About Arthur Morgan

I accidentally broke America. Now I'm writing a book about how we can fix it.

I have a confession to make. I spent three decades in Silicon Valley building the digital infrastructure that was supposed to liberate humanity. What I discovered instead was that I’d become a master of what Cory Doctorow calls “enshittification” — the art of creating products that seem good at first, but slowly decay as they extract ever more value from human attention.​

By 2016, I was experiencing a crisis of conscience. My daughter was struggling. Young people everywhere were drowning in social media addiction and despair. And I realized that the technology world had fundamentally failed at the one job that matters most: teaching young people how to become resilient, compassionate adults.​

It took another eight years to find the courage to escape from the Silicon Valley bubble, but at age sixty, with no job and nothing left to lose, I loaded my electric truck with a shotgun, my scruffy Spanish Water Dog, and a question that would obsess me for the next year: How did we lose our way in parenting? And can Americans still remember what it means to raise boys into men — and young people into citizens?​

What I discovered on my 8,500 mile journey across Trump Country, small-town America, and the heartland wasn’t what I expected. I didn’t find villains. I found something worse: a generation of young people so untethered from real-world experience, so addicted to screens, and so starved for genuine guidance that many couldn’t distinguish between their online identities and who they actually were.​
But I also found something hopeful: ordinary Americans who still understood that parenting is the most sacred responsibility we have — and that our national crisis isn’t a political one, it’s a parenting crisis.​

Travels With Paco is part travelogue, part confession, and part roadmap for reclaiming what makes us human in an age of algorithms. It’s a meditation on what we’ve lost, what we still have time to save, and how one man and his dog came to understand that the path to American redemption runs through our children.​

I live in the San Francisco Bay Area with my wife and two Spanish Water Dogs, but I now spend much of my time on the road, meeting with parents, educators, and young people about the future we’re building for the next generation.

— Arthur Morgan (“In Real Life”*)

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Miles travelled in Roci the Rivian with Paco
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States visited with Paco and Roci
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Years traveling with Paco
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Countries seen with Paco (*see FAQ)

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is Paco, and why the title "Travels With Paco?"

Paco is my beloved six-year-old Spanish Water Dog. The name “Travels With Paco” is inspired by one of my favorite books, Travels With Charley in Search of America, by John Steinbeck.  Steinbeck describes travels he took across America in his pickup truck, accompanied by his French Poodle named Charley. While I can’t match the literary genius of John Steinbeck, I do my best to honor his spirit of adventure by traveling with Paco in my electric pickup truck, a Rivian R1T, which I nicknamed “Rocinante 2.0” after Steinbeck’s truck. Steinbeck called his truck “Rocinante,” in a playful homage to Don Quixote’s trusty steed. If you like to explore new places and you haven’t yet read Travels With Charley, we highly recommend it!

* Why do you put "real-life version" and "IRL" after your name?

Starting in late 2018, whenever I would hand my driver’s license to a hotel clerk I would invariably get the same reaction. “Arthur Morgan? Wow! Did you know your name is the same as the main character in Red Dead Redemption 2?” 

At that point I was in my 50s and had not played video games for many years. The first time this happened I had to admit that I had no knowledge of the game or the character. I made a mental note to research the game later and was pleased to discover that Red Dead Redemption was a western-themed role playing game, and Arthur Morgan was the rugged Clint Eastwood-style protagonist of the second release in the game series. I was flattered to be associated with such a character, even in such a superficial way. 

Players of RDR2, as it is known to its fans, assume the identity of Arthur Morgan, exploring an 1899 version of America. The fictional Arthur Morgan faces numerous choices as he makes his way around the country. Sometimes the choices seem trivial. When a dog comes running up to you, barking and growling, do you scold the dog, or do you pet it? No matter how inconsequential the choice may seem at the time, each choice has the potential to affect your “honor score.” This is a cumulative number that is tracked throughout the game — essentially a karma index of sorts. Arthur Morgan is an outlaw, but one of his goals —  implied by the word “redemption” in the title of the game — is to redeem himself for his past transgressions.

What do you mean by "3.1 countries" seen with Paco?

Paco was born in Spain, and came to the US when he was four months old. He’s also spent some time in Baja California. When he was one and a half we tried to visit Canada, getting all the way to border station between Montana and Alberta on I-15. We couldn’t enter because of strict Covid rules 🙁 However, we were able to pick up a Canadian cousin for Paco named Zorro, “Checkpoint Charlie-style.” So Paco has seen the land of our friendly neighbors to the north, but he hasn’t actually been there. Yet.

What is "Roci the Rivian," and why do you call her that?

“Roci the Rivian,” AKA “Rocinante 2.0,” is my Launch Edition Green Rivian R1T. She has beefy all-terrain tires, Schwarzenegger-esque 835 horsepower, and a monstrous 908 pound feet of torque. She goes from zero to sixty in three seconds, has a 315 mile range, and can tow 11,000 pounds without breaking a sweat.

Roci the Rivian uses the pronouns “she/her,” but she is confident enough in her identity that she doesn’t need to spell this out on her LinkedIn profile (if she had one). There are multiple layers of meaning to this name and gender choice. At the core, innermost layer, Roci is short for “Rocinante.” Rocinante was the name John Steinbeck gave to the truck that he drove across the country as he collected material for his 1962 travelogue, Travels With Charley.

Steinbeck had in turn named his truck Rocinante after Don Quixote’s trusty steed in Miguel de Cervantes’ early 17th century novel, The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha. Steinbeck reportedly chose this name because his friends had teased him for being overly idealistic and impractical in planning a cross-country trip in a truck with his dog. Next, by shortening Rocinante to Roci and making the truck female, rather than male like Don Quixote’s horse, I am giving an implicit nod to modern feminism. The final layer of meaning is that I intentionally use the alliterative “Roci the Rivian” format of the name to evoke memories of the classic World War II motivational poster featuring “Rosie the Riveter.” Rosie the Riveter was a denim-clad woman with a bandana on her head who declared “We can do it!” as she rolled up her sleeve and flexed her right bicep.

This was exactly the attitude that I needed from my own yearling filly to accomplish my ambitious mission. And that’s why I needed a Rivian R1T.

 

Where can I get the book?

The book will be released to beta readers later this year. If you’re interested in being one of the first to read it, you can subscribe to get updates here.