Protopia.
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Technology & AI

Essays about artificial intelligence, software, and the compression of digital work.

A remote worker wearing a white spatial-computing headset sits at a spare desk overlooking the hills and Pacific coast near Nosara
Technology & AI

Fifty-one things

Fifty-one aphorisms on the future of work and AI, looking forward from March 2026.

March 25, 202622 min read
An empty office chair casts a long shadow containing forms, a calendar, and a box
Technology & AI

The human overhead

Everyone talks about what AI agents can and can't do. Nobody talks about what humans require just to show up. The severance packages, the exit interviews, the quiet resentments—the entire invisible infrastructure of employing a person.

March 20, 202613 min read
A surprised musician raises a mallet as a robotic hand strikes the drum first
Technology & AI

The eureka tax

There is a moment in songwriting when the bass clicks in with the drums, when the arrangement locks, when the thing you've been circling for hours suddenly resolves. AI is eliminating that moment. And it's eliminating it everywhere.

March 18, 202616 min read
A worker holds one glowing tool as a long blank folded process narrows into it
Technology & AI

The compression

Sometime around 2015, there was an office in a WeWork. The walls were exposed brick. The desks were reclaimed wood. They were building a website for a premium dog treat brand. The project would take four months and cost $180,000. And then, very quickly, a large language model learned to do most of it.

December 30, 202526 min read
A pleasant office clerk presents three identical blank pages while casting a machine-like shadow
Technology & AI

The benign mediocrity of AI responses

It's the second day of 2025. Commercial consumer-facing AI has been around for over two years. Here is a fundamental problem with AI chat.

January 2, 20256 min read

Protopia

by Curtis Duggan

Technology, business, society, and modern life.

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