Now look at consumers. The cynical or jaded explanation for Amazon’s huge success and Bezos’s immense wealth is that we are all becoming pampered shut-ins who love having dumb stuff shipped to our fat faces. Now, idiocracy is real, and we are happy to give away not only our most intimate personal information but surrender up all personal initiative to Amazon’s incentives, which become so complete and all-pervasive that they start to feel more like instincts.

There is also a feel-good, optimistic version of this dark dystopia. We are not ugly subhuman creatures who have foolishly allowed digital indignities to infest every aspect of our physical lives. From the sunnier view, we are really actualizing our humanity by pulling ourselves out of the alien world of online. We are creating a more healthful balance where the Internet is the guest and we are the hosts, not the other way around. In fact, using the Internet to perfect our personal projects of consumption, self-care, and membership creates a sustainable and rewarding foundation for peaceful, pro-social life.