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Technology won't help with this, regulation will. We have parallels from other platforms - specifically the fixed and mobile phone networks. There used to be
by jpollock 8y ago
Technology won't help with this, regulation will.
We have parallels from other platforms - specifically the fixed and mobile phone networks.
There used to be monopolies in local phone service. There were new competitors, but to change provider, you had to change phone number.
Even changing cell phone provider required a number change.
This obviously had strong network effects pulling you to stay with your provider. You had to tell _everyone_ in your extended network where to find you and have them update all of their business records when you changed from one carrier to another.
Eventually, everyone figured out this was stupid, and Number Portability [1] was forced on carriers by regulation.
This problem is completely gone now. You can take your number with you.
If we allow people to take their data to new social networks, and force federation, then we will get decentralization. However, it won't happen without regulation anymore than it did with the phone companies.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_number_portability#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_number_portability#Histo...
- TylerE 8y agoIf you have ever seen any attempt by any government to regulate software you would know this to be a Lovecraftian nightmare, and not a solution.
- jancsika 8y agoIf you have ever seen any attempt by any volunteer-run FLOSS team to solve nationwide social problems with technology you would know this to be a Lovecraftian nightmare, and not a solution.
- TylerE 8y agoBut you aren’t legally mandated to use it.
- jancsika 8y agoAlso-- companies that aren't legally mandated to allow third parties to reverse engineer their medical devices would otherwise use every means within their power to stop you from doing that. We know this because companies outside of the medical industry use every means within their power to stop you from doing that. And I can't see how a response of "let's get rid of the chess board so they can't play" would be an adult response to this problem.
- jpollock 8y agoThe way this usually works, is there's an entrant into the market who decides it is cheaper to use the government to gain access to a network instead of building their own (Number Portability, Local Loop Unbundling). The government then says "You have to allow competitors access to X, and you have to do it by date Y". Then the companies get together and agree on how to do it because they agree that government dictated standards suck. There is usually some jostling around with someone wanting to run a centralized database for a nice per-transaction fee. Typically this is tossed out in committee, but not always.