Achtung: Decentralize, decentralize, decentralize
drewdevault.com
Achtung: Decentralize, decentralize, decentralize
1–10 of 174 posts
Re: Achtung: Decentralize, decentralize, decentralize
#2I see this form of argument a lot:
Companies have an {obligation, fiduciary duty} to maximize value for shareholders, therefore they have no choice but to do horrible things to {users, customers, the environment, civic institutions}
Presumably, decentralization, federation and open source will eliminate the profit-maximizing corporation, thereby stopping all the horrible things.
The problem with this reasoning is that it only addresses one side of a two-sided transaction. The corporation doesn't transact with itself. The other side of the transaction is the user.
What if every user was willing to pay $5 per month for a "clean Facebook" without ads, without surveillance, without psychological profiling, without selling private data to malevolent third parties?
If every user paid $5 a month, Facebook could continue their current business with the best computer science talent and a global network of data centers.
If every user paid $5 a month, Facebook's shareholders would do fabulously well.
But of course, that's a ridiculous proposition. Only an infinitesimal number of Facebook's 2.2 billion users are willing to pay for the service.
Since a social network only has value to a user when all the user's friends and family are also on the network, a Facebook that only has a few people willing to pay won't be very useful.
Advocates of decentralized social networks need to explain (1) who will pay, and (2) how to get enough users to make the network valuable to a typical user.
Until we figure that out, we're stuck with social networks that are free for users, monetized with advertising, and regulated by the state.
Re: Achtung: Decentralize, decentralize, decentralize
#3I see this form of argument a lot: Companies have an {obligation, fiduciary duty} to maximize value for shareholders, therefore they have no choice but to do horrible things to {users, customers, the environment, civic institutions} Presumably, decentralization, federation and open source will eliminate the profit-maximizing corporation, thereby stopping all the horrible things. The problem with this reasoning is tha…
We already have decentralization in three primary forms of communication: phone, mail, and e-mail. They worked great in 1998. Why can't they work great in 2018?
Re: Achtung: Decentralize, decentralize, decentralize
#4Decentralization is mostly about power distribution, it doesn't imply privacy. There are a couple of decentralized projects that are worse for privacy (for the sake of decentralization) and ended up being used for OSINT.
Re: Achtung: Decentralize, decentralize, decentralize
#5I see this form of argument a lot: Companies have an {obligation, fiduciary duty} to maximize value for shareholders, therefore they have no choice but to do horrible things to {users, customers, the environment, civic institutions} Presumably, decentralization, federation and open source will eliminate the profit-maximizing corporation, thereby stopping all the horrible things. The problem with this reasoning is tha…
We already have decentralization in three primary forms of communication: phone, mail, and e-mail. They worked great in 1998. Why can't they work great in 2018?
There are now phone plans that are paid for by selling your data and sending you spam SMS. There are e-mail providers that operate similarly, and most e-mail addresses are registered with one of them. Those things don't really work for snail mail, but few people use it anymore, because sending a letter costs more and they have come to expect communication not to cost money.
The formerly decentralized services are no longer so decentralized since "free of charge, paid for by data and ads" has shown itself to be a viable business model that users love. (Until they understand what's happening, at least.)
Re: Achtung: Decentralize, decentralize, decentralize
#6Companies like Facebook, publicly traded, have a legal obligation to maximize profits for their shareholders. Private companies with investors are similarly obligated.
There is no promise that a company can make to its users that outweighs the fiduciary duty that obligates them to maximize profits by any means.
Not true. [1]
[1] https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/8146/are-u-s-co...
Re: Achtung: Decentralize, decentralize, decentralize
#7Earlier quoted context omitted.
We already have decentralization in three primary forms of communication: phone, mail, and e-mail. They worked great in 1998. Why can't they work great in 2018?
There are now phone plans that are paid for by selling your data and sending you spam SMS. There are e-mail providers that operate similarly, and most e-mail addresses are registered with one of them. Those things don't really work for snail mail, but few people use it anymore, because sending a letter costs more and they have come to expect communication not to cost money. The formerly decentralized services are no…
Your point is valid, but we still live in a world where we can call Verizon phones with AT&T phones; send e-mails to Gmail users with Yahoo; and send mail with UPS instead of USPS. With those means of communication, we still have control over our providers.
There is no control within Facebook's ecosystem. Similar with AOL, if you don't use Facebook, you're necessarily out of the loop, and I don't feel comfortable with that.
Re: Achtung: Decentralize, decentralize, decentralize
#8I see this form of argument a lot: Companies have an {obligation, fiduciary duty} to maximize value for shareholders, therefore they have no choice but to do horrible things to {users, customers, the environment, civic institutions} Presumably, decentralization, federation and open source will eliminate the profit-maximizing corporation, thereby stopping all the horrible things. The problem with this reasoning is tha…
We already have decentralization in three primary forms of communication: phone, mail, and e-mail. They worked great in 1998. Why can't they work great in 2018?
You pay for all three.
Re: Achtung: Decentralize, decentralize, decentralize
#9I see this form of argument a lot: Companies have an {obligation, fiduciary duty} to maximize value for shareholders, therefore they have no choice but to do horrible things to {users, customers, the environment, civic institutions} Presumably, decentralization, federation and open source will eliminate the profit-maximizing corporation, thereby stopping all the horrible things. The problem with this reasoning is tha…
A sharing model where the content you create allows you to access content is viable (see Bittorrent ratios). Facebook created a side market where they made markets to trade user data and targeted ads. That should have never been part of the bargain. It's like getting an ad toolbar from installing Java.
Re: Achtung: Decentralize, decentralize, decentralize
#10Mastodon does everything signed and unencrypted. This includes followers-only and private messages.
I can't in good faith recommend Mastodon.