Letter from the Founder & CEO

We believe that one of the greatest truisms is “Knowledge is power”. It’s one of the reasons why one of the birthplaces of the Enlightenment were 18^th century coffee houses; they promoted the free flow of ideas and debate. Alexandria Technologies focuses on creating a community around books and podcasts that uses your data to empower YOU, not exploit your attention. My goal as CEO is to earn your trust by outlining how we’re going to create a different digital community together.

The Problem

As big tech companies, like Meta (formerly Facebook) or Amazon, have integrated into society, some of them have leveraged their platforms to collect knowledge about individual behavior, mainly to sell space for ads. In return for this intimate, personal knowledge and attention, they’ve made it easier to connect us with loved ones, help us discover fascinating things about the world, and promote digital communities through “engagement”. Thus the attention economy was born.

Unfortunately, this engagement has downsides. For example, it often creates self-righteous tribes that promote fear, misinformation, and anger. As was reported last year, using an attention-driven model that only values engagement results in platforms that are toxic to young people, women, and other groups. These issues have penetrated down into society in a variety of ways, like being shown to lead to a 2% increase in depressive symptoms in teens for every hour they spent using social media. As these consequences collide, society’s ability to understand the story it’s telling itself breaks down. This is dangerous because stories are how humans and society create and pass knowledge down.

Creating a better option

Tech giants and their services are neither good nor bad by virtue; what’s important is how they’re used. Alexandria Technologies and similar companies can reject this trend of engagement for profit and instead focus on creating value by using tech and data to empower their customers by promoting principles that align to humane values.

I believe companies should have a set of humane guiding principles to which they should be held accountable. They can either follow guidelines that others have set out (e.g. Center for Humane Technology, The Integrity Institute, etc.), or use them as examples to create their own. By making more thoughtful decisions regarding their guiding principles, companies can release the untapped potential of what technology can achieve. Alexandria Technologies is going to do just that.

Let’s look at what some of the untapped potential might be if we were to use the framework set forth by the Center for Humane Technology. Two of the focuses provided by the framework include “Helping People Thrive” and “Respect Human Nature”. Instead of using technological knowledge to ping people’s brains like their gambling addicts, companies could create technologies that encourage people’s ability to explore their curiosities and questions. Companies could respect the nuances of human biology and create technologies that augment people’s ability to understand and be compassionate with one another while still allowing plenty of room for disagreement. By following these types of frameworks, companies could create technologies that drastically improve people’s ability to grasp the knowledge and goals they seek. These are the waters Alexandria Technologies wants to play in.

Goals & Accountability

Our goals at Alexandria Technologies are:

• To create a space that empowers people to determine what stories to pursue
• To create technologies that enhance people’s ability to understand what they discover
• To create an environment that encourages people’s inclination to positive exchange

We’re looking to bring the idea of the 18^th century coffee house into the 21^st century and beyond.

However, it’s one thing to say that the company being built will follow the principles of humane tech, it’s another to follow through. This is why we’re combining a set of tactics to tie us to the mast of our guiding principles.

1. We’ll be following the footsteps of other companies by having our own legally binding guiding principles by being a Public Benefit Corporation.
2. We’ll support ourselves by building on a business model that doesn’t rely on mining attention for profit, but instead by mainly selling books and audiobooks.

One of the reasons we’re focused on books is that I’ve been a book worm since as far back as I can remember. The other is that books are tools that help with the transfer of knowledge. They provide stories for people, something that humans have been sharing with one another for thousands upon thousands of years. We’re willing to bet that’s a trend that’ll continue. That’s why with these bindings, we will avoid the siren call of the attention economy.

In an era where data is valued higher than oil, we must be considerate of the knowledge that companies possess. By avoiding the attention economy path, Alexandria Technologies has the freedom to create new types of tools and communities that serve you.

Please, join our waitlist to be notified of updates as we build out a platform that can strengthen your abilities around books, podcasts, and the knowledge they can provide.

We look forward to gaining your trust!

Xavier A. Hayeck

Founder & CEO