Hello. It’s summer 2026.
⭕ My name is Finn Brunton. I’m a professor at UC Davis, where I teach in Science and Technology Studies and Cinema and Digital Media. I work on the history of networked computing and digital communication, with a focus on the role of utopian and speculative ideas in technology design.
⭕ This summer I’m in residence on Governors Island in New York City with the Institute for Public Architecture. I’m currently working on a book about simulationism and the dead internet, a book of historical essays about death and survival, and a utopian history of collective buildings. I’m represented by the Brockman Agency.
⭕ My professional interests include internet architecture and protocol, cryptography and cryptocurrency, the history of telecommunications, alternative networks, hypertext and early digital media, and the history of artificial intelligence; I also spend a lot of time with interesting technological subcultures—Extropians, rationalists, transhumanists, cosmists, agorists, accelerationists, and others.
⭕ I’ve written two books — Digital Cash and Spam — and cowritten Communication (with Mercedes Bunz and Paula Bialski) and Obfuscation (with Helen Nissenbaum). My most recent paper, The Financial Millennium, is about an apocalyptic crypto cult. I also wrote a recent essay about cryptocurrency and the Trump administration for the New York Times. Many of my papers are available to download, as is my CV.
⭕ You can email me at f at finnb dot net.
⭕ In my personal time I am a passionate advocate for decentralized and federated networks; shadow libraries and solar servers; strong cryptography and privacy; co-ops, mutual aid networks, community organizing, and direct democracy; bodily autonomy and self-determination; home canning, preserving, and fermentation; powerlifting and kettlebells; the longevity of simple tools; and the Miyawaki Method of reforestation. I have a lifelong fascination with string figures, knots, mnemonics, and storytelling.
❤️ Lina Bo Bardi. Steve Martland. Cornelius Castoriadis. Enzo Mari. Anna Kavan. Plutarch. Georges Hébert. Annie Dillard. Isak Dinesen. BIG|BRAVE. Johan Grimonprez. Tolstoy. Dostoyevsky (Demons!). Osip Mandelstam. Lydia Davis. Marcel Schwob. RAGANA. Herodotus. Kristin Hayter/Lingua Ignota. Aldo van Eyck’s playgrounds. Nina Simone. Eladio Dieste. Spinoza. Charlotte Perriand. Bolt Thrower. R.B. Kitaj. Cannonball Adderley.
(these are all stories I’m going to get around to telling one day)
John Cage’s sesame rice: For 4 cups hot cooked brown rice, sauté 2 tablespoons of cashews or more in 4 tablespoons of oil (sesame) and 1 cup sesame seeds. Continue until seeds are golden. Add 1 teaspoon sea salt. Mix with rice.
散るをいとふ世にも人にもさきがけて 散るこそ花と吹く小夜嵐