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Oliver Buchannon
Jonathan Bellack

Xoogler, 30-year Internet veteran, advisory fellow @ Harvard's Berkman Klein Center

Reader Mailbag

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Reader mailbag #2 - my first poll, and I missed a bunch of Fediverse tools for Exit

Dec 5, 2025

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7 min read

Reader mailbag #2 - my first poll, and I missed a bunch of Fediverse tools for Exit

Your chance to pick my end-of-year articles, and a review of Exit coolness I overlooked from the world of ActivityPub.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Identity

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Exit and Interoperability Exist Today, If You Know Where To Look

Nov 21, 2025

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10 min read

Exit and Interoperability Exist Today, If You Know Where To Look

Outside the big walled gardens, the open social web is making Exit and interoperability a reality. I review a few projects that I’m excited about, and where I think they could take us next.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Ad Tech

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Rant: Meta is earning billions from scams and fraud. Their lack of transparency is an insult.

Nov 7, 2025

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10 min read

Rant: Meta is earning billions from scams and fraud. Their lack of transparency is an insult.

Meta’s newly-revealed carelessness is egregious, but their bullshit response is the Platformocracy at its worst. I am pissed. Welcome to what my coworkers used to call a “Bellack Special.”

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Identity

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Can we regulate or spend our way to Exit? Lessons from Europe, Utah, and Project Liberty

Oct 31, 2025

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9 min read

Can we regulate or spend our way to Exit? Lessons from Europe, Utah, and Project Liberty

The EU has regulated data portability, but the US is dragging its heels. A deep-pocketed benefactor has put $500 million into the fight, but is even a large fortune enough to make a difference?

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Identity

More on Exit: competition is just one click away, unless it threatens our Daily Active Users metric

Oct 24, 2025

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8 min read

More on Exit: competition is just one click away, unless it threatens our Daily Active Users metric

Big social media platforms brag about their tools that let you download your data, but without import or forwarding, it’s a red herring. Companies could easily make this better.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Explainer

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Explainer #4: “Exit, Voice, and Loyalty” is why big tech platforms want you to leave

Oct 17, 2025

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8 min read

Explainer #4: “Exit, Voice, and Loyalty” is why big tech platforms want you to leave

A legendary economist and World War 2 badass tells us why heading to Bluesky or the Fediverse makes big platforms’ lives easier, and what it would take to convince you to stay and fight.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Explainer

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Explainer #3: The First Person Project could be the future of online identity

Oct 10, 2025

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10 min read

Explainer #3: The First Person Project could be the future of online identity

A new project with a long pedigree promises to put trust at the center of the Internet. I attempt to summarize their epic 80-page white paper in one post.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Google

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Private, community, public: online identity should not be one size fits all

Oct 3, 2025

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8 min read

Private, community, public: online identity should not be one size fits all

Today’s platforms don’t give us enough choice and control over expressing, or requiring, identity in different situations. Based on work of colleagues at Google, I propose a matrix of options to start a more nuanced discussion.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Privacy

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There is no online safety without anonymity

Sep 26, 2025

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10 min read

There is no online safety without anonymity

Last week, I said we need real-world identity online. This week, I rebut myself. Nobody said this Internet thing was going to be easy.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Identity

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If an account is not a person, then you don’t have to treat it with respect

Sep 19, 2025

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8 min read

If an account is not a person, then you don’t have to treat it with respect

Free, anonymous online accounts let bad guys proliferate and platforms pretend we are disposable. Real-world identity requirements could help us reclaim our digital selves.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Identity

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Can we protect the Internet without revealing our real-world identities?

Sep 12, 2025

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9 min read

Can we protect the Internet without revealing our real-world identities?

Free, anonymous online accounts are a cornerstone of the Internet. Fraud and child safety fears are putting that principle to the test.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Identity

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Account Terminations Are Easy, But Unjust

Sep 5, 2025

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9 min read

Account Terminations Are Easy, But Unjust

Violate a policy, lose your account. Simple, right? A tactic born to handle mass fraud has ended up hurting real people who are dependent on platforms for community and storage.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Ad Tech

Summer Field Trip 3: Of Platforms And People

Aug 29, 2025

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10 min read

Summer Field Trip 3: Of Platforms And People

It’s the super-sized finale of our trilogy: everything gets bigger, true motives are revealed, and hope returns to the galaxy.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Ad Tech

Summer Field Trip 2: Publishers and Middlemen (The Dark Middle Episode)

Aug 22, 2025

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8 min read

Summer Field Trip 2: Publishers and Middlemen (The Dark Middle Episode)

How the rise of the Internet unleashed sharks, short-term thinking, and shady practices.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Ad Tech

Summer Field Trip Part 1: Sell-Side Superhero Spectacular

Aug 15, 2025

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6 min read

Summer Field Trip Part 1: Sell-Side Superhero Spectacular

Join me for an IMAX-sized epic of online advertising. Perverse incentives! Corporate culture clashes! Ad blockers! It’s all here, for three weeks only.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Explainer

Five classic business books about tech failures to read after you finish “Yield”

Aug 8, 2025

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7 min read

Five classic business books about tech failures to read after you finish “Yield”

Get your schadenfreude fix (and some useful insights) from the blunders of a previous generation of tech leaders.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Ad Tech

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Bonus issue: I’m in a book! "Yield" by Ari Paparo, about Google’s ad business

Aug 6, 2025

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6 min read

Bonus issue: I’m in a book! "Yield" by Ari Paparo, about Google’s ad business

From Project Wolf to the “spaghetti football,” Ari tells a gripping story previously known only to insiders. Plus jokes!

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Trust & Safety

Thoughts on Casey Newton and TrustCon: corporate incentives, conflating bad and illegal

Aug 1, 2025

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7 min read

Thoughts on Casey Newton and TrustCon: corporate incentives, conflating bad and illegal

Casey Newton of Platformer wrote about TrustCon and got a lot of feedback. I am adding two things that I think the conversation missed.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Children

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Why Is Every Parent I Know Frustrated With Parental Controls?

Jul 25, 2025

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9 min read

Why Is Every Parent I Know Frustrated With Parental Controls?

Platforms offer us features, but we actually need context and customization. Believe it or not, AI could help. Call it Vibe Parenting.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Explainer

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Explainer #2: Guardianship Is Why Tech Execs Think They Are Uniquely Qualified To Protect Communities

Jul 18, 2025

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8 min read

Explainer #2: Guardianship Is Why Tech Execs Think They Are Uniquely Qualified To Protect Communities

Two millennia ago, Plato called them “philosopher-kings.” Today, we call them “global heads of platform safety.” They are still not a good idea.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Privacy

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Unchecked Surveillance In The Name Of Safety Is Dangerous

Jul 11, 2025

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6 min read

Unchecked Surveillance In The Name Of Safety Is Dangerous

Online policing could be corrupted and we’d never know.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Ad Tech

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Reader Mailbag #1: A Role For Blockchain? Plus Ad Fraud Debate And The Small Platform Struggle

Jun 27, 2025

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7 min read

Reader Mailbag #1: A Role For Blockchain? Plus Ad Fraud Debate And The Small Platform Struggle

Current and former luminaries from Harvard, ROOST, and the ad tech world weigh in on my first few weeks.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Explainer

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Explainer #1: “Implicit Feudalism” is why online communities feel like warring kingdoms

Jun 20, 2025

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6 min read

Explainer #1: “Implicit Feudalism” is why online communities feel like warring kingdoms

Ideas from the dial-up era are holding us back today. We can do better.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Ad Tech

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Cannes Special: How Google’s Ad Spam Secrecy Alienated A Generation Of Creators

Jun 13, 2025

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8 min read

Cannes Special: How Google’s Ad Spam Secrecy Alienated A Generation Of Creators

In its prime, AdSense could give you financial freedom — if you could survive the spam police.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack

Trust & Safety

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Bluesky trust and safety is too important to be left to Bluesky

Jun 6, 2025

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11 min read

Bluesky trust and safety is too important to be left to Bluesky

Bluesky is open about almost everything, except setting and enforcing their community guidelines. They have an opportunity to lead the Internet forward with a democratic alternative.

Jonathan Bellack
Jonathan Bellack
Load more

How tech companies became unelected governments and what to do about it, as told by a former Google executive.

© 2025 Jonathan Bellack.

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