Empty Innovation: What are we even doing?

In the last years we've seen multiple examples of empty innovations: Blockchain/NFTs, Metaverse, the "Uber but for X" phase before, our supposed "innovation leaders" are producing fewer and fewer meaningful changes aside from "more financialization", "pay rent for a thing you used to buy and own" and "this machine makes your labour rights go poof".

Why did this shift towards empty innovation happen?

And while these technological developments have poured millions of dollars (in the form of labour/open source code, etc) into the public web and the landscape of usable technologies, should we consider them to be a net positive in the form of "A few billionaires lost millions but we got some great software libraries out of it"?

In this session I want to have a look at what "innovation" is supposed to do for us as individuals, communities and societies and want to think about the question whether the way we innovate today is actually getting us where we need to go and how things need to change for us to be on the path towards a future where we and our infrastructures are not cast aside for the shiny new thing and are cared for and taken care of.

Let's move slow and fix stuff.