What tech gets wrong about taste

A take on all the takes

Beeple, mommy (Detail of Everydays, April 30, 2026), 2026. From Le Random: “Ruby Justice Thelot describes the emergence of machinic taste, a phenomenon where digital content is increasingly shaped by non-human preferences rather than human desire.”

We’ve reached peak taste discourse¹ with millions being invested to systematize the inherently ephemeral. AI labs are now trying to teach machines to have taste, and pseudo-thought leadership AI slop on the topic is proliferating from corporate NPCs everywhere.

It’s probably not going to work, because what makes taste is a distinctly human drive: to do things for enjoyment, or to solve the very human problem of existence being boring and lonely. We need to fill our time with curiosity and discovery to make life worth living. We don’t do it to create value for the shareholders.

Taste is downstream of curiosity

We cultivate taste to avoid boredom and loneliness, as well as because it is inherently enjoyable as a pastime (curiosity, learning, desire).

The design consultancy FIELD.IO called taste our scarcest asset. Not true. Humans enjoy tastemaking so much that it is abundant in variety and availability, and a highly desired role to perform. People spend free time on online platforms and pay to use those platforms for this specific activity, from Pinterest to Are.na to Cosmos to, yes, Substack and Instagram. (The problem of algorithms coercing taste in particular directions is another matter.)

What the practice actually is

Celine Nguyen’s essay “research as leisure activity” describes a mode of inquiry that runs on curiosity rather than credentials. I believe this is where taste develops, and part of why it’s uniquely human.

Taste is the byproduct of sustained, undirected, pleasure-driven research — countless hours in a flow state just looking at things because you wanted to, asking why they work on you, and following the question wherever it goes. Taste develops in us because we feel feelings when you encounter a thing, and then we dig deeper to learn more about it, because that discovery and learning feels good.