Essays & reporting
I don't just write about dust - but also digital culture, technology and futures.
Reported features and essays
Critically Endangered. ‘We ask a lot of some very small fish. Single species are relied on to save entire ecosystems.’ London Review of Books blog, 2025
Hell's Kitchen. ‘Imperial Valley cannot be a sacrifice zone for the clean energy revolution.’ On lithium development at the Salton Sea, California. London Review of Books blog, 2024
Intelligence is Everywhere. ‘A new kind of nature writing sees new technologies as one more branch of the teeming tree of life.’ Cover feature for New Humanist, 2022
Meet Me In The Metaverse. ‘As our lives become ever more digital, how do we untangle “real” experiences from virtual ones – and should we?’ New Humanist, 2022
Tell Me, Do You Intend To Fuck It? An essay on desire, materiality and the iPhone. Dirty Furniture, 2021
Post-Authenticity and the Ironic Truths of Meme Culture - Medium, 2018
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Reactions & discussion at Metafilter; Design Observer podcast Episode 80: Age and Authenticity; Slate Money podcast 205 on brands, Airspace and authenticity; Neil Perkin's post of the month.
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Chapter in the book Post-Memes: Seizing the Memes of Production, eds. Alfie Bown & Dan Bristow, Punctum Books, 2019
My Friend, The Bot. Medium, 2016
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Republished in Vector, the critical journal of the British Science Fiction Association
Is Fashion Ready for a New Aesthetic? Business of Fashion, 2012
Travel writing
The Ghost Grid of California City - Medium, 2016
Atomic California - Roads & Kingdoms, 2015
Opinion
Airbnb hasn’t lived up to its utopian claims - Guardian, 2020
The tech giants dominated the decade. But there’s still time to rein them in - Guardian, 2019
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Discussion on KGO 810 radio (San Francisco)
Ashes to Ashes - Smith Journal, 2019
Your mobile phone leaks - ICON magazine, 2012
Reviews
As Above, So Below: a review of Fred Scharmen's 'Space Forces' - Ancillary Review, 2022
Minimal Effort: a review of Kyle Chayka's 'The Longing for Less' - Apollo, 2020
Exploring the Future Beyond Cyberpunk - How We Get To Next, 2018
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Republished at Quartz, Nine Sci Fi Subgenres to Help You Understand the Future, and The Big Smoke, Woke space opera, solarpunk and cli-fi: The new subsets of sci-fi taking root
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Translated into Spanish for BBVA Open Mind, Una nueva ciencia ficción para entender lo que viene
Review of Keller Easterling’s ‘Extrastatecraft' - ICON magazine, 2015