MSP107 [] Episode X: A Rey of Light

MSP is in shameless Star Wars stealing-mode this week. Over the last decade, the forces of Silicon Valley seem to have transformed from information and data disruptors into Final Order-style monopolists. Are the 2020s set to become the battlefield for the Data Wars?

[] Show Notes []

This is a good start to a new decade, with you stealing notes from the Star Wars franchise.
Xmas holiday
Reading about runaway tech
Threat to our democracy, freedom.
Silicon Valley turning from liberator to demagogue,
On the back of it
Govts losing control.
Rampant surveillance capitalism.
So much doom and gloom.

They’re are all topics that you’ve spoken about at length on this show.
True.
Not knocking the truth of these pieces.
Or importance of understanding what’s in them.
Have to examine the Dark Side.

Is that where the Star Wars analogy comes in?
Kind of. It’s also a nice way to ease into 2020.
If you think of digital tech in the early noughties as being the first rush after the Empire fell.
Technology represented people power.
Bypass traditional news media. Post our own information.
Citizen journalism. The blossoming of freedom and independence movements.
Bypassing state controlled information systems.
Create information sharing networks.
At an individual level, celebrated the democratisation of data:
Be less isolated because somewhere online other people like us lurked.
Govts and city councils committing to open governance and sharing all kinds of data.
What we didn’t foresee was this flush of freedom turning into something like SW’s The First Order.

How do you think it happened?
We do a lot of these things to ourselves.
Spoken at length about how our freemium model has contributed to this system.
An active / passive choice many of us made to make our online experience cheaper.
These things happen by degree.
Google going from not being evil to bidding on US govt defence contracts.
Gradual.
And by interpretation: freedom meaning the freedom of companies to do as they choose.

So, that’s where we are? With Supreme Leader Snoke or a resurgent Emperor Palpatine?
Apologies to listeners who aren’t SW fans / followers.
One of the positive aspects of all those negative tech articles is realisation.
I’ve been banging on about unsustainable freemium models for years.
So have others. Talking about how we are willingly giving up our privacy.
Apart from a few people, majority of people thought we were scaremongering.
But people are scared. Tired. Mistrustful.