Does anyone else take fault with the increasingly commonplace usage of the word democratize as applied to technology? For every valid case, I see others that make my head hurt. Is it just a buzzword for telling a story with emotional appeal to users and investors? Making something available to someone who didn’t have it earlier isn’t democratizing. And ignoring future considerations is just lazy. If guns were invente…
"Democracy" refers to a political system, but "democratizing" has pretty much always meant to open things up more widely. Example:
"The State wishes to democratize instruction by its "French instruction" and the standard must inevitably be the lowering of the very standard it sets up." -- 1894
https://www.google.com/books/edition/Education_from_a_Nation...
And yeah -- guns do democratize violence. That's precisely why they were invented. A Google search for "guns democratize violence" turns up several hits.