In civic tech, we’ve gotten pretty good at saying how not to do things. Don’t build from the top down. Don’t ignore the user. Don’t digitize dysfunction. Important lessons, to be sure. But slogans like “build with, not for” are not blueprints. And while we’ve produced a forest of “open data playbooks,” they’re often too broad, too conceptual—or simply too disconnected from the messiness of real institutions and everyday implementation. What gives me hope, and what I believe defines the next w...

In civic tech, we’ve gotten pretty good at saying how not to do things. Don’t build from the top down. Don’t ignore the user. Don’t digitize dysfunction. Important lessons, to be sure. But slogans like “build with, not for” are not blueprints. And while we’ve produced a forest of “open data playbooks,” they’re often too broad, too conceptual—or simply too disconnected from the messiness of real institutions and everyday implementation. What gives me hope, and what I believe defines the next w...

In the rainforest, a strangler fig begins its life high in the canopy, germinating not in the soil but in the crook of another tree. It sends tendrils downward, encircling the host. Over time, the fig thickens, strengthens, and slowly takes over. Eventually, the host withers, leaving a hollow column of living wood where something else once stood. Software engineers know this as the strangler fig pattern — a way to modernize legacy systems without tearing them out wholesale. You build new comp...

In the rainforest, a strangler fig begins its life high in the canopy, germinating not in the soil but in the crook of another tree. It sends tendrils downward, encircling the host. Over time, the fig thickens, strengthens, and slowly takes over. Eventually, the host withers, leaving a hollow column of living wood where something else once stood. Software engineers know this as the strangler fig pattern — a way to modernize legacy systems without tearing them out wholesale. You build new comp...

Dear Ezra, Thanks again for elevating the conversation about American capacity. Your work has helped bring into focus how much of our crisis stems not from a lack of vision, but from our inability to execute. In my last letter, I shared a story about a stormwater ditch we built in my hometown—a process that could have taken ten years on paper, but was done in a day through community will and a bit of permitting jiu jitsu. Today I want to offer another parable, this time from the pavement bene...

Dear Ezra, Thanks again for elevating the conversation about American capacity. Your work has helped bring into focus how much of our crisis stems not from a lack of vision, but from our inability to execute. In my last letter, I shared a story about a stormwater ditch we built in my hometown—a process that could have taken ten years on paper, but was done in a day through community will and a bit of permitting jiu jitsu. Today I want to offer another parable, this time from the pavement bene...

During the long stillness of the pandemic I went deep into the oral epics. I read the Iliad and the Odyssey, the Aeneid and then their modern refactorings in Circe and Lavinia. What struck me was how each of these works began as a living river of words, carried on the tongues of countless tellers before they were ever written down. They were never fixed but always reshaped. This play between repetition and transformation is what gave them power. An epic is not a stone monument. It is a curren...

During the long stillness of the pandemic I went deep into the oral epics. I read the Iliad and the Odyssey, the Aeneid and then their modern refactorings in Circe and Lavinia. What struck me was how each of these works began as a living river of words, carried on the tongues of countless tellers before they were ever written down. They were never fixed but always reshaped. This play between repetition and transformation is what gave them power. An epic is not a stone monument. It is a curren...

Every so often, a book kicks the legs out from under the table you’ve been sitting at your whole life. 1491 is one of those books. We’ve been taught to see the pre-Columbian Americas as a wilderness—vast, unspoiled, and empty. But what if it wasn’t a wilderness at all? What if it was a garden? A machine? A vast, decentralized, collaborative act of planetary design? That’s the thesis buried in the pages of Charles C. Mann’s 1491, and once you see it, you can’t unsee it. Turns out, the Inka did...

Every so often, a book kicks the legs out from under the table you’ve been sitting at your whole life. 1491 is one of those books. We’ve been taught to see the pre-Columbian Americas as a wilderness—vast, unspoiled, and empty. But what if it wasn’t a wilderness at all? What if it was a garden? A machine? A vast, decentralized, collaborative act of planetary design? That’s the thesis buried in the pages of Charles C. Mann’s 1491, and once you see it, you can’t unsee it. Turns out, the Inka did...

Imagine explaining to a Paleolithic ancestor that you drive a machine to sit in another cave, stare at a glowing rectangle, and then—get this—you drive back to a different cave full of metal weights and artificial lighting in order to “exercise.” They might laugh. Or simply blink in quiet confusion. Why not just move and make and carry and dance and walk and lift and live...where you already are? This is the heart of the cyber paleo perspective shift—a way of seeing our blurred world of bits ...

Imagine explaining to a Paleolithic ancestor that you drive a machine to sit in another cave, stare at a glowing rectangle, and then—get this—you drive back to a different cave full of metal weights and artificial lighting in order to “exercise.” They might laugh. Or simply blink in quiet confusion. Why not just move and make and carry and dance and walk and lift and live...where you already are? This is the heart of the cyber paleo perspective shift—a way of seeing our blurred world of bits ...

There’s a curious intersection outside the local high school in La Crescenta, California. It’s not curious because of its design—nothing fancy, just an unassuming street where kids walk to class, neighbors cross with coffee, and cars glide by with variable awareness. It’s curious because of what it doesn’t have: a stop sign. Now, you might think: surely, if a stop sign is needed, someone just installs it. But the tale, like so many in our modern civic life, is stranger than fiction and more t...

There’s a curious intersection outside the local high school in La Crescenta, California. It’s not curious because of its design—nothing fancy, just an unassuming street where kids walk to class, neighbors cross with coffee, and cars glide by with variable awareness. It’s curious because of what it doesn’t have: a stop sign. Now, you might think: surely, if a stop sign is needed, someone just installs it. But the tale, like so many in our modern civic life, is stranger than fiction and more t...

You know, I used to sit around a fire in the high Sierra, watching the sparks spiral into the stars, thinking about how it all stays the same. One moment, you’re sharing jerky with a neighbor and a common dream. The next, someone’s standing just a little taller, asking if you still believe in “shared sacrifice.” It’s a funny phrase—shines like old brass but always weighs heavier on some shoulders than others. Now, I want to tell you a story of us. Of these United States, from the Founding to ...

You know, I used to sit around a fire in the high Sierra, watching the sparks spiral into the stars, thinking about how it all stays the same. One moment, you’re sharing jerky with a neighbor and a common dream. The next, someone’s standing just a little taller, asking if you still believe in “shared sacrifice.” It’s a funny phrase—shines like old brass but always weighs heavier on some shoulders than others. Now, I want to tell you a story of us. Of these United States, from the Founding to ...

Picture this: you walk into city hall and it feels like stepping back into the age of typewriters. The same rituals, the same paper piles, the same council meetings where “public comment” means showing up on a Tuesday night to speak into a microphone for three minutes before anyone actually makes a decision. Even with Zoom layered on top, it’s still the same old play. The camera just lets you beam in to watch the theater from your couch instead of a plastic chair. You see it everywhere. Permi...

Picture this: you walk into city hall and it feels like stepping back into the age of typewriters. The same rituals, the same paper piles, the same council meetings where “public comment” means showing up on a Tuesday night to speak into a microphone for three minutes before anyone actually makes a decision. Even with Zoom layered on top, it’s still the same old play. The camera just lets you beam in to watch the theater from your couch instead of a plastic chair. You see it everywhere. Permi...

Dear readers, You may have noticed that this year my posts shifted from hand penned artisanal crafted posts to a curated bit of what increasingly is called slop.* I say may because I really have no idea how many actual flesh and blood people really read this silly little web like log of various ideas and missives from the frontiers I spend time intellectually exploring. And no I make no apologies for said slop. I have a lot of ideas and AI offers a nice way for a busy dad with lots of actual ...

Dear readers, You may have noticed that this year my posts shifted from hand penned artisanal crafted posts to a curated bit of what increasingly is called slop.* I say may because I really have no idea how many actual flesh and blood people really read this silly little web like log of various ideas and missives from the frontiers I spend time intellectually exploring. And no I make no apologies for said slop. I have a lot of ideas and AI offers a nice way for a busy dad with lots of actual ...

In an age of overpriced analysis from the consultant industrial complex—where dirt-simple projects are delayed by memos, models, and middle managers—the most urgent infrastructure breakthrough isn’t a new material or financing mechanism. It’s a return to something older: the ability to act in the face of uncertainty, to sketch boldly, to observe and respond swiftly. This is the path of Fermi-Dyson Thinking—a way of building rooted in approximation, improvisation, and a deep respect for the fe...

In an age of overpriced analysis from the consultant industrial complex—where dirt-simple projects are delayed by memos, models, and middle managers—the most urgent infrastructure breakthrough isn’t a new material or financing mechanism. It’s a return to something older: the ability to act in the face of uncertainty, to sketch boldly, to observe and respond swiftly. This is the path of Fermi-Dyson Thinking—a way of building rooted in approximation, improvisation, and a deep respect for the fe...