Ryan Hagemann

Ryan Hagemann is the technology and civil liberties policy analyst for the Niskanen Center, a libertarian issue advocacy organization. He also serves as an adjunct fellow with TechFreedom, a libertarian think tank focused on technology issues.

Articles

Enterprise

The Hyperloop cometh

If you’re a resident of California, a new mode of transportation could soon be changing the way you think about getting around. The hyperloop is a pneumatic tube system that transport passengers in pods at sonic speeds approaching 800 mph using magnetic levitation. Elon Musk, who originally proposed the hyperloop concept as a crowdfunding campaign […]

Enterprise

The future of transportation: autonomous, electric, and looped

In a classic op-ed, “Why Software Is Eating the World,” Marc Andreessen argued “that we are in the middle of a dramatic and broad technological and economic shift in which software companies are poised to take over large swathes of the economy.” From service and retail to manufacturing and the public sector, innovation in software […]

zExcludeUK

America: Embracing the fertile verge of progress

We live in an age of miracles. Autonomous vehicles, commercial drones, nano-medicinal drug delivery systems, gene therapy, quantum leaps in microprocessor technology, and the ubiquitous and nigh-uncontrollable flow of information are just a few of the changes that are beginning to upend our way of life. Disruptive technological change is rapidly re-creating a world that […]

Enterprise

Free the skies for commercial drones

Around the world, the number of registered commercial drone operators is rapidly increasing. Unfortunately, few of them are in the United States thanks to an outdated and taxing regulatory scheme that has failed to keep pace with technological innovation. The biggest impediment for a wider and more robust commercial drone, or unmanned aerial systems/vehicles (UAS/UAV), […]

Ownership

Encryption: the Internet user’s friend and the government’s illusory bogeyman

Earlier this year UK Prime Minister David Cameron said, “[t]he question is are we going to allow a means of communications which it simply isn’t possible to read. My answer to that question is: no, we must not.” Cameron’s comments follow on the heels of an ongoing debate in Western nations focusing on a perceived […]

Energy & Environment

How software will make us healthy, wealthy, and wise

In his seminal editorial masterpiece Software is Eating the World, venture capitalist and tech entrepreneur Marc Andreessen makes the point that software is quickly penetrating, and disrupting, broad swaths of the global economy. Everything from agriculture to online government is beginning to see benefits from the application of software development. The world is now, more […]

Enterprise

Future imperfect: why we must not fear innovation or the unknown

Scarcely a day passes by without one hearing of a new techno-bogeyman lurking in the wings, waiting to tear apart the fragile fabric of society. From anti-tech doomsayers like Evgeny Morozov to the less nuanced, more rapacious talking heads on nightly news, it appears as though techno-pessimism grips every facet of our lives. We are […]