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The final act of the dystopic digital transition we are witnessing is when the (until recently ringfenced) information flows of the broader financial system sta

The final act of the dystopic digital transition we are witnessing is when the (until recently ringfenced) information flows of the broader financial system start getting commingled with the other digital activity already being collected and monitored. With the headlong rush to eliminate physical cash soon there will be no opt-out whatsoever. As the world of old oligopolies dies and a worse one emerges, the grotesque and frightening outline of a handful mega-digi-corps that are the defacto rulers of the brave new world is already visible. There must be some escape hatch from this nightmare, some red lever behind a glass encasing with a label "break and pull when your society is in existential danger". But I don't see it.

debacle 4y ago
Dick predicted all of this before many of us were even alive. There is likely no escape from an inhuman future.
- oleganza 4y ago
  OTOH, was there really a time when humans were not enslaving each other in any form? I don't mean in a wide marxist term like "wage slave", but more specific kinds of bonding and control. Liberal changes in Europe in end of 18th century / beginning of 19th coincided with imported slavery from Africa and new colonies. That is freer factory worker would gain their productivity and better relative freedom while producing added value to raw materials produced by serfs elsewhere. In 20th century you either had direct serfdom in some countries like Russia, while countries like US owned slaves indirectly by setting up large-scale production in 3rd world countries and controlling their governments. Today we could probably breakdown the supply chain so that the lower you go by the ladder of "added value complexity", the more interchangeable and less free the people are. On the top of such chain there are managers, IT people, accountants and various service workers for the above who enjoy freedom while the bottom half of the supply chain is much more prosaic and constrained.
  - college_physics 4y ago
    I still hold the (maybe naive) belief that the path from the slave empires of previous eras to today was a benign one. The many deficiencies, setbacks etc cannot negate this relative ranking, even if (like Graeber and co might argue) we are conditioning on a particularly negative societal development some millennia ago. What is really disappointing is that today people have the illusion that somehow we have learned how to keep overbearing power concentration in check whereas it is manifestly not so. The informed and educated "middle class" that should know better (because it is its own existence that is at stake) is missing in action. [My take: A small fraction of it co-opted by the promise of joining the ruling elite, while the majority pushed down into the precariat] The result is that the same old monsters re-emerge, now in digital clothes.
minton 4y ago
I think people underestimate the importance of physical cash. It’s annoying, sure, but it affords a type of freedom that won’t be replaced once lost. I wish more people understood this. Sadly, most people seem willing to trade a tiny bit of convenience today for a worse future tomorrow—for example, the tipless, cash-only coffee shop on the HN front page. I guess, like smokers, people don’t believe there’ll be consequences until it’s too late.
- phpisthebest 4y ago
  >>I guess, like smokers, people don’t believe there’ll be consequences until it’s too late. I wonder with this comment is irony or not? So let me ask, did you support the banning of smoking by government there by denying people the right to body autonomy, deny business the right to control their property, and deny consumers the right to choose for themselves the types of business they transact with? (aka freedom of association) all under the mantra of "the greater good" Because if you support that infringement upon liberty then it is indeed ironic for you to then use smokers as a prop to talk about further governmental infringement to liberty
  - SketchySeaBeast 4y ago
    I think all they were saying with that is that the long term consequences of smoking is often a problem that isn't apparent until it's too late, which is very much true, but it seems some jimmies were rustled.
- college_physics 4y ago
  what I find baffling is that supposedly enlightened societies like Sweden are at the forefront of this cashless "revolution". Maybe they are simply overconfident / delusional about their ability to control the risks of the digital age or maybe the progressiveness was a shtick all along, confined to signature issues and not applicable towards the outstanding challenge of building a truly democratic and free digital society.
- noughtme 4y ago
  The best analogy i've heard for digital currency is not that digital currency is the automobile to cash's horse drawn carriage, but that cash is a bicycle. both can (and should) co exist. the low tech cash is a better solution for many problems, and people without access to digital currency, but it risks being displaced by lobbyists and needs to be protected by the efforts of private citizens.

debacle 4y ago

Dick predicted all of this before many of us were even alive. There is likely no escape from an inhuman future.

oleganza 4y ago
OTOH, was there really a time when humans were not enslaving each other in any form? I don't mean in a wide marxist term like "wage slave", but more specific kinds of bonding and control. Liberal changes in Europe in end of 18th century / beginning of 19th coincided with imported slavery from Africa and new colonies. That is freer factory worker would gain their productivity and better relative freedom while producing added value to raw materials produced by serfs elsewhere. In 20th century you either had direct serfdom in some countries like Russia, while countries like US owned slaves indirectly by setting up large-scale production in 3rd world countries and controlling their governments. Today we could probably breakdown the supply chain so that the lower you go by the ladder of "added value complexity", the more interchangeable and less free the people are. On the top of such chain there are managers, IT people, accountants and various service workers for the above who enjoy freedom while the bottom half of the supply chain is much more prosaic and constrained.
- college_physics 4y ago
  I still hold the (maybe naive) belief that the path from the slave empires of previous eras to today was a benign one. The many deficiencies, setbacks etc cannot negate this relative ranking, even if (like Graeber and co might argue) we are conditioning on a particularly negative societal development some millennia ago. What is really disappointing is that today people have the illusion that somehow we have learned how to keep overbearing power concentration in check whereas it is manifestly not so. The informed and educated "middle class" that should know better (because it is its own existence that is at stake) is missing in action. [My take: A small fraction of it co-opted by the promise of joining the ruling elite, while the majority pushed down into the precariat] The result is that the same old monsters re-emerge, now in digital clothes.

minton 4y ago

I think people underestimate the importance of physical cash. It’s annoying, sure, but it affords a type of freedom that won’t be replaced once lost. I wish more people understood this. Sadly, most people seem willing to trade a tiny bit of convenience today for a worse future tomorrow—for example, the tipless, cash-only coffee shop on the HN front page. I guess, like smokers, people don’t believe there’ll be consequences until it’s too late.

phpisthebest 4y ago
>>I guess, like smokers, people don’t believe there’ll be consequences until it’s too late. I wonder with this comment is irony or not? So let me ask, did you support the banning of smoking by government there by denying people the right to body autonomy, deny business the right to control their property, and deny consumers the right to choose for themselves the types of business they transact with? (aka freedom of association) all under the mantra of "the greater good" Because if you support that infringement upon liberty then it is indeed ironic for you to then use smokers as a prop to talk about further governmental infringement to liberty
- SketchySeaBeast 4y ago
  I think all they were saying with that is that the long term consequences of smoking is often a problem that isn't apparent until it's too late, which is very much true, but it seems some jimmies were rustled.
college_physics 4y ago
what I find baffling is that supposedly enlightened societies like Sweden are at the forefront of this cashless "revolution". Maybe they are simply overconfident / delusional about their ability to control the risks of the digital age or maybe the progressiveness was a shtick all along, confined to signature issues and not applicable towards the outstanding challenge of building a truly democratic and free digital society.
noughtme 4y ago
The best analogy i've heard for digital currency is not that digital currency is the automobile to cash's horse drawn carriage, but that cash is a bicycle. both can (and should) co exist. the low tech cash is a better solution for many problems, and people without access to digital currency, but it risks being displaced by lobbyists and needs to be protected by the efforts of private citizens.