley, Tim Scott and why the real function of racism is distractionKeith Boykin is a TV and film producer, national political commentator, New York Times best-selling author, and a former White House aide to President Bill Clinton. His latest books are Race Against Time: The Politics of a Darkening America (2021) and Quitting: Why I Left My Job to Live a Life of Freedom (2022). A graduate of Dartmouth College and Harvard Law School, Keith has taught at American University in Washington, D.C., the Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia University, and City College of New York. He is a co-founder and first board president of the National Black Justice Coalition and a Lambda Literary Award-winning author of six books. Keith was a co-host of the BET talk show “My Two Cents,” starred on the Showtime reality television series “American Candidate,” worked as an associate producer of the film “Dirty Laundry,” and has appeared on numerous TV shows, including BET’s “Being Mary Jane.” Born in St. Louis, Keith has lived in 12 cities, visited 48 of the 50 United States, and traveled the world. He lives in Los Angeles.Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
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Jan 25, 2024 • 37min

Suburbia and American Disillusionment: Benjamin Herold on the unravelling of both America's suburbs and the American dream

EPISODE 1941: In this KEEN ON show, Andrew talks to Benjamin Herold, author of DISILLUSIONED, about the unravelling of both America's suburbs and the American dreamBenjamin Herold explores America's beautiful and busted public education system. His award-winning beat reporting, feature writing, and investigative exposés have appeared in Education Week, PBS NewsHour, NPR, the Hechinger Report, Huffington Post, and the Public School Notebook. Herold has a master's degree in urban education from Temple University in Philadelphia, where he lives with his family. Learn more at www.benjaminherold.com.Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
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Jan 23, 2024 • 43min

The War for Israel's Soul: Bernard Avishai on the age old battle in Israel between globalists and messianic Zionists

EPISODE 1940: In this KEEN ON show, Andrew talks to Bernard Avishai, author of the Harper's story "Israel's War Within", about the age old battle in Israel between globalists and messianic ZionistsBernard Avishai: Bernard Avishai is the author of The Tragedy of Zionism and The Hebrew Republic, among other books. He teaches at Dartmouth College and splits his time between New Hampshire and Jerusalem.Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
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Jan 18, 2024 • 38min

A Winston Churchill for our TikTok age? Simon Shuster on Volodymyr Zelensky, the workaholic improv politician who needs to be loved by his Ukrainian people

EPISODE 1939: In this KEEN ON show, Andrew talks to Simon Shuster, author of THE SHOWMAN, about Volodymyr Zelensky, a workaholic improv politician who needs to be loved by his Ukrainian peopleSimon Shuster has reported from Russia and Ukraine for 17 years, most of that time as a staff writer for Time Magazine. His coverage of the war began in 2014, when he was the first foreign journalist to arrive in Crimea as Russian troops took over the peninsula. In 2019, he met and interviewed Volodymyr Zelensky for a profile of his presidential campaign, then continued covering his administration in the years that followed, first traveling to the war zone with the President in April 2021, as the Russians gathered their armies at the border. When the full-scale invasion began the following year, Simon spent months embedded with the President’s team, securing unparalleled access to their compound in Kyiv, where he wrote The Showman, his first book.Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
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Jan 18, 2024 • 21min

A venture capitalist imagines a world after capital: Albert Wenger on work, leisure and the environment in the AI age

EPISODE 1938: In this special KEEN ON show from DLD in Munich, Andrew talks Union Square Ventures partner, Albert Wenger, about work, leisure  and the environment in our smart machine ageAlbert Wenger is a managing partner at Union Square Ventures. Before joining USV, Albert was the president of del.icio.us through the company’s sale to Yahoo and an angel investor (Etsy, Tumblr). He previously founded or co-founded several companies, including a management consulting firm and an early hosted data analytics company. Albert graduated from Harvard College in economics and computer science and holds a Ph.D. in Information Technology from MIT. Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
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Jan 18, 2024 • 42min

In Trouble With Gender: Alex Byrne explores slippery sex facts and factual gender fictions

EPISODE 1937: In this KEEN ON show, Andrew talks to Alex Byrne, author of TROUBLE WITH GENDER, about slippery sex facts and factual gender fictions​Alex Byrne teaches in the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. (In the philosophy half of the department.) His main interests are philosophy of mind (especially perception), metaphysics (especially color) and epistemology (especially self-knowledge). A few years ago he started working on philosophical issues relating to sex and gender. He recently finished a book on these topics, Trouble with Gender: Sex Facts, Gender Fictions, which is now out in the UK and the US.Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
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Jan 18, 2024 • 29min

Can AI produce genuine culture? Martin Puchner on the future of artistic creativity in the age of the smart machine

EPISODE 1936: In this special KEEN ON show from DLD in Munich, Andrew talks to Martin Puchner, author of CULTURE: THE STORY OF US, FROM CAVE ART TO K-POP, about on the future of artistic creativity in the age of the smart machine​Martin Puchner, the Byron and Anita Wien Professor at Harvard University, is a prize-winning author, educator, public speaker, and institution builder in the arts and humanities. His writings range from philosophy and theater to culture and technology and have been translated into many languages. Through his best-selling Norton Anthology of World Literature and his HarvardX MOOC Masterpieces of World Literature, he has brought four thousand years of literature to audiences across the globe. His book, The Written World, which tells the story of literature from the invention of writing to the Internet, has been widely reviewed in The New York Times, The Times (London), the Financial Times, The Times Literary Supplement, The Atlantic, The Economist, among others, covered on radio and television, and has been translated into some twenty languages. It appeared on the Wall Street Journal bestseller list and received the Massachusetts Book Award. His book The Language of Thieves has been praised as an unusual combination of scholarship and memoir, and the writing, compared to Stevenson's Treasure Island and Tolkien's Lord of the Rings. An adventurous foray into the philosophy of language, it is also a reckoning with Germany's past. His book Literature for a Changing Planet is based on the inaugural Oxford University Lectures in European History, delivered in November 2019, has been reviewed in the Financial Times, The New York Review of Books and other venues. It calls for a new approach to storytelling and climate change. His most recent book, Culture: The Story of Us, tells a global history of culture that raises fundamental questions about how culture works, and how different cultures should relate to one another.Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
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Jan 17, 2024 • 24min

Radically reinventing America in upstate New York: Susan Danzinger on how to effectively put philosophy into action

EPISODE 1935: In this special KEEN ON show from DLD in Munich, Andrew talks to Susan Danzinger about she is putting radical philosophical ideas into practice in upstate New YorkSusan Danziger is an investor and entrepreneur, founding a venture capital firm along with several social and environmental impact organizations including Wally Farms—a living research project dedicated to finding a food system that is better for the planet, the economy and the consumer. With their eyes set on the future of farming, Wally Farms is looking to find new, more sustainable ways to structure the food industry. By working with farmers, processors, distributors, chefs and more, Wally Farms is actively looking for solutions to the sustainability and nutrition accessibility issues that pervade our current system. Wally Farms also offers an extensive educational program, providing online courses, workshops and events as well as hands-on experiences for the local community at the farm. Additionally, Wally Farms is committed to reducing their carbon footprint by building a microgrid of solar panels. This grid provides Wally Farms with their main, and soon to be only, source of energy. They also reduce their carbon footprint by utilizing electric vehicles, prioritizing electric tools, tractors, cars and bikes for all on-site projects. Why She Made the Worthy 100: Danziger’s project, Wally Farms, is finding innovative ways to improve the farming, processing and distribution methods that make up the American food supply chain. Their holistic approach to improving our current food system focuses on researching ways to address the climate crisis and providing communities with educational experiences as well as access to more nutritious foods.Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe

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