Cory Doctorow and the Electronic Frontier Foundation have published a five-part series with that title. Mr. Doctorow examines how Big Tech has come to dominate the news and social media, and offers suggestions as to how to turn that around. They may not be practical if Big Tech decides to steamroller them, but they also offer ways we can limit our interaction with such propaganda.
The five articles are, in order:
To Save the News, We Must Ban Surveillance Advertising
To Save the News, We Need an End-to-End Web
I don't necessarily agree with all of Mr. Doctorow's suggestions, but I think he offers an excellent overview of current problems and how we can approach them. Given that Big Tech is going to dominate coverage of our next Presidential election, and influence millions of voters, it's surely not a bad idea to start thinking already about how to counter their propaganda.
Recommended reading.
Peter
4 comments:
Lot of 'wishing' there, and it would be one option. Reality? I doubt it, it would 'cost' Big Tech too much money/influence.
A monopoly is like a patent, where a legislature declares only a certain entity may supply a product or service. Examples of monopolies include: fresh water delivered in pipes in the ground, sewage removed in pipes, electricity delivered by wires on poles, fiber data cables buried and hung in road right of ways, zoning and permits and codes for data center buildings, radio broadcast licenses, anything related to the electronic transfer of money. In every detail required to produce news the legislators, not the Big Tech companies, create regulatory environments which harm small competitors, and coalesce the communications industry into a few big players. Radio broadcast licenses contain an anti-first-amendment veto for content not being 'in the public interest', which means whatever the regulator says it means.
Did splitting up AT&T into baby bells create new forms of telephones which competed? Did hassling Microsoft create new forms of web browsing? Does the entire EFF contain no lawyers who studied the history and track record of those monopolistic public policies? No, the EFF knows better; it's been taken over by liberals and now writes propaganda for the regime. The conclusion of this series is 'you must give up more control to government'.
For at least ten years my question has been, " who's the master?" Are lefty/Democrats giving media marching orders, are they simply "fellow travelers ", or is BIG MEDIA calling the shots, for the politicians? Neither is working for the taxpayers, that much is clear...
Doctorow is a fascinating fellow. (And the EFF for that matter). Some of his ideas I vehemently disagree with. And sometimes he's great, addressing important issues with insight.
Yes, it's normal to agree and disagree depending on the issue, but Doctorow manages to embody the extremes more than most others.
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