banner
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg
@melgregg.bsky.social
270 followers 180 following 120 posts
Sustainability advisor and Professor of Digital Futures at University of Bristol. Writing about low carbon computing and other ecological urgencies. https://melgregg.com
melgregg.com
Posts Media Videos Starter Packs
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · 18h
The full program for today's event run by Chips Communities United, right in the middle of SemiCon West. Fascinating convergence of interests in AZ: www.eventbrite.com/e/the-semico...
The Semiconductor Con: The Dark Side of the Chip
A one-day conference on the semiconductor industry's impact on the environment and workers and how we can organize so it benefits all of us.
www.eventbrite.com
1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · 1d
Giving a talk today on the economic and ecological colonisation that continues to define Silicon Forest, inspired very much by the work of local Hillsboro archivists and historians who are trying to stave off environmental amnesia. www.youtube.com/watch?v=OR_F...
Remembering the Nez Perce Stories of Resilience and Heritage - A Dedication By Silas Whitman
YouTube video by Dirk Knudsen
www.youtube.com
1
Reposted by Melissa Gregg
rcecoleman.bsky.social
Rebecca Coleman @rcecoleman.bsky.social · 2d
A reminder that this is happening online on Wednesday. More info and registration below
rcecoleman.bsky.social
Rebecca Coleman @rcecoleman.bsky.social · Jun 4
Online seminar in October, organised by Newcastle Youth Studies Centre, Australia - info and sign up here! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-materi...
The Materialities of Inequality: Mould, Acid and Glitter
How Stuff Matters
www.eventbrite.co.uk
1 3
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · 5d
If I were a female cochineal right now, I would be quite worried www.marketplace.org/story/2025/1...
Walmart's removal of synthetic dyes could ripple through the food supply chain
Walmart says 90% of products from in-store brands are already free of these additives. But even a 10% change for a retailer as massive as Walmart can have a big effect on the industry
www.marketplace.org
4
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · 15d
Even now that we can apparently have superhuman co-workers, they still have to be advertised with attractive women www.agaton.ai
Agaton | AI-powered sales superiority
Agaton builds secure, domain-specific AI agents for sales teams introducing superhuman co-workers that help companies win.
www.agaton.ai
1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · 15d
Another landmark in alienation as data eats the world: "Aalo’s approach reimagines the whole nuclear facility—reactors, turbine, containment, and balance-of-plant—as a single modular product built off-site." newsletter.mcj.vc/p/aalo-inves...
MCJ's Investment in Aalo
Extra-modular nuclear reactors for data centers
newsletter.mcj.vc
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · 26d
The robots are still far too creepy youtu.be/cru2bkqwSYk?...
Silicon Valley’s Doing Hard Things Again
YouTube video by Asianometry
youtu.be
1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Sep 2
I forgot about this
A paragraph from the Miya Tokumitsu book “Love What You Do” describing furniture from the TV show The Good Wife
1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Sep 2
I just re-read those opening pages as I move libraries again. It's so good. I still haven't figured out the way to write about my original home, it is going to be painful. Currently writing about the most recent one first (Oregon) since Silicon Forest could well be over
1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 27
In Hillsboro OR data centres are demolishing the past and the future youtu.be/m3NeM0SELVA?...
Everyone Was FORCED to Leave - How This Oregon Town was ERASED for Internet Ground Zero
YouTube video by Stringer media
youtu.be
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 27
Next time I'd like a time lapse video over the TSMC and Intel plants that are located in this region. Because that's where we're putting the infrastructure that runs the global economy www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCYu...
Monsoon and dust storm leaves thousands without power in Arizona
YouTube video by ABC News
www.youtube.com
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 26
10/ “Steve used to always tell the groups, ‘This will be the high point of your life,’ and I was thinking, God, I hope not, right? Because that’s really a sad way to think.” To this day, I still hear tech execs saying this to employees to encourage long hours and peak performance.
1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 26
9/ I did appreciate the comments by Jon Rubinstein from a CHM interview: “A lot of people got sick at Apple. The list goes on and on of people who got terminally ill or really ill…and I worried that if I stayed, I’d end up damaging myself, and my health was, frankly, more important.”
1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 26
8/ "At the end of each shift, men from the small, traditional Muslim community would park their vehicles outside and shine their high beams at the factory. It was an unnerving practice, meant to ensure the factory girls came home rather than stay out late camping around with the Californians."
1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 26
7/ "...with their small hands they would thread all the wires through the four metal parts of the gooseneck. It took eight to ten minutes per neck, a terribly inefficient process." 🙄
1 1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 26
6/ To create one desktop computer design inspired by the sunflowers planted by Laurene Powell Jobs, "extension metal components were assembled in a VCR factory on a palm oil plantation in Malaysia. Inside, young women would form three to four assembly lines, with around twenty people on each"
1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 26
5/ Beyond all the workaholic bravado (multiple "mystery" cancers, dedicated United flights to Hangzhou, 5am gym sessions with the boss, spousal trips to accompany endless 7 day work weeks, the need for 2 PAs per day to keep pace with maniacal execs) there are further awful workplace stories:
1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 26
4/ "When Apple first hit the $3 trillion valuation in January 2022, it meant Apple’s market value had grown by more than $700 million a day from when Cook took over in August 2011."
1 1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 26
3/ "Gou got in on the ground floor and created a name for himself making reliable sockets and connectors–small components that facilitate communication between different parts of a computer. The conn in Foxconn–Hon Hai’s international name–refers to connectors. 'Fox' is just an animal he likes"
1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 26
2/ "By 2012 the value of Apple-owned machinery in China had soared to $7.3 billion - more than Apple’s US buildings and retail stores put together. Apple had essentially cracked the code on how to manufacture the world’s best products without doing any of the manufacturing itself"
1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 26
Some notes from Patrick McGee's Apple in China:
1/ "The meeting of the minds between Steve Jobs and Jony Ive had made Apple products unique, but it was Terry Gou and Tim Cook who would ensure they were ubiquitous."
1 1 1
Reposted by Melissa Gregg
melinabuns.bsky.social
Melina Antonia Buns @melinabuns.bsky.social · Aug 21
excited to share the call for the workshop

EXTRACTIVE NATURES / NATURES OF EXTRACTION

happening at @uobrisceh.bsky.social on 6-7 Nov 2025,

made possible by the @britishacademy.bsky.social

deadline: 10 September!

full call below ⤵

#envhist #envhum
URL and ALT text to follow.
3 64 77
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 21
Silicon Forest continuing a long tradition of removing forest. youtu.be/fEmPYtx6bJw
Trammel Crow and City of Hillsboro Shut Major Access To Hillsboro In 2025 - Is this Unprecedented?
YouTube video by HillsboroHerald
youtu.be
1 1
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 15
but we should seek to achieve the same objective as that of foreign high-technology programs… without direct government intervention in the free-market process” - Robert Noyce, 1981
melgregg.bsky.social
Melissa Gregg @melgregg.bsky.social · Aug 15
"The American response to… aggressive foreign development programs should not be to emulate the policies and practices of our trading partners…
1