10 ms·

Surprisingly, the Internet is becoming centralized like the Minitel was. Is history repeating itself?

by arnaudsm 9y ago

johnflan 9y ago
Specifically, the Apple app eco system comes to mind.
- freehunter 9y ago
  Apple's apps have nothing to do with an open or closed Internet.
  - kyberias 9y ago
    But people seem to think that and they have a reason. When apps replace web content, they quite clearly have something to do with the Internet. Web is part of the Internet. Isn't this obvious?
    - freehunter 9y ago
      People like the guy I responded to think that because they have an axe to grind against Apple. Notice how he said "Apple's app ecosystem" and not "Android app ecosystem", when Google's platform is just as robust? And didn't Microsoft start it with ActiveX and IE? Or how about "Works best with Netscape Navigator"? But no, it's Apple's fault. Everything is Apple's fault.
      - bigbugbag 9y ago
        Maybe I'm wrong but my interpretation was quite different. To me he's just pointing out a fact, to me along the 20+ years since I've been aware of the issue many things happened or didn't happen but a few specific things come out of the pack, including the one he cited. To me you came out as the apple fanboy who cannot stand that apple is part of the issue and that it is undeniably apple who popularized the "app store" model, emblematic of the problem at hands. It's only after apple's success that the others followed suit and copied the model to recreate their own distinct impossible to interconnect ecosystem. Even Mozilla has one now. Yes Apple is among the GAFAM who are to blame among many others for the current state of things, but ultimately the failure is in us who chose voluntary submission to new masters, who failed to use our technical knowledge to provide to other less technically inclined, who failed to force ISP to offer the means to self host, and so on I guess this is quite an illustration of "don't argue with fools, from a distance people may not be able to tell the difference".
  - bigbugbag 9y ago
    Of course they have. When you have to use an app and a specific hardware to access content instead of the browser it's an open unless its closed internet (see tapas.io for one such example). The walled garden model is causing the closed internet.
bigbugbag 9y ago
I remember discussions circa 1995 on how the web becoming commercial would ultimately destroy the democratic potential of the internet to mirror the issues of capitalism such as centralizing power and wealth. In 2003 (was it 2001?) there's the 2nd edition TAZ preface by Hakim Bey[3], in 2007 there's this infamous talk "free internet or minitel 2.0"[1] at the Libre Software Meeting[2]. Closer to now there's RIPE publishing "The death of transit"[3] and recently Peter Sunde told us we have lost the internet and it's all about damage control now.[4] I would not say it's a surprise, it's simply the consequences of applying the same model that's making our civilisation fail, removing the conditions favorable to life on the planet, causing the current mass extinction, etc. [1]: https://www.fdn.fr/actions/confs/internet-libre-ou-minitel-2-0/ https://www.fdn.fr/actions/confs/internet-libre-ou-minitel-2... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libre_Software_Meeting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libre_Software_Meeting [3]: https://labs.ripe.net/Members/gih/the-death-of-transit https://labs.ripe.net/Members/gih/the-death-of-transit [4]: https://thenextweb.com/eu/2017/06/09/pirate-bay-founder-weve-lost-the-internet-its-all-about-damage-control-now/ https://thenextweb.com/eu/2017/06/09/pirate-bay-founder-weve... [5]: I think perhaps the least useful part of the book is its section on the Internet. I envisioned the net as an adjunct to the TAZ, a technology in service to the TAZ, a means of potentiating its emergences. I proposed the term "Web" for this function of the Net. What a joke. Time magazine identified me as a cyber-guru and "explained" that the TAZ exists in cyberspace. "Web" became the official term for the commercial/surveillane function of the Net, and by 1995 it had succeeded in burying the anarchic potential of the Net (if any really existed) under a mass of advertising and dot-com scams. What's left of the Left now seems to inhabit a ghost-world where a few thousands "hits" pass for political action and "virtual community" takes the place of human presence. The Web has become a perfect mirror of Global Capital: bordeless, triumphalist, evanescent, aesthically bankrupt, monocultural, violent -- a force for atomization and isolation, for the disappearance of knowledge, of sexuality, and of all subtle senses.

Surprisingly, the Internet is becoming centralized like the Minitel was. Is history repeating itself?

johnflan 9y ago

Specifically, the Apple app eco system comes to mind.

freehunter 9y ago
Apple's apps have nothing to do with an open or closed Internet.
- kyberias 9y ago
  But people seem to think that and they have a reason. When apps replace web content, they quite clearly have something to do with the Internet. Web is part of the Internet. Isn't this obvious?
  - freehunter 9y ago
    People like the guy I responded to think that because they have an axe to grind against Apple. Notice how he said "Apple's app ecosystem" and not "Android app ecosystem", when Google's platform is just as robust? And didn't Microsoft start it with ActiveX and IE? Or how about "Works best with Netscape Navigator"? But no, it's Apple's fault. Everything is Apple's fault.
    - bigbugbag 9y ago
      Maybe I'm wrong but my interpretation was quite different. To me he's just pointing out a fact, to me along the 20+ years since I've been aware of the issue many things happened or didn't happen but a few specific things come out of the pack, including the one he cited. To me you came out as the apple fanboy who cannot stand that apple is part of the issue and that it is undeniably apple who popularized the "app store" model, emblematic of the problem at hands. It's only after apple's success that the others followed suit and copied the model to recreate their own distinct impossible to interconnect ecosystem. Even Mozilla has one now. Yes Apple is among the GAFAM who are to blame among many others for the current state of things, but ultimately the failure is in us who chose voluntary submission to new masters, who failed to use our technical knowledge to provide to other less technically inclined, who failed to force ISP to offer the means to self host, and so on I guess this is quite an illustration of "don't argue with fools, from a distance people may not be able to tell the difference".
- bigbugbag 9y ago
  Of course they have. When you have to use an app and a specific hardware to access content instead of the browser it's an open unless its closed internet (see tapas.io for one such example). The walled garden model is causing the closed internet.

bigbugbag 9y ago

I remember discussions circa 1995 on how the web becoming commercial would ultimately destroy the democratic potential of the internet to mirror the issues of capitalism such as centralizing power and wealth. In 2003 (was it 2001?) there's the 2nd edition TAZ preface by Hakim Bey[3], in 2007 there's this infamous talk "free internet or minitel 2.0"[1] at the Libre Software Meeting[2]. Closer to now there's RIPE publishing "The death of transit"[3] and recently Peter Sunde told us we have lost the internet and it's all about damage control now.[4] I would not say it's a surprise, it's simply the consequences of applying the same model that's making our civilisation fail, removing the conditions favorable to life on the planet, causing the current mass extinction, etc. [1]: https://www.fdn.fr/actions/confs/internet-libre-ou-minitel-2-0/ https://www.fdn.fr/actions/confs/internet-libre-ou-minitel-2... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libre_Software_Meeting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libre_Software_Meeting [3]: https://labs.ripe.net/Members/gih/the-death-of-transit https://labs.ripe.net/Members/gih/the-death-of-transit [4]: https://thenextweb.com/eu/2017/06/09/pirate-bay-founder-weve-lost-the-internet-its-all-about-damage-control-now/ https://thenextweb.com/eu/2017/06/09/pirate-bay-founder-weve... [5]: I think perhaps the least useful part of the book is its section on the Internet. I envisioned the net as an adjunct to the TAZ, a technology in service to the TAZ, a means of potentiating its emergences. I proposed the term "Web" for this function of the Net. What a joke. Time magazine identified me as a cyber-guru and "explained" that the TAZ exists in cyberspace. "Web" became the official term for the commercial/surveillane function of the Net, and by 1995 it had succeeded in burying the anarchic potential of the Net (if any really existed) under a mass of advertising and dot-com scams. What's left of the Left now seems to inhabit a ghost-world where a few thousands "hits" pass for political action and "virtual community" takes the place of human presence. The Web has become a perfect mirror of Global Capital: bordeless, triumphalist, evanescent, aesthically bankrupt, monocultural, violent -- a force for atomization and isolation, for the disappearance of knowledge, of sexuality, and of all subtle senses.