NeoAcademia Episode 1 - Readocracy | Mario Vasilescu

Exploring our Information Diet

I wanted to kick this podcast off with a guest who is working on how we handle information on the internet. My conversation with Mario was one of many that we’ve had over the years exploring topics like misinformation, credentialing, the attention economy, and the future of work and education. We talked for 2.5 hours (bonus content for paid subscribers will come out tomorrow), and there’s never enough time for us to talk about all the things. We don’t always agree, but this episode you’ll notice I was slightly more agreeable than usual. There may be a couple of reasons for this:

1. This is my first episode in this format.

2. I want my guests to feel welcome…but

3. My biggest concern by far is that perhaps it is because Readocracy is sponsoring this podcast. Full transparency - I was concerned about this and so I decided to write this preamble.

I always want to have integrity and the courage to explore things that might be controversial or dangerous - even if it comes to my livelihood. I know Mario encourages this, and I wouldn’t work with him if he didn’t. After listening, I wanted to dig deeper into a few questions, so I’ll put them here, and make the promise that Mario and I will revisit this discussion, and I will pursue these questions with other parties as well. In the meantime, let me know what you think!

Labeling food and offering “suggested” servings and proportions was implemented before the obesity epidemic. Is it possible that labeling information, could exacerbate the problem?

I started thinking about when obesity started becoming a problem, and in the 70s the obesity rate was about 14% and as of 2010 there wasn’t a state under 19%. This is obviously correlation not necessarily causation, but just look up “Food Lobbying” and you’ll find that where there is regulation, companies find opportunity. There is a sordid history of food lobbists applying pressure to push their food of choice into US guidelines. This happens in the drug industry and many people fear the same thing happening in a sort of 1984 Ministry of Truth type scenario. We discussed this briefly, but I fully intend to go deeper into this issue.

How will Readocracy handle misinformation that becomes information?

I touched on this briefly with the “health debacle” at 20:23, but I wish I had pressed into this a bit more. In science, something may change from conjecture to evidence rather quickly, and we certainly don’t want a Galileo-type situation, but how can we avoid that?

Readocracy seems to take a hands-off approach when it comes to misinformation, but I’m still wondering who watches the Watchmen? Maybe this is more of a question for the Fact-Checkers (future episode…), but anyone using their Checked Facts has some responsibility to hold them accountable.

And as for “fringe ideas”. I absolutely am a “rabble-rouser”. Am I a “shithead rabble-rouser”? Maybe, but I don’t mean to be. I like to stoke the fire of ideation. I think it’s good to have an weird ice cream and flavor every now and then. Reading from bizarre or even “extremely polarized” sources is probably a necessity to understand limits, boundaries and even come up with new ideas. In fact, I think a healthy dose of conspiracy is warranted to fully interrogate something (Stay tuned for Episode 5). I really want to know how Readocracy could reward deep investigation including fringe ideas.

I appreciate Readocracy’s approach to Free Speech vs Free Reach. Under Citizen’s United the US Government does not make this distinction. They find that money is equivalent to expression and think that you should be free to buy the biggest megaphone in the world if you want to. I don’t know that I agree, and Readocracy doesn’t either. Like my boy Carl says: extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

A lot of what people consume today is in the form of videos/pdfs/podcasts. How will people get credit for these things and how will these sources be credited?

I know this is coming soon, and I can’t wait. Learning is happening far and wide across a million platforms and mediums. If you know me, you know I think TikTok is a great medium to introduce people to ideas.

Are higher quality sources sometimes behind a paywall?

Again this may not be a problem for Readocracy to solve, but it may be an institutional barrier. For example, independent scholars may download PDFs from a very special Russian site and would therefore not get “credit” as the article would not be in a web browser.

How can we trust any institution at this point?

We talked a lot about trust, and while Mario cited institutions like Betaworks, Mozilla and SxSW, I’m still left wondering what criteria make an institution trustworthy. Is it time?

For more on this, stay tuned, I’ll be opening up discussion groups on Readocracy soon.

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Show Notes

For a full transcript check out my website, Substack can’t handle 5000+ word posts yet.

3:02 What is Readocracy?

4:55 The Mission of Readocracy - Bringing awareness to “Infobesity” and creating an incentive to consume healthy information

6:21 The disconnect between knowledge and the knowledge economy

9:49 - Why it’s easier to recognize unhealthy food diet vs information diet

11:26 - What people are using information for “box checking” and the “frothy”, self-indulgent foam modern intellectual elites

13:20  How Readocracy could serve as a supplement to higher education through application

17:54 Courses created by creators are being underutilized by universities and the expert unbundling

19:44  How could Readocracy could support the maintenance of knowledge? Mario thinks it begins with trust.

21:42 Tech companies have incentivized the pollution of the information commons and hoarding data.

31:24 How the big tech players may have done something good for society after all

34:00 How Readocracy showcases and incentivizes critical discussions gated for information  

41:35 Excavation through automation: how corporations are hollowing out the value of their organization and DAOs are no better.

46:29 How the “business” of academia could benefit from sharing their knowledge

51:32 Readocracy for Multi-hyphenates. Which type of Readocratic User are you: Ranger, Outlier, or Original?

53:09 Who has to be HustleGang to change the institutions?

55:03 The Creator Economy needs to be a life raft to a holistic shore

57:38 How Readocracy is handling misinformation and labeling?

1:03:40 How Readocracy makes money

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For more resources on this topic, check out the collection Mario and I created for you. Use the password “neoacademia” for access.

Readocracy is NeoAcademia’s first sponsor, and I highly encourage you to check out the tool. I have been using it daily for years now, and I even include some of my personal metrics in my monthly Rabbithole newsletter for my paid subscribers. It’s a fun way of reflecting on what you consume.