101. The Internet Still Delivers Massive Public Good – Tech Field Day Podcast

The Internet is often characterized as full of cat pictures and manipulative social media, yet the Internet is home to thousands of websites and communities that deliver massive public benefit. This episode of the Tech Field Day podcast features Denny Cherry, Lino Telera, Shala Warner, and Alastair Cooke, who all took part in Cloud Field Day in Santa Clara. The discussion highlights two key non-commercial organizations: the Internet Archive and SETI. The Internet Archive does monumental work in preserving digital and human culture, including a trillion web pages and physical books, funded by large and small community donations and distributed globally to build resilience against censorship and ensure accessibility. SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) is explored from its early distributed computing efforts with SETI@home to its current use of advanced AI and powerful GPUs to process terabits of radio telescope data and explore laser communication, also touching on citizen science initiatives like crowdsourced “All-Sky Camera” projects. Ultimately, the panel celebrates how the internet continues to enable significant advancements in scientific research, cultural preservation, and community building, emphasizing its ongoing potential for positive global impact.