Today's Random News

[Fe 26]

I wouldn't be surprised if this is capitalism at work. They want to remove things like facebook so someone rich and local can make an alternative.

Or in the case of this current story, conservatives removing foreign influence and silencing youths.

[Vasteel]

Ding ding Ding! We have a winner!

[Drewbacca]

Yeah all these government idiosyncrasies like France demanding data rights so we all have to click accept on every click bait listicle we read, and China removing all autonomy within their networks is totally capitalism’s doing.

[Fe 26]

It could be with France, maybe not china.

It really depends on if a local somebody gets rich providing a private alternative. Kind of like how corporate prisons work.

[Drewbacca]

Sure. But Facebook is going to want to serve one codebase globally rather than provision local servers and forks of their product. It’s a pain to manage (human cost++) and less centralized (control--). There’s v little to gain there.

The only ppl cronying up the web are politicians (ie social actors). Net neutrality for example. Eventually even tech giants gave up because of how retarded/influenced governance is.

And competition-wise a local startup wouldn’t make a dime in social media (in an open market) without the scale of FB. It’s an attention based economy like all ads.

[Satsuki]

the world is fundamentally invested in nationalism/populism right now, which in turn causes the products to shore up. Since we refuse to consider internet a utility, it will be firmly embedded in the "product" category, and restrict accordingly.

[Fe 26]

I dont know if making it a utility would make it any less restricted. Maybe more so if the state can argue that some behavior is destructive to other users.

[Drewbacca]

It definitely would. Populism is a political construct (pursues by state) not a market driven one. Making something a utility gives state MORE control, not less.

[kedawa]

I trust the telcos even less than I trust the government.

[Fe 26]

Far better the overlord that is greedy and lazy than the one that thinks he is saving the world.