"No Escape? Mining the Need for Human Connection in an Age of Uncertainty"

AI companions aren't solving problems, they're creating them. Casey Mock reveals the venture-backed machinery designed to profit from the need for human connection and extract value from our increasingly fragmented reality. In a digital landscape flooded with AI products that feel suspiciously like solutions in search of problems, it can be easy to lose sight of a basic question: what are these products for, and who are they really serving? By examining the flow of venture capital and deliberate technological design choices behind these systems, his talk reveals how these products aren't built to serve genuine human needs, but exploit them. Casey offers critical perspectives on reclaiming our ability to relate to one another before our common reality dissolves completely.