#77: Doomsday narratives, online etiquette, and tech beyond the West
A Q&A with tech journalist Victoria Turk
Hello, and Happy 2024!
I hope the Holidays were exactly what you needed them to be.
Between the lounging and the festivities, I indulged in one of my favourite rituals: reflecting on the year past and setting intentions for the next. To structure my thoughts, I use Year Compass, a free tool I discovered through former Q&A guest Lauren Currie.
Year Compass is a booklet split into two sections. Through a series of prompt questions and exercises, it invites you to explore the learnings, surprises, decisions, risks, challenges, wins, people, places, habits, and hobbies of your past and future self. There are around 50 prompts, but you’re free to gravitate towards what’s most valuable.
As someone who likes to time-box and check off tasks, I challenge myself to set no limits for Year Compass. This time, I sat with it for a few days. When reflecting on Pass It On specifically, I decided to be gentler in my ambitions for 2024.
Pass It On exists to help the tech and non-profit sectors learn from each other. It’s a continuous knowledge exchange experiment in pursuit of a better world, and that’s why the newsletter has always been free. There are no cost barriers or sponsored messages between you and what you signed up for.
The flip side of free is slower growth: there isn’t capital to spend on advertising. One “free” alternative to growing through advertising is creating more content. You grow the subscriber base by posting on social media multiple times a week and continuously optimising posts for maximum reach and engagement. There is, of course, a cost to this content-first approach: time and, potentially, mental health. In my case, Pass It On exists alongside my full-time job at a fast-paced scaleup. I have to acknowledge my limits.
Keeping Pass It On free in 2024 will be an important exercise in patience. I’m impatient by nature, and so is my professional environment. The tech world wants growth, and it wants it fast. Let’s see how I get on!
Now, onto our first Q&A for 2024 with Victoria Turk.
Victoria is the features director at Rest of World, a non-profit publication that, like Pass It On, exists to close a knowledge gap:
In the US, tech outlets tend to focus on the domestic giants, missing how these companies influence global outcomes (by their presence or their absence). And even in thriving hubs like Nairobi and Bangkok, tech reporting is largely preoccupied with funding rounds, CEOs and unicorns. While billions of people suddenly had access to the world’s information—seeing their lives change virtually overnight—there was little questioning about what this all meant. Instead, more stories about Jack Dorsey’s fasting regime. (Sorry, Jack.)
This information gap is why I started Rest of World.
Rest of World sheds light on tech’s impact in places typically overlooked by Western media. Their reporting is expansive yet, at times, delightfully niche, like this recent piece on how the world laughs online.
Before joining Rest of World, Victoria worked for publications including Wired, New Scientist, and Vice. She also studied the same Modern Languages degree program as me at university, one year above. When I spotted her name on the Rest of World team list late last year, it had been a decade since we’d last seen each other. I’m forever grateful for Pass It On connecting and reconnecting me with inspiring individuals doing great things for the world.
You've been writing about technology since you graduated from journalism school. Why is tech and digital culture interesting to write about? What's kept you in this world for so long?
I guess I'm part of the first generation to really "grow up online," so tech and digital culture has always been ingrained in my life. I was initially attracted to writing about this space because I was excited by the potential represented by technological advances—and I still am! But I've stayed in this field because of the increasing role that tech plays in every aspect of life, from politics to culture, and the need to hold the power that comes with that to account. Even ten years ago, I think the tech beat was seen as quite a niche, nerdy pursuit, but now tech companies have so much presence and influence that all of the biggest stories have a tech element. There's a particular lack of scrutiny on how tech is impacting people well beyond Silicon Valley, which is why I'm so excited about the work we do at Rest of World to cover stories outside of the Western bubble.
What led you to Rest of World? Why does its mission matter to you?
Rest of World's mission is to capture people's experiences with technology outside the West. We focus on on-the-ground reporting in places that are often overlooked and underestimated. It was very much this mission that drew me to the role. It's so rare to have the opportunity to work with a genuinely global team—I have colleagues across five continents—and for a publication willing to invest in the on-the-ground reporting necessary to truly uncover stories that matter and that aren't being told anywhere else. It's such a fantastic team, and I am continually astounded by the quality of the stories we publish.
💡Check out some recent Rest of World stories
What it takes to bring Wordle into other languages
The end of anonymity on Chinese social media
How AI reduces the world to stereotypes (by Victoria)
What's the best piece of tech journalism you've ever read, and why?
Despite people sometimes seeing tech as cold and "inhuman," the best tech journalism usually reveals the profound impacts technology can have on human lives. I will always appreciate investigative work that uncovers the true mechanics of how tech is being used or misused. Like the 2013 Snowden revelations that exposed the extent of technologically-enabled governmental surveillance. Or the Wall Street Journal’s 2021 Facebook Files, which revealed myriad issues on Meta's (then Facebook's) platforms. And there's been some great journalism in recent years that's captured the sometimes-ridiculous excesses of Silicon Valley, such as John Carreyrou's Bad Blood, which blew the lid on Theranos.
💡 Learn more about Theranos in Lauren’s issue on noble cause corruption
Recently, I've been particularly impressed by a swell of reporting on the global labour force behind technologies, including workers moderating social or data labelling for AI, often for low wages and in difficult working conditions. And as a longform editor, I always love anything with really strong narrative storytelling (like this brilliant piece on the decline of British chippies) regardless of the topic.
You wrote a modern guide to online etiquette called Kill Reply All. What's one tip from the book you wish everyone knew about?
Ha! I have many, many opinions about email, most of which boil down to the idea that good email etiquette means making things as easy as possible for your recipient to deal with. By the same token, one recent trend I despair at is WhatsApp voice notes. Just don't do it! In almost all cases, leaving a voice note instead of a text message is more convenient for the person sending the message but less convenient for the person receiving it—which makes it objectively poor etiquette by my accounting!
I think the doomsday narrative of a humanity-threatening superintelligence, pushed by many of the loudest names in the industry, is a distraction from AI issues that are already having an impact.
What's an unusual opinion or uncommon belief you hold?
Like many tech journalists in my circle with a generally sceptical demeanour, I strongly believe the negative potential of AI is massively overhyped. That's not to say I don't think our current AI systems are impressive or that there aren't huge problems with AI—quite the contrary. But I think the doomsday narrative of a humanity-threatening superintelligence, pushed by many of the loudest names in the industry, is a distraction from AI issues that are already having an impact, like bias, inequality, and labour conditions. I also think the hype has the added effect of making these companies' products perhaps seem a bit more advanced than they are.
💡 Head to Neef Rehman’s recent Q&A for more on the consequences of sensationalist AI narratives
What do you wish the tech sector understood better about the non-profit sector and vice versa?
I'm in an interesting position as I feel like I'm working between these two worlds! Rest of World is a non-profit, but we also see ourselves as a startup with the same challenges and opportunities that many young tech businesses experience. Like setting up new workflows, choosing the best tools to use, hiring a whole team, and generally just punching above our weight.
We're also a tech publication, first and foremost, with our main responsibility being to our readers. It's a tough time for journalism in general, so trying new models can only be a good thing.
Regarding the non-profit question, I think many in the tech sector (and elsewhere!) should reconsider their preconceptions about non-profits. My colleague Emily Tracy, Rest of World's Chief Development Officer, puts it well:
"There's this stereotype that tech is the saviour and the 'little engine that could' non-profit would be ineffective and helpless without tech bro intervention. Wrong!"
Tracy also points out that non-profits exist because of market failure: neither the government nor the for-profit sector can (or wants to) solve a problem. And that, contrary to preconceptions, non-profits actually hold a lot of power because they aren't beholden to stakeholders in the same way as for-profits. Other sectors could learn a lot from organisations where profit isn't the main driver of their existence.
With the above in mind, I think it’s important to approach any collaboration as equals working towards a shared goal, and not as a partnership with a power imbalance.
More questions for Victoria? Find her on Twitter/X or email victoria@restofworld.org.
Thanks so much for reading!
Lauren
wonderful edition Lauren!!