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Technorealism (1998)

technorealism.org

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Re: Technorealism (1998)

#41

Post by CRConrad »

GhettoComputers wrote: post #37
cma wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What is artificial scarcity? The copyright system allows artificial scarcity to help fund things by restricting copies. But it doesn't have to be done that way.

In history it has been the most productive and innovative, because research and development takes time and money. The wright brothers are patent trolls who prevented the US from making plane designs, but without them we wouldn’t have modern flight. If we took away this incentive I doubt the world would be better. Currently you have this system where countries that don’t respect patents will just make it anyway, the U…

> If my ideas aren’t my own and anyone can copy it, I wouldn’t want to put efforts into something others will clone.

And yet, the FOSS movement persists.

Re: Technorealism (1998)

#42

Post by CRConrad »

specialist wrote: post #28

Agree with all. > The Internet is revolutionary, but not Utopian. Yes and: This isn't quite right. In political science terms, I want an adjective stronger than "revolutionary", in the same direction. "Radical" has more punch, but wrong direction. The Internet accelerated consolidation, not challenge it. Back in 1998, I had no awareness of "preferential attachment" and "winner takes all". I currently believe that red…

> Many technotopians thought the Internet would be the great liberator, toppling the gatekeepers and elites. Disintermediation! That certainly happened.

> But what happened was gatekeepers killed off the old guard, feasted on their corpses. The larger trend was a massive consolidation, an unprecedented power grab, and ridiculous transfer of wealth.

So, yes and no: Disintermediation happened, but the erstwhile disintermediators turned out to be / became the new gatekeeper elite.

(Also, to some extent, they were probably the exact same old gatekeeper elites who just adapted to a new role.)

Re: Technorealism (1998)

#43

Post by jhbadger »

gfody wrote: post #30
Barrin92 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Information isn't just knowledge packaged for transport. Knowledge is always subjective and a representation of some information as it holds meaning to a subject that interprets it. Simple example, a gazillion string long DNA segment holds information, but without actual understanding and organization in some context (which importantly differs depending on who interprets it for what purpose) it holds no meaning. Sayi…

> the most loaded "just" in history nah I can do better. DNA is just data, you can say it "holds information" the way a footprint holds information but that's just an idiom. knowing is just a perception. you can think you know something and be wrong.

It really isn't "just an idiom" -- DNA holds information even in the very most rigorous definition of information as defined by information theory by Claude Shannon and others. Computing the entropy of sequences is actually a useful way to predict if they are likely to have a function.

Re: Technorealism (1998)

#44

Post by specialist »

CRConrad wrote: post #42
specialist wrote: post #28

Agree with all. > The Internet is revolutionary, but not Utopian. Yes and: This isn't quite right. In political science terms, I want an adjective stronger than "revolutionary", in the same direction. "Radical" has more punch, but wrong direction. The Internet accelerated consolidation, not challenge it. Back in 1998, I had no awareness of "preferential attachment" and "winner takes all". I currently believe that red…

> Many technotopians thought the Internet would be the great liberator, toppling the gatekeepers and elites. Disintermediation! That certainly happened. > But what happened was gatekeepers killed off the old guard, feasted on their corpses. The larger trend was a massive consolidation, an unprecedented power grab, and ridiculous transfer of wealth. So, yes and no: Disintermediation happened, but the erstwhile disinte…

I'd love to learn more about the disintermediation thesis. Especially: Did it even happen? Or was it just merely the defunding of news institutions?

The best notion I've come up with is reapplying Chomksy's five filters of mass media model to social media. My hunch is the Owners stole the Advertisers lunch money. But I'm no media critic (academic), so it's just a guess.

It'd also be cool if someone "followed the money", as you suggest. It'd be pretty wild if the shareholders behind the Owners remained the same.

Huh. Writing this out, it's now obvious that Flak stole almost all of Media Elite's power and money.

Re: Technorealism (1998)

#45

Post by dredmorbius »

ctdonath wrote: post #39
dredmorbius wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The mix is an issue. Much of what's freely-available is low-quality at best, propaganda (or worse) in the worst case. Curation itself has value, and yet is constrained. This is in fact a major theme of Andrew Shapiro's The Control Revolution , and one of the tired arguments still encountered frequently today which was entirely anticipated over two decades ago.

Calories aren’t free. They’re not just there for the redistribution. What is one’s fair share of what another has worked to produce? Anyone can, for vanishingly low cost, distribute or access nearly any information they like. Yes, curation is important - and, like other work, has value worth trading for calories. Why the insistence on devaluing work, insisting the caloric cost of productivity not be compensated per i…

The starting point of this discussion was specifically how to pay.

My initial comment in the thread addressed specifically that:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29573768

Your own first comment rejected the claim that access to information was a problem, I addressed the additional concern that informational quality and relevance matter.

Compensation for that role still falls under my first comment, linked above.

Re: Technorealism (1998)

#46

Post by dredmorbius »

CRConrad wrote: post #40
ctdonath wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Calories aren’t free. They’re not just there for the redistribution. What is one’s fair share of what another has worked to produce? Anyone can, for vanishingly low cost, distribute or access nearly any information they like. Yes, curation is important - and, like other work, has value worth trading for calories. Why the insistence on devaluing work, insisting the caloric cost of productivity not be compensated per i…

But curation is the work nobody wants to pay for now, isn't it? "Calories" and "caloric cost" is a funny measure of value. Especially ironic given that from a nutritional perspective, they're what the poor get too much of and the rich do their best to avoid. In the information-nutritional world, dross ("empty calories") is what FAANG throws at the plebeians to milk them of their money ("caloric value"?). So yeah, now…

My read is that ctdonath is equating infomration at nil marginal cost with food or fuel at nil marginal cost.

I believe the absurdity is self-apparent.

If that's not their argument ... then what they're trying to state is less than clear.

Re: Technorealism (1998)

#47

Post by gfody »

jhbadger wrote: post #43
gfody wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the most loaded "just" in history nah I can do better. DNA is just data, you can say it "holds information" the way a footprint holds information but that's just an idiom. knowing is just a perception. you can think you know something and be wrong.

It really isn't "just an idiom" -- DNA holds information even in the very most rigorous definition of information as defined by information theory by Claude Shannon and others. Computing the entropy of sequences is actually a useful way to predict if they are likely to have a function.

information theory equates information with data (bits), it's the spherical cow in a vacuum and in that context the "information" that DNA "holds" is just a jargon referring to the bits.

Re: Technorealism (1998)

#48

Post by cma »

GhettoComputers wrote: post #37
cma wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What is artificial scarcity? The copyright system allows artificial scarcity to help fund things by restricting copies. But it doesn't have to be done that way.

In history it has been the most productive and innovative, because research and development takes time and money. The wright brothers are patent trolls who prevented the US from making plane designs, but without them we wouldn’t have modern flight. If we took away this incentive I doubt the world would be better. Currently you have this system where countries that don’t respect patents will just make it anyway, the U…

Both systems can run alongside each other.

Re: Technorealism (1998)

#49

Post by jhbadger »

gfody wrote: post #47
jhbadger wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really isn't "just an idiom" -- DNA holds information even in the very most rigorous definition of information as defined by information theory by Claude Shannon and others. Computing the entropy of sequences is actually a useful way to predict if they are likely to have a function.

information theory equates information with data (bits), it's the spherical cow in a vacuum and in that context the "information" that DNA "holds" is just a jargon referring to the bits.

But that's like saying atoms are just "jargon" for talking about matter. Bits are what information is comprised of.

Re: Technorealism (1998)

#50

Post by gfody »

jhbadger wrote: post #49
gfody wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

information theory equates information with data (bits), it's the spherical cow in a vacuum and in that context the "information" that DNA "holds" is just a jargon referring to the bits.

But that's like saying atoms are just "jargon" for talking about matter. Bits are what information is comprised of.

it's not because "atom" isn't a technical term, it has always referred to the indivisible bedrock (greek root a-tomos or "not-cuttable").

equating information with data outside the context of information theory is precisely wrong and definitely not the same information being discussed in tfa. bits do not comprise information, you could say data reduces to bits. data != information. data is objective by definition. information must be able to inform/influence the metaphorical ledger backing ones ability to know, transferring knowledge. not all knowledge can become information and not all information can become data.

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