Encouraging individual sovereignty and a healthy commons • Hacker News Board

Re: Encouraging individual sovereignty and a healthy commons

#31

Post by eropple » Tue, Feb 21, 2017, 5:02 PM UTC

kelvin0 wrote: post #18

bresc wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not up to the masses. There is so much going on in the world, that it became impossible to deal with everything and have an opinion on everything. So it's actually up to a as large and diverse group as possible, to oppose movements like this. Which ultimately results in just a few making decisions for the masses. You can try to solve this problem before or just demand that the once/few in charge right now do the…

If everyone stopped using FB (not saying they should), what do you think would happen? As individuals we have a choice in certain actions and their impacts. I agree with you that having an opinion on everything and boycotting this and that can lead down a rabbit hole ... but we did bring this upon 'ourselves'. (I am not a FB user, but I do respect peoples use of it)

If "everyone" did something, we'd have all the unicorn hides we could ever want. Expecting "everyone" to do anything is silly and is frequently used--not saying you are, but it's a thing that happens--to delegitimize concerns by whatabouting them to death.

Re: Encouraging individual sovereignty and a healthy commons

#32

Post by Someone1234 » Tue, Feb 21, 2017, 5:02 PM UTC

decebalus1 wrote: post #20

65827 wrote: post #5

We're really moving into the strange cyberpunk dystopian future when CEOs start writing bizarre manifestos about how they want to reshape the world like this. Really just a few years out from private corporate armies I think (Zuckerberg already has a small private army protecting him with heavy weaponry) and cyber wars and espionage and open defiance of governments. Like we all knew this was an option of where we wer…

> (Zuckerberg already has a small private army protecting him with heavy weaponry) Source? I agree with your ideas overall but I'm genuinely interested in this aspect.

There's some details here:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-04-28/facebook-...

I think calling four full time guards a "small private army" is a little hyperbolic, but it is safe to say he is heavily protected.

Re: Encouraging individual sovereignty and a healthy commons

#33

Post by concinds » Tue, Feb 21, 2017, 5:04 PM UTC

The mainstream view is that for the world to be sustainable and stable, it needs to be more centralized and governed from the top.

That doesn't work, because the world is a complex system. It needs to be more functional, not more centralized.

The NNTaleb view is that to be sustainable and stable, the world needs to be decentralized and antifragile. In other words: not 1 government, but 100 well designed, functional governments with small, local democratic governance.

This seems necessary since societies are changing more rapidly, dealing with more problems and crises than before that just can't be effectively solved by bloated entities (see the EU), can't adapt quickly enough to various changes (see all the places in the US without fast internet), and aren't future-oriented enough because of inertia (see Singapore as a counterexample). It also seems more realistic than the article.

Edit: I didn't expect this response to blow up, so let me address more of the article:

1) Completely disagree that technology is "part of us". Amazon isn't a part of me, just a company I shop at. The closest thing we have to "explants" are the platforms we use, like Facebook or WhatsApp. The article seems heavy on buzzwords and light on common-sense. Encrypted messaging is the best solution, to maintain freedom of communication and reduce corporations' influence. That only requires installing Signal or WhatsApp, not "creating a new world".

2) People are not "property". You are free to share what you want. Others are free, too. If you want to work (Naval-style) towards decentralized, encrypted platforms, that's a step in the right direction. Doesn't require buzzwords either.

3) It seems like the article's worldview is based in an even greater influence of technology over our lives (as if the author realized that technology isn't really part of us, but wanted to make it so). The personal cloud would be hosted by "individual organizations", but what makes you think that 1 or 2 orgs won't emerge on top, and cause the exact same problem again?

Re: Encouraging individual sovereignty and a healthy commons

#34

Post by AnimalMuppet » Tue, Feb 21, 2017, 5:04 PM UTC

Ygg2 wrote: post #9

Preface: I might be too influenced by Adam Curtis. But what I find most interesting about this reply/rant, is that it - like most of left, always seems to envision a world without power. And you can't confront entrenched power, without seizing power, and using it to transform society.

It's worse than that. Fundamentally, the problem is that people are not angels.

The left recognizes, correctly, that the people in power - the leaders - are not angels. So the left wants them gone - wants there to be nobody in power.

The problem is that the people who are not in power also are not angels. Left to themselves, a fair number of them will find ways to harm (economically or even physically) people around them. They need someone with power to restrain them.

But then you're back to having people in power, and they're not angels...

Re: Encouraging individual sovereignty and a healthy commons

#35

Post by maleno » Tue, Feb 21, 2017, 5:04 PM UTC

Ygg2 wrote: post #9

Preface: I might be too influenced by Adam Curtis. But what I find most interesting about this reply/rant, is that it - like most of left, always seems to envision a world without power. And you can't confront entrenched power, without seizing power, and using it to transform society.

I'm not sure that's right. I mean, if we replace the word "power" with the word "agency", then maybe it's clearer. The goal isn't so much a world without power, but a world where agency is more evenly distributed, and far less coupled with wealth/capital.

This isn't to say that such a world is easy to imagine, or easy to bring about.

Re: Encouraging individual sovereignty and a healthy commons

#36

Post by devoply » Tue, Feb 21, 2017, 5:05 PM UTC

Oxitendwe wrote: post #24

devoply wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Think of the poor and how much they have been helped by the globalization of the world is how they were won over. See how many people we've lifted out of poverty because of globalization.

That's not really something people typically argue against when criticizing globalization - the issue is that these people are often helped at the expense of citizens of other countries that pursue a globalist agenda, and that people believe their government has a duty to protect the interests of its citizens above all others.

The countries don't pursue globalist agendas. Their corporations do. And they have benefited immensely because of that. The poor being helped is just a side-effect of that. In the end they care about profits, the side effects are irrelevant to them. It's just a peripheral side effect used for its marketing value, to turn the attention away from self-interest of the people negatively impacted.

Re: Encouraging individual sovereignty and a healthy commons

#37

Post by gph » Tue, Feb 21, 2017, 5:05 PM UTC

Not a bad rebuttal, I have to agree that Zuckerberg is trying to position Facebook as the end all be all of social contact in the future. I don't think that's a good solution.

But in reference to this quote:

>The reason we find ourselves in this mess with ubiquitous surveillance, filter bubbles, and fake news (propaganda) is precisely due to the utter and complete destruction of the public sphere by an oligopoly of private infrastructure that poses as public space.

That's going a little far, filter bubbles and propaganda have existed since forever. The public sphere was never a panacea for these problems. Certainly with facebook and social media it's changed the whole landscape, and perhaps made it worse given what happened during the last election. But returning social interactions to the public sphere isn't going to entirely fix the dissemination of fake news or suddenly pop the filter bubbles we live in.

If social media were outlawed tomorrow it might weaken filter bubbles, but a suburban upper middle class republican from Kansas is still going to be getting way different info and building a much different world view than a barista in Brooklyn would.

Re: Encouraging individual sovereignty and a healthy commons

#38

Post by sandworm101 » Tue, Feb 21, 2017, 5:05 PM UTC

k-mcgrady wrote: post #22

sandworm101 wrote: post #10

Am i the only one here that doesnt use facebook? I think i logged in once eight or so years ago. My clients dont use it. My friends do ... well did . But it was never an issue. My students avoid it due to the "creep factor". I still live life via email and telephone and that isnt unussual. Even my tech clients, some in downtown SF, expect email to be the norm. So when I see zuck going on about revolutions I have to w…

1.8 billion DAU's. They must be getting something out of it. You're definitely in the minority (even on HN, but I'm sure there are a sizeable number of people here not using it). I think every B2B scenario would expect tel/email. I have never encountered any that asked me to interact over Facebook and I'd be shocked if they did. Is it possible your view of Facebook is skewed by not using it in the last 8 years? A lot…

1. My phone. 2. Websites (bbc.co.uk/news for a start). 3. Amazon. 4. I use eventbright for public things, email for private functions. 5. That isnt people. Thats the corporate facebook account. And it has never generated a real client, but has created much busywork and false leads.

Re: Encouraging individual sovereignty and a healthy commons

#39

Post by leggomylibro » Tue, Feb 21, 2017, 5:05 PM UTC

65827 wrote: post #5

We're really moving into the strange cyberpunk dystopian future when CEOs start writing bizarre manifestos about how they want to reshape the world like this. Really just a few years out from private corporate armies I think (Zuckerberg already has a small private army protecting him with heavy weaponry) and cyber wars and espionage and open defiance of governments. Like we all knew this was an option of where we wer…

Musk and Bezos both have access to the rocketry tech necessary to produce ballistic missiles, along with autonomous machines which are starting to rival the sort of things usually produced by DARPA. Meanwhile, Facebook is tinkering with the best ways to influence masses of people and journalism/propaganda channels.

So I'm not necessarily saying that we're living out a mashup between Shadowrun and that Simpsons episode where Homer starts working for a supervillain, but I'm also not ruling it out.

Re: Encouraging individual sovereignty and a healthy commons

#40

Post by 3pt14159 » Tue, Feb 21, 2017, 5:06 PM UTC

Someone1234 wrote: post #32

decebalus1 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (Zuckerberg already has a small private army protecting him with heavy weaponry) Source? I agree with your ideas overall but I'm genuinely interested in this aspect.

There's some details here: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-04-28/facebook-... I think calling four full time guards a "small private army" is a little hyperbolic, but it is safe to say he is heavily protected.

Kinda BS, to be honest. The CEO of Canada Goose Jackets has full time protection. If you're worth a lot of money you need to be careful with your security.