Randy Fernando

And when something's treated as human, when something is anthropomorphic and sounds like a human and has an avatar, looks like a human, then we give it preferential treatment.

And that is very advantageous for the people who build those products.

This is where the big push to personalize everything is leading us.

It's leading us away from this principle.

And that loss of shared understanding doesn't show up on any company's balance sheet.

It's sort of invisible, right?

This is a real example of an externality.

But along the way, we can't forget that that's what we need, again, to bridge our conversations, to solve problems, to resolve disagreements.

And so what we have to do is really make that part of our investment process.

When we're building technology, we have to invest in and prioritize this shared understanding and cooperation.

What Audrey is talking about in this example is the way that we can actually use technology to surface many more voices than we do right now in a much more nuanced way, where people can express their opinions much more completely.

than just a vote, like a yes or a no, but rather expressing preferences in complex ways on complex topics.

And it's really inspiring.

And there's so much more like that, that we can do once we turn our attention to that.

Okay, so you've made it all the way through this episode, and I bet you're wondering, if I'm a technologist or a funder, how do I actually make this stuff happen?

It all sounds good, but there's a reason we don't do it, right?

So how do we make humane technology win?

If you've invested in humane technology, there are actually some things you can do.

So one is you can get the rules right.

You can fight for laws that match the humane practices you've already demonstrated or invested in.