Analog-ish: Seeking low-tech ideas in a high-tech world

Third Spaces and Building Community Offline with Altagracia Montilla

In this episode, you'll hear from Altagracia Montilla, a visionary community architect, facilitator, and founder of the 7th Space Art Gallery and Wellness Center. Altagracia breaks down what third spaces actually are, and why they matter more than ever in our hyper-individualistic, screen-saturated culture. You'll explore the difference between a place and a space, why building community feels as scary as dating, and how to practice connection in small, low-stakes ways. From printing flyers in coffee shops to striking up conversations with strangers, Altagracia offers grounded, creative strategies for reclaiming in-person community and restoring your humanity, starting with yourself. Topics Covered: • What third spaces are and why they matter, Ray Oldenburg's definition and the key characteristics of true third spaces (free, come-and-go access, no social hierarchies) • Why our community-building skills were eroding long before 2020, and how American hyper-individualism makes it even harder • The difference between a "place" and a "space," and how intention transforms physical locations into sites of belonging • Why building community feels scary (hint: it's a lot like dating), including the risk of harm, rejection, and vulnerability • How to sustain third spaces financially without capitalist extraction, pay-what-you-can models, creative reciprocity, and trusting that generosity returns • Creating norms instead of rules, establishing a "spirit of culture" that invites people to relax, show up authentically, and share generously • Practical first steps for the community-rusty, striking up conversations with strangers, asking about someone's book, attending free library events, and printing flyers offline • Why restoring humanity starts with yourself, and the radical act of journaling to reconnect with your own humanity before seeking it in others Resources Mentioned: • 7th Space Art Gallery and Wellness Center [https://the7space.com/] • Freedom Readers Book Club [https://altagraciamontilla.com/freedom-readers/] Connect with Altagracia Montilla • Threads [https://www.threads.com/@alta_monti] • Website [https://altagraciamontilla.com/] 🎤 JOIN US IN THE FEMINIST PODCASTERS COLLECTIVE [http://feministpodcastcollective.com/]

Breaking Free from Always Being "On" with Jordan Maney

In this episode, you'll hear from Jordan Maney, the Radical Joy Coach, about how tech has fundamentally changed our relationship to rest and joy. Jordan helps people recovering from burnout use rest as a space to experiment with joyful living while transitioning into something kinder. You'll explore how social media shifted from an event to a constant presence, why scrolling puts your nervous system into survival mode instead of flow state, and what it means to reclaim your energy, attention, and time from platforms designed to keep you hooked. Jordan shares practical tools like social media office hours, the "look up" method for breaking scroll cycles, and her powerful definition of rest as an act of reclamation. This conversation is a permission slip to stop being constantly on. Topics Covered: * How social media evolved from an event (something you logged into intentionally) to a constant, exhausting presence that has fundamentally changed our relationship to rest * Why the fluctuation between cute dog videos and war footage on our feeds is traumatizing our nervous systems and keeping us in a perpetual state of survival mode * The myth of multitasking and how scrolling while doing other things actually prevents us from achieving flow states and genuine rest * Social media office hours: what they are, how they help manage capacity, and why setting external expectations protects your internal boundaries * The "look up" method — a simple embodied practice to interrupt the scroll cycle by literally lifting your eyes, breathing, and asking yourself what you're actually getting from being online * Why rest isn't boring or uncomfortable: Jordan's definition of rest as the energy, attention, and time you return to yourself, and how that reclamation can be joyful and generative * The attention economy and how platforms are systematically designed to rob us of our attention, making it crucial to bring intentionality to every interaction with tech * Why Germans disappear for the entire month of August and what we can learn from cultures that don't treat constant availability as a moral virtue * The difference between using social media as an event (intentional, time-boxed) versus a default coping mechanism for boredom, mood shifts, or avoidance Connect with Jordan Maney: * RestLab Report on Substack [https://jordanmaney.substack.com/] * Instagram * LinkedIn * YouTube: @theJordanManey 🎤 JOIN US IN THE FEMINIST PODCASTERS COLLECTIVE: http://feministpodcastcollective.com/ [http://feministpodcastcollective.com/]

Why I'm Quitting AI for a Year: Dr. Amelia Hruby

In this episode, you'll hear from Dr. Amelia Hruby—author of Your Attention is Sacred, host of Off the Grid, and founder of Softer Sounds—about her decision to take a full year off from using generative AI chatbots like ChatGPT and Claude. Amelia shares what prompted her "GPT sobriety," how it's reshaping her relationship with creativity and skill-building, and why the pressure to use AI is actually the result of a massive marketing campaign designed to make us feel left behind. You'll also hear her honest take on harm reduction, why choosing intentional friction matters, and how to resist the pull of tools that promise efficiency but deliver erosion. If you've been wondering whether you have to use AI to keep up—or if there's another way forward—this conversation is for you. Topics Covered: * Why Amelia decided to take a full year off from generative AI tools like ChatGPT and Claude, and what "GPT sobriety" actually means in practice * The parallel between leaving social media five years ago and stepping away from AI now—and why both decisions required confronting the fear of being "left behind" * How the pressure to adopt AI is not organic but the result of billions of dollars in marketing campaigns from companies like OpenAI and Anthropic * The cognitive and creative costs of outsourcing tasks to AI, including skill erosion and the loss of the ability to think through problems independently * Why AI feels different from other productivity tools: it's designed to replace human thought, not assist it * The labor, environmental, and data privacy harms embedded in mainstream AI tools—and why those harms matter even if we're not directly seeing them * What harm reduction looks like when you do choose to use AI: setting boundaries, choosing less harmful tools, and staying intentional about where and how you use it * Alternatives to ChatGPT and other extractive AI platforms, including open-source and nonprofit-driven tools * How stepping away from AI has made Amelia more creative, not less—and why reclaiming friction is an act of resistance * Why intentionality matters more than perfection: you don't have to be "sober" to make better choices about your relationship with AI Resources Mentioned: * Your Attention is Sacred by Dr. Amelia Hruby [https://amzn.to/3OHEl22] * Mel Mitchell Jackson [https://melmitchelljackson.com/] * Amelia's list of ChatGPT and Gemini alternatives [https://cutoffthespigot.substack.com/p/de-google-series-part-1-search-and] Connect with Amelia Hruby: * AmeliaHruby.com [https://www.ameliahruby.com/] * Off the Grid: Leaving Social Media podcast [https://offthegrid.fun/] 🎤 JOIN US IN THE FEMINIST PODCASTERS COLLECTIVE [http://feministpodcastcollective.com/]

Mikki Kendall: When Your Voice Becomes a Weapon (And That Changes Everything)

In this episode, you'll hear from Mikki Kendall, author of Hood Feminism, about what happens when being online stops being casual and starts being work. Mikki shares how public visibility changed her relationship with social media—from casual check-ins with friends to weighing every word for potential backlash, death threats, and AI companies stealing her work. You'll hear about the real costs of parasocial relationships, why she had to stop playing a phone game she loved, and how her kids' lives changed when strangers started showing up at their school. This is a raw, urgent conversation about the collapse of privacy, the weaponization of AI, and why slowing down—and sometimes logging off—is an act of self-preservation. Topics Covered: * How becoming a public figure transforms your relationship with social media—from personal expression to calculated risk assessment * The hidden labor of managing parasocial relationships: when strangers think they know you well enough to comment on your food, your health, and your body * Why Mikki stopped playing the location-based game Ingress after a stranger tracked her to her child's school playground * How AI companies like Grammarly and Anthropic used Mikki's name and work without consent—and what it's like to sue over plagiarism by machine * The emotional and practical toll of death threats, online harassment, and having to renegotiate friendships around safety protocols * Why Mikki believes we'll see the death of social media before we see it fixed—and what that means for how we engage now * The dangerous mythology of "tech bros know best" and why AI is replicating—not solving—systemic racism and misogyny * How speculative fiction and Afrofuturism (Octavia Butler, N.K. Jemisin) help us see the futures we're building—and the ones we can still refuse * Why white women (and all people with privilege) need to stop trusting the right, the center, and even the left without accountability * The apocalypse has already happened—to Indigenous people, to survivors of the Transatlantic slave trade—and what that teaches us about collapse, resistance, and survival Resources Mentioned: * Hood Feminism by Mikki Kendall [https://amzn.to/4sTM8I9] * Positive Obsession by Susanna Morris [https://amzn.to/3QXAlLm] Connect with Mikki Kendall: * Website [https://mikkikendall.com/] * Threads [https://www.threads.com/@karnythia] 🎤 JOIN US IN THE FEMINIST PODCASTERS COLLECTIVE  [http://feministpodcastcollective.com/]

Trailer: Why I Made a Podcast About Being Human

Welcome to Analogish, a weekly podcast for people who are tired of being optimized. Hosted by Becky Mollenkamp, this show explores what it means to stay human in a high-tech world that profits from your exhaustion.  In this trailer, Becky shares why she started the podcast. What broke inside her when generative AI arrived and demanded even more content, faster, forever. She introduces the kinds of conversations you'll hear: writers leaving social media, makers building with analog tools, activists treating rest as political resistance, and everyday people figuring out how to show up online without losing themselves.  This isn't about going off the grid. It's about asking better questions: What are we trading away when we move everything online? And how do we get it back? If you're burned out, skeptical of big tech, or just miss what it felt like to be bored and unsupervised, this show is for you.