Capital, capitalism, assuming you own an iPhone, any smartphone, assume you have Wi-Fi at the house or a 4G or 5G connectivity thing, assuming that you have a car an automobile etc.; and also, assuming that you don’t grow your own vegetables and groceries etc., then what that then means is you are a part of society and capitalism.
Don’t be a hippie 
I think I figured it out… The notion of being a “hipster”, essentially it’s just a hyphenated form of saying hippies or hippy–
Funny enough, studying a bit of the etymology of the word hippie, comes from the word hip, like same hip as in hip hip-hop. Although now, we think of that weirdos vegan cults flower worshiping and war hippies and the like, not the gangsta hip-hop rappers that we think of today.
And actually what is very interesting, considering I was born in 1988, and grew up in the East Bay Alameda Oakland, Bay Area 510 rap hip-hop KEAK DA SNEAK, E40 hyphy movement ,,, my flavor of hip-hop and rap culture that I grew up was very different than the strange hip-hop culture today, and also a bit different from the mainstream 50 Cent gangsta idea that was popularized in the 2000s.
Anyways, I think what is so fascinating to me about capital, digital capital, digital capitalism and the like is how insanely paradigm shift it is.
Why?
So the first question is… Why or why does this all matter?
First, assuming you’re a photographer, digital photographer etc.; what that then means is you and all of us we are all implicated! And I think this is a good thing; digital is good, digital is better!
For example, besides what all these virtue signaling hipsters say, I really do think that digital photography is 1 trillion times superior and now more virtuous than film. I think film was a good fling, but now in the year 2024… And now that the new Lumix S9 Camera is out with the phenomenal 26 mm F8 pancake lens, there’s almost 0 reasons to shoot film anymore. And zero reasons to shoot any loser Leica camera.
Your opinion will change with technology and the times 
Technology does matter; for example, in the past, it did make a difference. For example the original Leica M9 camera was a big deal at the time because full frame was simply too big, too bulky, not very accessible. At least in a small form factor. But now, in the year 2024 and beyond… Technology has changed and shifted.
2024 — everything has changed!
For example, for a long time, film photography did indeed look superior to digital photos. But now with new digital technologies, I would actually make the bold claim that digital photos with the right image processing filters, can actually look superior and more supreme to film photos. 
For example, on the new Lumix S9 camera, we essentially have this “dynamic Leica monochrome” filter, with high contrast, grain added… the photos look phenomenal! Even deeper and richer contrast than my beloved Ricoh GR cameras?
Even a random thing that I never really expected… there’s this new “LUT” concept — I think it’s from cinema or video or something, which I think is just a fancy word for color preset or film grading for cinema and media.
Anyways, one of the built-in included LUT filters is like this really lovely cross processing color filter which shifts and brings out this really lovely orange cyan hue — the photos look beautiful! And also, when shooting 24 FPS video on it, it looks so beautiful and cinematic! I call the new Lumix S9 baby Godzilla!
Digital is supreme
Anyways, some reasons why I think this matters and why I care; the big one is I think we should lean really really hard into digital, the digital aesthetic the digital concept etc. I think there is too much pain misery and suffering in the world of photography and especially, digital photography. Everyone is having this weird small man complex, in which they and we never feel good enough in anything, until they somehow get some really really expensive mythical camera? And this is ridiculous because not only is it not sustainable, financially it is ridiculous.
Let us consider that honestly at this point a Leica camera is just like a Panasonic LUMIX camera with a body kit. Kind of like how a Porsche 911 is just like a Volkswagen beetle on steroids! Or even, how a Lamborghini is essentially a Volkswagen Passat on steroids!
Think different, become different, become superior?!
Why driving is bad for your soul
In America, the weird bias is somehow we have all been suckered into thinking that for some reason or another, it is desirable and good to desire own and drive, and experience forms of cars?
For example, whether that be a Lamborghini with scissor doors or a Porsche 911 GT 3RS or whatever, why is it that we desire these things?
The other day I actually had to drive to downtown late last night, to pick up Cindy, and it was probably one of the stupidest decisions that I made, me, thinking my machismo bravado was doing a good thing, in fact, was a really really dumb idea. Why? I have been driven at night for so long, but it was so tiring, so exhausting, and actually I forgot… Driving at night is actually really really hard on the eyes. You can’t see shit, in about after driving 40 minutes there, and a speedy 15 minutes back, leaving at 7 PM and coming back at 8 PM… I was destroyed and so exhausted.
I think it was a good reminder to me, perhaps a nice wake up call because so much of American consumerist capitalist culture is centered around all of these ridiculous notions of sitting on your butt. Let us consider how much the ultimate desire is to somehow be sitting, sedentary? 
For example, it doesn’t matter if you’re driving $1 million Bugatti car or whatever, as long as you’re in a position, you are in a fragile, undo dominant position. Doesn’t matter if you’re in a Lamborghini or Rolls-Royce Pagani etc.… It’s like you’re sitting on a big dick.
 I wonder if there are more studies on this, just how terrible and bad that your physiology and body becomes when you are forced to sit all day, or even, stand all day in a secondary position, indoors, under fluorescent or LED lights, without exposure to the real worlds, the direct UV suns of outside, etc.?
Even a nice thing in Southeast Asia if they have a lot of these Eco resorts which you could just take a shower or a bath in a bathtub outside in the direct elements?
A random aside; I met the neighborhood kids who got a chameleon as a pet. He discovered it somewhere. He told me that actually, the chameleon changes colors in the direct sun outside in the direct UV radiation of natural light, but it doesn’t work with fake lights.
Even assuming that you had the world‘s best fake UV sunlight set up thing… It might only ever be 2% as good as the real sun.
In fact one of the things I’m trying to fight against is how everyone has sun phobia or UV phobia now. Certainly if your genetic heritage is from northern Sweden, to be in the direct Vegas sun all day without any hats or long sleeve clothing or sunblock seems like a bad idea. Everyone is so afraid of some cancer skin cancer or whatever. But I’m wondering… How much of this is for marketing, to sell you overpriced “eco-friendly“ $30 sunblock or loser “UV protection” sunglasses– Luxor exotica essentially owns all of the sunglasses brands in America and beyond; they have a real monopoly overall the sunglasses, it doesn’t matter how cool you want to look, I’m sure they all get made in the same factory and mean in China for about $.50, and they market up to $300! Everyone wants to seem cool and look cool, all under the guys that they want to protect their eyeballs from the sun.
I think we’re wearing a hat is natural, a wide brim hat, a sun hat, maybe even a sombrero. But not sunglasses, this is very unnatural. It is almost like having condoms for your eyeballs, not natural. Same thing with AirPods or noise canceling headphones, essentially condoms for your ears. And this is bad because I actually think that you have more wisdom and sensory perception in your ears Than your eyeballs, even though I am a photographer and a visual artist, in terms of joy, I think I might get 1000 X more joy from music than visual artwork. And I also think that there is 10,000 times more in intelligence and wisdom in your ears than your eyes.
In terms of evolution, I think actually most organisms first develop years and hearing before eyes or visual senses?
The digital transformation of capital and the economy
I think this is what is so difficult for people to understand and grasp, even scientist who are supposed to think first principles. Rather than think about analogies, like how things were done in the past, and trying to iterate based on the past, much more interesting to Start with the clean slate, from scratch, thinking and trying to consider how things could and should be, rather than how things always have been.
I think this is difficult for most basic people because once again, to think first principles is both gutsy, ballsy, unorthodox, unconventional, and also requires some sort of childlike mindset, in which you are not held back by the past.
For example, the reason why you should trust no traditional thinkers, or why a lot of college dropouts are so successful, like Mark Zuckerberg is that they knew that the traditional path was not as interesting or meaningful; and that instead,  they would be able to change the course of the human race by not being stuck in some sort of academic hamster wheel.
In fact, there is a story about Peter Thiel in which he was on track to become some sort of big shot judge or something somewhere, but eventually he didn’t make it, at first although he was dismayed, 20 years later when his law school buddy met him he said “with a grin, aren’t you happy you didn’t get that clerkship? Because otherwise he wouldn’t have started PayPal and wouldn’t be the billionaire today.
everything happens as it should have happened
I think this is also a difficult thing to consider; certainly there are lots of bad things that happen in our life, but with enough foresight in hindsight, plus or minus 30 years,  you discover that actually, everything precisely happened as it should have happened, precisely for the best reason possible.
I don’t think of this like some sort of weird mystical woo hoo, I just think of it more like a practical thing; things happen, sometimes randomly, and the best way to live life is to take a stomach and optimistic approach;
Is it possible that this “bad” thing that happened to me today, could have actually have been the best possible thing that ever befell me? 
For example, there is this one Taoist story in which a man has a son, who was riding horse, fell off, and broke his legs or back or something. It was seen as very bad and unfortunate. But a week later, the province declares war on a different territory, and because the sun was injured, didn’t get drafted in the war, and as a consequence, doesn’t get killed in the combat. Then later, one of the village chief remarks, “aren’t you so happy that your son ended up injuring himself by falling off that horse, so he didn’t go to war and died?”
No I think this is a hard thing, because nobody could think about the future, nobody knows.
So whenever things happen, whether they’re good or bad, or even weather good; know that things happen, and the best way forward is to take everything in the positive!
Even let us say that you won the lottery and became a billionaire or whatever, let us say as a consequence you get addicted to drugs meth cocaine heroin and prostitutes and strippers, and this destroys your life. Totally possible.
Wealth could be some of the worst things that happens to your family 
Not always but often I see a lot of kids for trust fund kids or aren’t you really wealthy families become degenerates, super lazy and unambitious.
Maybe one of my biggest benefits of being born and raised poor was actually, this was the biggest benefit of all time; — he gave me the fire for entrepreneurship and self-reliance; I am sure if I was born to a well to do middle class or rich family, I would probably be some sort of generic something else.