In a mere twenty years, we have gone from fears of the Government controlling the Internet to fears of the Internet controlling the Government. We have? Last I

In a mere twenty years, we have gone from fears of the Government controlling the Internet to fears of the Internet controlling the Government. We have? Last I checked, countries were turning off the internet when there are protests, the Chinese are taking the internet and turning it into a Panopticon of enormous scope and scale. Countries everywhere are swooping in and picking up whatever data they'd like from ISPs and social media providers. And the ISPs and social media companies are helping them do this. Cell carriers are turning your location data into another profit center. Government intrusion hasn't gone anywhere. Anybody worried about the current landlords controlling the net are just worried about the caretakers. You could eliminate all of them tomorrow and the problem wouldn't go anywhere. (The root of the problem is that data, once collected, can go anywhere and do anything. There's no way of putting the genie back in the bottle.) It bothers me to see people focus so much on Facebook or other companies like that. They're just the tip of the iceberg, and if you don't define the problem right, you have no chance of getting the solution right either.