Not Safe for Work?

It was once typical of countercul­ture nonchalance to dream of a benign technological future full of easy rewards. “I like to think / (it has to be!) / of a cybernetic ecology / where we are free of our labors / and joined back to nature,” the American poet Richard Brautigan wrote, in 1967. “All watched over / by machines of loving grace.” While Brautigan’s glib vision is no longer just a fanciful prospect, the reality is anything but a blithe utopia.

The domination of our daily lives by digital technologies, including those that watch and listen around the clock, has grown with remarkable speed. Global internet traffic will soon rise to 150,700 gigabytes per second, compared with 100 gigabytes per second in 2002. And the information and communications technology, or ICT, sector now represents 15.5 percent of the world’s total wealth, as measured by gross domestic product. Of the ten largest companies by market capitalization, seven are tech firms. Two on that list...