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Everything is relative. A couple of millenia ago, powerful technologies meant plumbing, sewage, currency, postal mail. Do you want to think about any of these t

by cm277 6y ago

Everything is relative. A couple of millenia ago, powerful technologies meant plumbing, sewage, currency, postal mail. Do you want to think about any of these things? No, you just assume they work so you can move your thinking up the stack. But you absolutely want them regulated and managed by a democratic authority too... Why is Twitter different?

JumpCrisscross 6y ago
> you absolutely want them regulated and managed by a democratic authority too... Why is Twitter different? If my sewage or plumbing stop working, I get sick and die. If my Twitter stops working, nothing...I am not on Twitter. Lots of countries (e.g. Japan) do fine with a private postal service. And plenty (e.g. Panama or America in the era of free banking) do fine outsourcing their currency. I am not saying Twitter shouldn’t be regulated. Just that this isn’t the argument for it.
- undreren 6y ago
  It depends on what you mean by “stops working”. When social media becomes the primary driver of misinformation and anti-democratic sentiment, then it has arguably “stopped working”. While users might not be sick in the flesh, their minds will surely start to rot.
  - bserge 6y ago
    And solving it by blocking Twitter is just so... human. The platforms aren't the problem, people are the problem. Education is piss poor, if that's not fixed/improved, we can go back to pre-industrial times and people would still vote for a moron who promises big things, never delivers and just grabs power for themselves. Financial/civic/political education in schools? Public-sponsored articles and videos debunking conspiracies? Nah, just ban Twitter, that'll solve it. People on either side of the fence believe they're right. Keep ignoring and belittling each other and it will lead to an even worse situation down the road.
    - undreren 6y ago
      In the end, unless we are talking about natural calamities, everything is a people problem. Are blocked sewer is a people problem; it’s either poorly designed, poorly constructed, poorly maintained or a combination of causes. But in the end, the problem is caused by people.
- cm277 6y ago
  Put more succinctly then: when a platform/technology becomes so successful that's used by a lot of people and/or other businesses built and depend on it, it (eventually) has to be regulated. If the prize of success is monopoly (as per Thiel), the price of success must be regulation.
  - BlueTemplar 6y ago
    Indeed. But with platforms being privately owned and centralized, the scale at which they start being problematic is fairly small. The likes of Facebook/Twitter/YouTube have blown past this limit a long time ago. At this point it's too late for regulation. You can't effectively break them down. Nationalizing them is pretty much unfeasible since they have so many international users. So the only solution left seems to be to shut them down completely, and let the competition do their job (it won't take long, considering Internet timescales). But maybe before consider what kind of regulations these competitors will have to live under. (Maybe a built-in time limit before they are shut down in turn, and the cycle starts all over again ?)
  - giantg2 6y ago
    If it's a monopoly, it should be broken apart. This could reduce or remove the need for regulation. Although maybe not in cases like this - protecting ignorant people from themselves because they can't think for themselves or fact check social media information. I'm not sure these problems can be regulated away either.
- user-the-name 6y ago
  Social media has fueled quite a few murders. If social media is not working right, YOU might not die. Someone else might, though.
giantg2 6y ago
I do think about plumbing, sewer, ect. It's good to know how it works so that you can fix it. While moving thinking up the stack may be an option, I don't think that's really what's happening. People would rather use that time for leisure (look at digital consumption). Not to mention, knowing the basics of these services is very elementary. The people capable of thinking further up the stack would not be significantly impacted by possessing a basic understanding of simple services.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
syshum 6y ago
Well as I home owner I absolutely think about most of those things, and I want to understand how they work if for no other reason so I am not ripped off by a contractor should I need these systems repaired. On a macro scale I also want to understand them so I know how badly my utility is screwing me when they propose rate hikes and other things to justify their poor management covering that poor stewardship with need for "improvements" or other explinations that will be ignorated by the masses of people that "do not want to think about any of this things" This is known as Outsourcing your thinking, one should never do that I also do not at all want them "regulated and managed by a democratic authority". I neither want centrally planned systems nor do I want them to be managed "democratically" which is at the end of the say 2 wolves and lamb voting on what is for dinner.
ashton314 6y ago
Twitter is different than plumbing, sewage, currency, etc. because it was not created in response to an urgent need of sustaining life. While it might not have been clear at its inception, Twitter has changed how we thing about public discourse and politics. In the case of simple technologies, the needs of society drove the creation, implementation, and use of such things. Now, we have Twitter, the existence of which has changed our society in ways that Jack Dorsey & al. probably didn't intend. The big idea from Postman on this is that with simple technologies, the culture and the society drive their development and use. Whereas with bigger technologies (Internet, statistics, Twitter, etc.) start to shape society around them. I'm doing a poor job of explaining myself; Postman has more to say on page 23 onward of Technopoly if you're curious for a better explaination.

by cm277 6y ago

JumpCrisscross 6y ago

> you absolutely want them regulated and managed by a democratic authority too... Why is Twitter different? If my sewage or plumbing stop working, I get sick and die. If my Twitter stops working, nothing...I am not on Twitter. Lots of countries (e.g. Japan) do fine with a private postal service. And plenty (e.g. Panama or America in the era of free banking) do fine outsourcing their currency. I am not saying Twitter shouldn’t be regulated. Just that this isn’t the argument for it.

undreren 6y ago
It depends on what you mean by “stops working”. When social media becomes the primary driver of misinformation and anti-democratic sentiment, then it has arguably “stopped working”. While users might not be sick in the flesh, their minds will surely start to rot.
- bserge 6y ago
  And solving it by blocking Twitter is just so... human. The platforms aren't the problem, people are the problem. Education is piss poor, if that's not fixed/improved, we can go back to pre-industrial times and people would still vote for a moron who promises big things, never delivers and just grabs power for themselves. Financial/civic/political education in schools? Public-sponsored articles and videos debunking conspiracies? Nah, just ban Twitter, that'll solve it. People on either side of the fence believe they're right. Keep ignoring and belittling each other and it will lead to an even worse situation down the road.
  - undreren 6y ago
    In the end, unless we are talking about natural calamities, everything is a people problem. Are blocked sewer is a people problem; it’s either poorly designed, poorly constructed, poorly maintained or a combination of causes. But in the end, the problem is caused by people.
cm277 6y ago
Put more succinctly then: when a platform/technology becomes so successful that's used by a lot of people and/or other businesses built and depend on it, it (eventually) has to be regulated. If the prize of success is monopoly (as per Thiel), the price of success must be regulation.
- BlueTemplar 6y ago
  Indeed. But with platforms being privately owned and centralized, the scale at which they start being problematic is fairly small. The likes of Facebook/Twitter/YouTube have blown past this limit a long time ago. At this point it's too late for regulation. You can't effectively break them down. Nationalizing them is pretty much unfeasible since they have so many international users. So the only solution left seems to be to shut them down completely, and let the competition do their job (it won't take long, considering Internet timescales). But maybe before consider what kind of regulations these competitors will have to live under. (Maybe a built-in time limit before they are shut down in turn, and the cycle starts all over again ?)
- giantg2 6y ago
  If it's a monopoly, it should be broken apart. This could reduce or remove the need for regulation. Although maybe not in cases like this - protecting ignorant people from themselves because they can't think for themselves or fact check social media information. I'm not sure these problems can be regulated away either.
user-the-name 6y ago
Social media has fueled quite a few murders. If social media is not working right, YOU might not die. Someone else might, though.

giantg2 6y ago

I do think about plumbing, sewer, ect. It's good to know how it works so that you can fix it. While moving thinking up the stack may be an option, I don't think that's really what's happening. People would rather use that time for leisure (look at digital consumption). Not to mention, knowing the basics of these services is very elementary. The people capable of thinking further up the stack would not be significantly impacted by possessing a basic understanding of simple services.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

syshum 6y ago

Well as I home owner I absolutely think about most of those things, and I want to understand how they work if for no other reason so I am not ripped off by a contractor should I need these systems repaired. On a macro scale I also want to understand them so I know how badly my utility is screwing me when they propose rate hikes and other things to justify their poor management covering that poor stewardship with need for "improvements" or other explinations that will be ignorated by the masses of people that "do not want to think about any of this things" This is known as Outsourcing your thinking, one should never do that I also do not at all want them "regulated and managed by a democratic authority". I neither want centrally planned systems nor do I want them to be managed "democratically" which is at the end of the say 2 wolves and lamb voting on what is for dinner.

ashton314 6y ago

Twitter is different than plumbing, sewage, currency, etc. because it was not created in response to an urgent need of sustaining life. While it might not have been clear at its inception, Twitter has changed how we thing about public discourse and politics. In the case of simple technologies, the needs of society drove the creation, implementation, and use of such things. Now, we have Twitter, the existence of which has changed our society in ways that Jack Dorsey & al. probably didn't intend. The big idea from Postman on this is that with simple technologies, the culture and the society drive their development and use. Whereas with bigger technologies (Internet, statistics, Twitter, etc.) start to shape society around them. I'm doing a poor job of explaining myself; Postman has more to say on page 23 onward of Technopoly if you're curious for a better explaination.