This is a HeadGum Podcast. I don't know what you think I don't know what you say

and that's all right

yeah that's all right

I don't know anything.

Hello everyone, welcome to Factually.

I'm Adam Conover, and for decades we've heard about how technology will change the world, right?

In the 90s, it truly seems that the internet and revolutionary, even utopian potential. We were all told and we believed that would break down the

barriers that separate people and information. We were told tech would fix all of

our problems. It would solve educational access with free, massively online

classes. It would eliminate discrimination because no one could tell who was who online, so we would

all compete on the merits. We even thought that tech would be strong enough to topple

dictatorships. Remember the Arab Spring? The media literally told us that

Twitter was going to be stronger than decades of authoritarianism from Tehran to Cairo.

And this was back when Twitter only had 120 characters.

Each of those characters was doing a lot of heavy lifting.

Well, suffice it to say, if you're living in the same present that I am,

none of these dreams has come true. A decade later, the Democratic gains of the Arab

Spring have largely rolled back and authoritarian governments have proved to be even

more adept at harnessing the communicative power of the internet than democratically minded citizens

are.

And in America, well let's just say our utopia of

technologically secured equality has not arrived yet. Let's start with a claim

...