Keen On America

Is there anyone who still believes in America as a force for good in the world today? There’s that doddery old cold warrior Joe Biden, of course, and his younger globalizing sidekick, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken. And then there’s Edward Goldberg, the author of The United States as Global Liberal Hegemon, who is still hawking the idea that the world needs America as the global policeman for peace and prosperity. You have to admire Goldberg’s chutzpah, I guess, given the catastrophic consequences of its “liberal” invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. But, in 2024, to be still imagining the US as any kind of hegemon, especially a “global liberal” one, seems at best a tragicomic nostalgia for a world that no longer exists.

Edward Goldberg is Adjunct Assistant Professor in the Center for Global Affairs at New York University, USA. He is the author of Why Globalization Works For America: How Nationalist Trade Policies Are Destroying America (2020) and The Joint Ventured Nation: Why America Needs A New Foreign Policy (2016).

Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.

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Instagram superstar and “Here’s Where It Gets Interesting” podcast host Sharon McMahon has been dubbed America’s government teacher. In her first book, The Small and the Mighty, McMahon writes about twelve unsung Americans who changed the course of history. Some of her heroes are more unsung than others, but as she explains, they all - like Sharon McMahon herself - capture the moral agency & can-do spirit that reflects the best of America.

Sharon McMahon is a former high school government and law teacher who earned a reputation as “America’s Government Teacher” amidst the historic 2020 election proceedings for her viral efforts on Instagram to educate the general public on political misinformation. Through a simple mission to share non-partisan information about democracy, Sharon has amassed hundreds of thousands of followers online, affectionately called the “Governerds,” who look to her for truth and logic in a society plagued by bias and conspiracy.

Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.

Back in April 2011, Saad Mohseni was made one of Time’s 100 most influential people in the world. And who exactly is that, you might ask. I have to admit I hadn’t heard of him either. But as Rupert Murdoch wrote about Mohseni for that Time award, “he's the best-informed person in the world about Afghanistan”. Mohseni, in fact, is the Afghan version of Murdoch (without the wives & nasty right-wing politics). Even today, with the Taliban back in power, Mohseni remains amongst Afghanistan’s most influential media moguls. And he writes about all this in Radio Free Afghanistan, a memoir focusing on what he calls his “twenty-year struggle for an independent voice in Kabul”. Important stuff about a country that needs to be remembered in the West rather than conveniently forgotten.

Described by the Asia Society as a ‘Game Changer’, Saad Mohseni has built a reputation as a dynamic and innovative entrepreneur. As Chairman and Chief Executive of MOBY GROUP, Saad has been widely applauded for his role in advancing press freedom, empowering civil society and defending women’s rights. Time Magazine recognized him in 2011 as one of the 100 most influential people in the world, while in 2013, Foreign Policy magazine named him among 100 Global Thinkers. In 2016, he was featured in the Business Insider 100 “The Creators” list, and recognized by the BBC as one of 10 men globally championing gender equality. Saad currently serves on the boards of the International Crisis Group (ICG) and the Washington DC-based International Center for Journalists (ICFJ). One of four children of an Afghan diplomat, Saad spent his early years in the United Kingdom, Kabul, Islamabad and Tokyo, before emigrating to Melbourne, Australia.

Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.

Keen On is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

There are few more authoritative American journalists than the longtime NPR and PBS host Ray Suarez. So it was a real treat to sit down with Ray earlier this month in Washington DC to talk broadly about his and his family’s experience as American immigrants from Puerto Rico. Suarez is part of that golden generation of late twentieth century American journalists who exemplified both trust and authority in their coverage of the news. And listening to him today is a reminder of what America has lost because of its failure to replace guys like Suarez with a young generation of equally trusted and authoritative journalists.

Ray Suarez is the host of the public radio program and podcast "On Shifting Ground," produced by Commonwealth Club-World Affairs and KQED-FM. His next book, on the modern era of American immigration, We Are Home: Becoming American in the 21st Century, is published by Little, Brown. He has been a visiting professor of Political Science at NYU Shanghai, and the John McCloy Visiting Professor of American Studies at Amherst College. He is a graduate of New York University and the University of Chicago. Earlier in his career, Suarez was the host of the daily news program "Inside Story" from Al Jazeera America, Chief National Correspondent for The PBS NewsHour, and the host of "Talk of the Nation" from NPR. His recent podcast productions include two seasons of "Going for Broke," produced with the Economic Hardship Reporting Project, and "The Things I Thought About When My Body Was Trying to Kill Me," from Evergreen Podcasts, about cancer and recovery. Suarez’ journalism has been recognized with two DuPont-Columbia Awards, the Ruben Salazar Award from UNIDOS-US, and UCLA’s Public Policy Leadership Award for his reporting on urban America, among others.

Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.

Keen On is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Do you work too hard? Is it ruining your life? If so, then you may want to look at Brigid Schulte’s new book, Over Work, an exploration of why American work isn’t working and how our lives can be made more meaningful. Schulte traces the arc of our discontent from a time before the neo-liberal 1980s, when work was compatible with well-being and allowed a single earner to support a family, until today, with millions of our new precariat working multiple hourly jobs or in white-collar positions where no hours are ever off duty. And she imagines a future in which we will all be able to transform the daily grind of work into a more meaningful life.

Brigid Schulte is the author of the bestselling Overwhelmed: Work, Love, and Play When No One Has the Time and an award-winning journalist formerly for the Washington Post, where she was part of a team that won a Pulitzer Prize. She is also the director of the Better Life Lab, the work-family justice and gender equity program at New America. She lives in Alexandria, Virginia, with her husband and two children.

Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.

Keen On is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Few people are more familiar with America’s drug addiction crisis than Ryan Hampton. A former addict himself as well as the author of three books on the crisis, including the new Fentanyl Nation, the Las Vegas based Hampton is also running for the Nevada State Assembly in November. For Hampton, America’s failed war on drugs and its toxic politics are part of the same “uniquely American” problem of what he described to me as “reckless capitalism”. That’s why, he explains in Fentanyl Nation, 80% of the world’s illegal opioid drugs end up in the United States. And it’s why addressing America’s drug crisis, Hampton argues in Fentanyl Nation, simultaneously requires confronting what he considers to be the toxic politics of the country’s pharmaceutical and medical economy.

A prominent advocate, speaker, author, and media commentator, Ryan Hampton travels coast-to-coast to add solutions to our national addiction and drug overdose crisis. In recovery from a decade-long opioid addiction, Hampton is regarded as a forefront expert and thought leader in America’s rising addiction recovery advocacy & drug policy reform movements. An alumnus of the Clinton White House, he’s worked with multiple non-profits and addiction recovery organizing campaigns. He’s now a prominent, leading face and voice of recovery advocacy and is working to change the longstanding negative narratives about those impacted by addiction, recovery, and overdose. Through his books and media, organizing campaigns, and social content that reaches millions, Ryan breaks down cultural barriers that have kept people suffering in silence and is helping to inspire a new generation of advocates recovering out loud, pushing for common-sense policy. He was part of the core team that released the first-ever U.S. Surgeon General’s report on alcohol, drugs, and health in 2016 and was singled out by Forbes the following year as a top social entrepreneur in the recovery movement. Ryan connects a vast network of people passionate about ending the overdose crisis in America. He has been featured by—and is a contributor to—media outlets such as the Today Show, the Associated Press, USA Today, MSNBC, ABC News, Fox and Friends, the New York Times, NPR, HLN, Vice, Slate, The Hill, the Wall Street Journal, and others.

Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.

Keen On is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Not everyone fears that AI revolution represents an existential event for humanity. Anindya Ghose, the Heinz Riehl Professor of Business at NYU’s illustrious Stern school, actually believes AI can positively impact our daily lives - from health and wellness, to work, education, even love and dating. In Thrive, a new book he co-authored with Ravi Bapna, Ghose explains how we can maximize our well-being in the AI age. It won’t be easy, he acknowledges. But, in sharp contrast with skeptics like Gary Marcus, Ghose believes that the AI revolution can nudge us into living richer, happier, healthier and more productive lives. Let’s hope he’s right.

Anindya Ghose is the Heinz Riehl Chair Professor of Technology and Marketing at New York University's Leonard N. Stern School of Business where he holds a joint appointment in the TOPS and Marketing departments. He is the author of TAP: Unlocking The Mobile Economy which is a double winner in the 2018 Axiom Business Book Awards and has been translated into five languages (Korean, Mandarin, Vietnamese, Japanese and Taiwanese). He is the Director of the Masters of Business Analytics and AI Program at NYU Stern. He is a Leonard Stern Faculty Scholar with an MBA scholarship (the Ghose Scholarship) named after him. He has been a Visiting Professor at the Wharton School of Business. In 2014, he was named by Poets & Quants as one of the Top 40 Professors Under 40 Worldwide and by Analytics Week as one the "Top 200 Thought Leaders in Big Data and Business Analytics".

Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.

Keen On is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Working on Sheryl Sandberg’s team at Google, Megan Hellerer - who had just graduated top of her Stanford class - was on the fast track to become a young Silicon Valley superstar. A few years later, however, she had a breakdown and quit. Describing herself as an “underfulfilled overachiever”, she writes about this traumatic experience in her new book, Directional Living. Hellerer - who now runs her own career coach consultancy and includes Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez as a client - confesses that at Google she wasn’t living her life and thus was miserable. Her answer to what she calls the traditional “destinational thinking” of career development is in “directional living” - a concept that replaces the “achievement lie” with a more authentic and less quantifiable path to personal fulfillment.

Megan Hellerer is a career coach and the founder of Coaching for Underfulfilled Overachievers. She has led hundreds of women, including Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, to transform their lives by transforming their careers. After checking all the traditional boxes of success—graduating at the top of her class from Stanford University and spending eight years as a Google executive—and still deeply unhappy, she quit her great-on-paper job with no plan. Now her mission is to provide others with the support and guidance that she needed when she herself was struggling. Megan has been featured in New York, Vogue, The Wall Street Journal, CNBC, and The Times. She lives with her husband and daughter in the Hudson Valley, New York.

Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.

Keen On is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Earlier this week, I interviewed the Australian AI expert Toby Walsh about Google’s new NotebookLM, a seemingly magical AI product that creates believable conversation between bots. Today, on our weekly That Was The Week tech roundup, Keith Teare and I agreed that this is going to profoundly change the way we not only produce media, but also how we imagine “trust” and “truth” in our synthetic media age. Referencing an optimistic essay by @Every CEO Dan Shipper entitled “Generalists Own the Future”, we agreed that products like NotebookLM will create what Shipper calls a “wicked environment” for generalists to create their own unique content. GPT-4o and Claude Sonnet 3.5 and the other LLMs means that we all have “10,000 Ph.D.’s available at our fingertips.” While that’s exciting news for know-nothing generalists like Keith and I, it’s less good news for all those narrow Ph.Ds beavering away in research libraries In the age of AI, these types of narrow specialists are the new proletariat. Luddites will, of course, encourage them to unite, telling them that they nothing to lose but their (irrelevant) specialization. But, in they want to survive in our synthetic media age, they might be better off turning in their library cards and downloading NotebookLM.

Keith Teare is the founder and CEO of SignalRank Corporation. Previously, he was executive chairman at Accelerated Digital Ventures Ltd., a U.K.-based global investment company focused on startups at all stages. Teare studied at the University of Kent and is the author of “The Easy Net Book” and “Under Siege.” He writes regularly for TechCrunch and publishes the “That Was The Week” newsletter.

Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.

Keen On is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Last year, Michael Scott-Baumann, author of The Shortest History of Israel and Palestine and a peace activist at the Balfour Project, came on the show to talk about the problem to end all problems - the Israel-Palestine question. Today, Scott-Baumann explains, this problem has, if anything, metastasized into something even more shameful and insoluble. Gaza has been transformed from what he calls “the world’s largest outdoor prison” into a war zone and the two sides are no nearer what the Balfour Project calls “peace with justice, security and equal rights for Palestinians and Israelis.” Given this deeply depressing situation, it’s essential that analysts like Scott-Baumann keep giving us the bad news. There is nothing to be cheerful about here. The situation, Scott-Baumann reminds us, is unrelentingly bad. And it is likely to get considerably worse.

Michael Scott-Baumann is a graduate of Cambridge University and has an MA from the School of Oriental and African Studies in London. He has 35 years’ experience as a history teacher and lecturer. He has traveled widely in the Middle East and worked as a volunteer under the auspices of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, with whom he conducted field work on the West Bank. He lives in Cheltenham, England.

Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.

Keen On is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.