> Technologists’ desire to make a parallel to evolution is flawed at its very foundation. Evolution is driven by random mutation — mistakes, not plans But this

> Technologists’ desire to make a parallel to evolution is flawed at its very foundation. Evolution is driven by random mutation — mistakes, not plans But this is not what the evolution metaphor is alluding to. Nobody in their right mind would argue that technological progress is driven by random mutations. But it is driven by market pressure. If something can be invented and sold, it will be invented and sold, be it invasive surveillance tools for your kids or Bluetooth enabled condoms. And market pressure is in some sense akin to evolutionary pressure where if there is a biological niche, some form of life will evolve to take advantage of it. That said, the argument about regulation is somewhat sound. Just because the current market for technological innovations is pretty much unregulated (at least as far as things like privacy are concerned), doesn't mean it has to stay that way. Back in the day pharmaceutical companies sold heroin laced cough drops and radioactive face creams, but then FDA was established and took control of drug safety. There is no theoretical reason why something similar cannot happen in the technology market. The problem, the way I see it, is that regulation is driven by perceived risk. It is easy to argue that pharmaceutical industry has to be regulated, since the danger of bad and/or inefficient drugs is fairly obvious to everyone. Arguing that technology has to be regulated is a lot harder, because the perceived risk of erosion of privacy is a lot lower and hard to quantify.