Economists since Adam Smith have taught us that in a competitive economy, the pursuit of private interests leads to the best possible outcome for everybody. But notice the qualifier: for this arrangement to work, there must be competition. It should disturb us, then, that the founders of Google themselves admit that the history of searches they have amassed creates a gigantic barrier to new entrants.
Grab a coffee.
Short form summary, from a skim: when a new technology arises there will be many who try to take advantage of it. Most will fail. From around 90 companies who comprised the auto competition 100 years ago, 3 big (north american) winners remain.
Big tech is different from previous game changers in that big tech doesn’t just supply information, it shapes information. There will be less big tech companies in the future, but how much will the filtering shape the form of the inevitable Darwinian winnowing of companies to the eventual survivors? Can the knowledge of what we want, and what we do, short circuit the free market mechanism?
Scotland___ Edinborough ___ Athens of the North ___ is finally investing money to upgrade and promote the Adam Smith legacy. It can be found behind the Church on the Royal Mile with the Home and Burial Plot of the individual who moved the World closer to the “Great Experiment” and advanced Civilization and a Social Contract more than any other Person.
the amount of information now available exceeds man’s ability to absorb even a small amount. just how is competition to control information a problem? if the average person has a question the answer in most cases is easily available. will the answer to my questions be lies? if I am told how to incorrectly build something that would not be good. if I am lied to politically, well, that happens all the time and the results are there for all to see. libraries and universities used to hold the largest store of information available and now it and more is available with the touch of a switch. would government regulation improve this. in my lifetime governments have improved absolutely nothing.
Two core issues need to be addressed by our political class.
The first issue is access, ownership, control and administration of personal information. There is only one solution that can satisfy what is a legitimate demand for individual privacy. If the information is about me then I own and control access to it in all its various forms. Until Big Tech is brought to heel on personal information in their possession individuals will be at grave risk from individuals and/or groups who could use that information in a malicious or malevolent way.
The second issue is freedom of speech, freedom of expression and what must be a basic freedom – access to information that is searched for, even if that information may be deemed to be inappropriate for whatever reason. The filtering of information searches is a far greater threat to individual freedom than the threat posed by access to the various types of information that is deemed inappropriate. That said, accessing some types of information by its very nature should carry the risk of increased scrutiny by authorities and may result in restrictions being placed on an individual and/or criminal charges being laid against an individual. Individuals must be responsible and accountable for their actions. That said, Big Tech must not be the guardian of access to information. Access to information must remain unfettered if freedom is to remain a core value.
Jim
Good points. Unfortunately governments are now getting into the gathering, abusing, and selling personal information. For example Stasicanada. And of course the secret agencies such as NSA in the USA and the Chinese, Russian, etc which collect enormous amounts of data and, I suspect, have backdoors into data sources such as google, facebook, credit agencies etc.
Justin Turdeau, if we keep electing him, will eventually bring in a social credit score, similar to that being implemented in China.
What does this mean?
Since I spelled his name as Turdeau, my score will go down. If I say something negative about Islam, government policy, or complain about the carbon tax, my score will go down. If I visit web sites that Turdeau doesn’t like, such as SDA, then my score goes down. If I get a parking ticket my score will go down. Jail time means my score will go down. Be a friend on facebook or someother site with someone who has a low score, then my score will go down.
Every time you want to do something like buy an airline ticket – oops joe your social score is too low you cannot fly. Oops joe your score is too low, you cannot renew your vehicle registration. Oops kiddies, your dad’s score is too low, you cannot go to university, unless you increase your score by donating to the liberal party etc etc
Welcome to the new world of the left.
Joe,
Great points. This is the reason why ordinary Canadians must bring our political class to heel.
The life or death struggle between the progressive post-modern ideology of the post-nation state and globalism and what is fast becoming a new populist based form of nationalism with conservativism at its core must ultimately be won by the “Somewheres” and not the “Anywheres”, a reference from the book “Right Here, Right Now” by Stephen J. Harper. I recommend it to anyone as a worthwhile book to add to your reading list. It is an easy read yet, profound in both its truth and in the direction it points out political class to take for the good of the country.
One only has to see how YouTube (google) has censored Prager University for no compelling reason to see why these behemoths need to be broken up. Before its too late.
There is a “compelling reason” why YouTube has censored Prager University. They want to constrain the audience from knowing and thinking what Prager University will teach.
And that fact is our compelling reason why we need something, even government action with its potential for unintended consequenses, to interfere with the way YouTube runs its operations.
We might start with requiring them to publish on every screen a warning to users that ” Because this organisation is run by humans 1. It is impossible for them to avoid making mistakes such as providing information that isn’t true and 2. That it is extremely unlikely that they will never deliberately provide information they know to be untrue, i.e lie, and never withhold information to mislead us for the purpose of getting more money and/or power for themselves and their friends. Caveat Emptor.”
While on a flight back from vacation, I watched the re-make of Fahrenheit 451, the classic Ray Bradbury story. However, this remake had only the very faintest attachment to the original story. In point of fact, my immediate thought was “This is the future should the Democrat Party in the US and the Liberal Party in Canada make their tenures permanent”. The film emphasized major thought control and an all-pervasive government presence. The government WANTED people to not be able to read but to watch mindless entertainment on their big-screen TV’s (hello all reality TV shows!) and the government was always watching the individual.
I just read on-line about the spread of the pushback against globalization – inspired by the recent actions of the Yellow Jackets in France. This push-back is very much needed against big government. Viva the Second French Revolution!
I’ve noticed, (Google location set to Canada), that SDA is the 9th result after completing the word “small” in a Google search box. That’s fairly impressive for a non sequitur. Google ranking is at work and is perhaps an intangible asset that, if recognized, would be swiped away by those who think they know best. I congratulate the selflessness of the “Break Them Up” campaign.
During and after the 2009 election campaign Google had done its very best to suppress evidence pointing to Barry Soertoro’s lack of citizenship and therefore willingly subverted the democratic process of the United States of America. Google does not need to be broken up; it needs to be shut down with it’s CEO’s and board of directors imprisoned.
Happy New Year!
I just tried it through google.ca and SDA was number eight.
You don’t have a right to use other people’s computers for free.
If it can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt that Big Tech has, say, committed actionable fraud, breached contract or violated election laws, then prosecute them as we would prosecute any newspaper or street-corner preacher. But this disturbing, “they took away my free shit” wailing makes soi-disant conservatives no better than the hordes of the underclass rioting when the EBT cards glitch.
If you think there are problems with the Internet now, You’re Going to Hate the New Rules when you decide to give the government control over it. I seem to recall a time when soi-disant conservatives were against the Fairness Doctrine.