#63: Human-scale success

A Q&A with designer and Dense Discovery publisher Kai Brach

Hello!

Today, I have the pleasure of introducing one of my newsletter heros—the designer and publisher, Kai Brach.

Kai publishes the print magazine Offscreen, but is probably best known for his newsletter Dense Discovery (DD). Each week, Kai curates interesting ideas at the intersection of design, technology, sustainability, and culture for 43,000 subscribers. I’ve read DD religiously for 5 years: it’s equal parts inspiring and thought-provoking.

A central theme behind both of Kai’s publications is human-centred technology. Kai is interested in how we shape technology and how technology shapes us, and offers a much-needed critical perspective on both. He has strong views about the climate crisis too, and is proactive about living on a small footprint from his base in Australia.

Beyond these areas, there’s little I know about Kai. He manages to remain quite private despite the success of his publications, and rarely does interviews. But he agreed to do this one, and I’m extremely grateful.

Over to you, Kai.

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You believe the tech world’s obsession with growth is fundamentally damaging and that the tech community needs to examine its role more critically. Why is this? What would a more self-critical tech community look like?

What makes the tech industry unique is its outsized scale and impact. A simple change in an algorithm has real-world consequences for the lives of billions of people from vastly different cultures. Social media’s unrelenting pursuit of more eyeballs and more attention at any cost is a good example: Facebook’s obsession with growth has little patience for how it impacts the trust/mistrust of news/journalism required for a functioning democracy, for instance. 

The Center for Humane Technology has a good overview of the multi-pronged approach it takes to create a more human tech ecosystem. It must involve all stakeholders—from users to investors and policymakers to the education sector.  

This is Kai

I’ve heard you say that you wished more companies would pursue human-scale success. Can you unpack this term for us?

I would describe human-scale success as success that remains conscious of its impact on the human experience. Many (perhaps even most) endeavours don’t need to grow into complicated behemoths where that growth becomes its sole reason to exist. Sure, some organisations need a certain scale to operate and be effective, but many don’t. We’ve all experienced dealing with organisations that feel human and those that feel… anti-human, for the lack of a better word.  

What’s your perspective on the latest AI wave? What impact will it have on society within, say, the next 5 years?

I think there are currently enough people sharing their ‘takes’ on AI and how it will affect the future, so I don’t really feel the need to add to that. The sheer bandwidth of opinions—from AI as the beginning of the end of our civilisation, to the ‘tech thought leaders’ that promise ‘revolutionary productivity gains’—suggests that nobody really knows what’s next. However, given the history of past tech hype cycles, I have little hope that this time we allow ourselves the luxury of reflection—of thinking about the consequences of this black box before we witness its destructive potential.

One of my favourite DD issues was “The time to imagine better.” You argued that many ideas meet resistance due to a lack of imagination. What are the causes behind this lack and how can we learn to overcome it?

It’s a good question. I would say that it’s part human nature and part the systems we have created. Most people don’t like disruption, so any proposed change that requires a ‘let’s try and see how it goes’ approach will be eyed sceptically. In addition, we all have tons of biases that work against the uncertainty that comes with change. And then there are the many behaviours our system reinforces through commonly accepted norms and defaults that we’ve been conditioned to since birth.

I like using car-centric urban planning as an example. Most people who currently rely on cars really hate the idea of road space being given to active (e.g. cycling) or public transport, because it seems to make traffic congestion worse. A ton of research shows that more alternatives to private transport (i.e., cars) benefit everyone, including drivers. Our capitalistic system has done a great job portraying cars as an expression of status and associating them with the ultimate freedom of movement. In reality, car-centrism is costing all of us dearly. 

If you could wave a magic wand and change anything about how humans are responding to the climate crisis today, what would you change and why?

I wish we all had more historical context of how we ended up at this point—of how mind-bogglingly unique this moment in time is. With a better understanding and a longer view of human history, we may appreciate how much we interdepend on all other living things on this planet. And we may not see our current extraction and consumption culture as a sign of our species’ success but as a survival mechanism gone awry. 

Your newsletter curates so much goodness across articles, books, art, typography, and more. What’s your process for finding and identifying what’s worth sharing? How do you ensure you’re taking it all in?

There is no magic to it. I subscribe to a bunch of newsletters, follow some folks on Twitter/Mastodon, and read some old-school RSS feeds. I use Raindrop to store and categorise interesting things I stumble across. Every week I go through the various categories and pick things that I think deserve my readers’ attention.

My favourite things maintain a human scale and a sense of community. I like ideas and endeavours that occur on the margins, where people undertake projects that aren’t beholden to excessive expectations around success and growth.

What three books or other media have impacted you most and why? 

I always struggle with ‘best of’ questions. Here are three things that caused me to reflect on them for quite a while after reading/watching them: 

This essay on the Fermi Paradox is quite mind-boggling and puts our existence on this planet in perspective. The notion of a ‘Great Filter’ is particularly relevant in today’s conversations about climate collapse.

The book The Art of Frugal Hedonism written by a local Melburnian couple is an easy, fun read convincing you that a more modest lifestyle leads to more joy.

I’m a pretty big fan of Alain de Botton’s School of Life and the many, many short videos they publish. In particular, this talk of his helped me see the concepts of love and relationships in a completely new light.

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Thanks so much for reading!

Lauren