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Allow me to open with a wildly speculative question: What if the internet were public interest technology? I mean "internet" the way most people understand it,

by recifs 2y ago

Allow me to open with a wildly speculative question: What if the internet were public interest technology? I mean "internet" the way most people understand it, which is to say our whole digital sphere, and by "public interest" I don't mean tinkering at the margins to reduce harm from some bad actors or painting some glossy ethics principles atop a pile of exploitative rent-seeking — I mean through and through, warts and all, an internet that works in support of a credible, pragmatic definition of the common good.

imagineerschool 2y ago
We'd start with a group of people centered around agreement on "credible, pragmatic definition of the common good" I'm in.
- its_ethan 2y ago
  And history has no examples of times when a group of people centered around agreement on their version of common good going poorly, right? Right??
  - digging 2y ago
    Better then to just not work toward the common good?
    - its_ethan 2y ago
      Better to let ideas compete and build consensus than to surrender decision making abilities that effect everyone over to some arbitrary group of people that we are just told to trust (but don't worry they have good intentions). We don't currently have a select group of people who share a vision of "common good" making decisions for us, and yet things keep improving. So I'd advocate we stick with what we know is working, rather than the above surrendering of autonomy in exchange for the promise of some utopia..
      - digging 2y ago
        Ok, I suppose we were arguing different points, but I disagree with your arguments. > yet things keep improving I mean, that's just obviously not true.
        its_ethan 2y ago
        I have no doubt you could find some metrics to show a recent decline in, but (on the whole) is the average human not better off in the year 2024 than they were in 1954? 1924? 1824? I do have a feeling we're not talking about the same thing here, so could you clarify how it's "obviously not true" that things have been/are improving?
        digging 2y ago
        I'm referring to the internet, not the whole of human existence. That would be too complicated a subject to make any such simplistic statements on. But actually I also disagree with your premise that we don't have small corrupt groups already deciding what's "best" for everyone, WRT the internet or life as a whole. Just because they're openly motivated by greed doesn't make them less harmful. It's the cabals atop Google and Facebook which ushered in an age of absolute surveillance on a mass scale, how cool and fun.
        its_ethan 2y ago
        I never said anything about corruption one way or another, I said we don't have groups with an agreed upon definition of "common good" - look at basically any healthy decision-making group (government, party planning committee, whatever) and you'll find two sides with differing definitions. I think we'd maybe both agree that Google and Facebook ushering in "absolute surveillance" probably came about from a single-minded view of "common good" within those companies - aka an example of a group of people aligned on a common good leading to things going poorly. But it's silly to think that some other group with a different (but also single-minded) definition of common good is going to somehow fix all the problems and not cause new, potentially worse, problems. That's what I was attempting to get at with my initial comment. Given that we weren't even really talking about the same thing from the start, and that I don't care enough to continue, I'm gonna opt out from this convo. Have a nice day though.
Gormo 2y ago
The moment you try to define a singular "common good", you wind up with a variety of competing factions all putting forth their own wildly divergent and often contradictory notions of what that common good consists of. Most people have an unfortunate tendency to project their own values and preferences onto the world at large, and fail to recognize when they cross the boundary out of their own spaces and into other people's. Recognizing this means advancing solutions that primarily aim to minimize conflict among many parties, each pursuing their own particular concept of the good within their own boundaries, and avoiding trying to universalize any singular set of terminal values. Attempting to pursue solutions that depend on everyone agreeing on the same set of terminal values will always fail, and will often generate intense conflict that escalates well beyond the bounds of the original question and causes a great deal of collateral damage.
- mistermann 2y ago
  This (the last 2 paragraphs) certainly seems correct, but what if the fact of the matter is you have it ~backwards?
  - Gormo 2y ago
    Then I supposed I'd have to re-evaluate my priors. Are there any 'facts of the matter' that might substantiate an alternate conclusion?
- digging 2y ago
  > The moment you try to define a singular "common good", you wind up with a variety of competing factions all putting forth their own wildly divergent and often contradictory notions of what that common good consists of. Yes, that's called compromise. It's basically one of the foundations of society and civilization. It's not a blocker for public-interest projects.
  - cheeseomlit 2y ago
    'Compromise' paints an idealistic picture, its often just a euphemism for 'the more powerful/entrenched party gets what they want by default, but they'll let the other side vocally express their frustration to maintain the veneer of an actual conversation.' What you're describing sounds like a top-down restructuring of the internet at large, which is a golden opportunity for any interested party to restructure it in their favor. Whoever has the means will do so, and it will not be motivated by public interest since the public are not the ones with the means. When I hear "an internet that works in support of a credible, pragmatic definition of the common good", to me that translates to "we're going to turn the surveillance up to 11 and ban encryption to combat CSAM", because that's how such projects pan out in reality
atoav 2y ago
I mean to be honest something like the early social media platforms like myspace or even reddit up to a degree were public interest platforms. And back then nobody really thought all that mich about financing, so these spaces weren't about extracting user data or shaping their opinions. The algorithms were simplistic as hell and the timelines still deserved that name. The state runs libraries not just to give people access to books, but also because they are social community spaces. Why not provide something like that, just online. Something that doesn't need to make money, but provide a service that people can trust in a different way that a corporation.

by recifs 2y ago

imagineerschool 2y ago

We'd start with a group of people centered around agreement on "credible, pragmatic definition of the common good" I'm in.

its_ethan 2y ago
And history has no examples of times when a group of people centered around agreement on their version of common good going poorly, right? Right??
- digging 2y ago
  Better then to just not work toward the common good?
  - its_ethan 2y ago
    Better to let ideas compete and build consensus than to surrender decision making abilities that effect everyone over to some arbitrary group of people that we are just told to trust (but don't worry they have good intentions). We don't currently have a select group of people who share a vision of "common good" making decisions for us, and yet things keep improving. So I'd advocate we stick with what we know is working, rather than the above surrendering of autonomy in exchange for the promise of some utopia..
    - digging 2y ago
      Ok, I suppose we were arguing different points, but I disagree with your arguments. > yet things keep improving I mean, that's just obviously not true.
      - its_ethan 2y ago
        I have no doubt you could find some metrics to show a recent decline in, but (on the whole) is the average human not better off in the year 2024 than they were in 1954? 1924? 1824? I do have a feeling we're not talking about the same thing here, so could you clarify how it's "obviously not true" that things have been/are improving?
        digging 2y ago
        I'm referring to the internet, not the whole of human existence. That would be too complicated a subject to make any such simplistic statements on. But actually I also disagree with your premise that we don't have small corrupt groups already deciding what's "best" for everyone, WRT the internet or life as a whole. Just because they're openly motivated by greed doesn't make them less harmful. It's the cabals atop Google and Facebook which ushered in an age of absolute surveillance on a mass scale, how cool and fun.
        its_ethan 2y ago
        I never said anything about corruption one way or another, I said we don't have groups with an agreed upon definition of "common good" - look at basically any healthy decision-making group (government, party planning committee, whatever) and you'll find two sides with differing definitions. I think we'd maybe both agree that Google and Facebook ushering in "absolute surveillance" probably came about from a single-minded view of "common good" within those companies - aka an example of a group of people aligned on a common good leading to things going poorly. But it's silly to think that some other group with a different (but also single-minded) definition of common good is going to somehow fix all the problems and not cause new, potentially worse, problems. That's what I was attempting to get at with my initial comment. Given that we weren't even really talking about the same thing from the start, and that I don't care enough to continue, I'm gonna opt out from this convo. Have a nice day though.

Gormo 2y ago

The moment you try to define a singular "common good", you wind up with a variety of competing factions all putting forth their own wildly divergent and often contradictory notions of what that common good consists of. Most people have an unfortunate tendency to project their own values and preferences onto the world at large, and fail to recognize when they cross the boundary out of their own spaces and into other people's. Recognizing this means advancing solutions that primarily aim to minimize conflict among many parties, each pursuing their own particular concept of the good within their own boundaries, and avoiding trying to universalize any singular set of terminal values. Attempting to pursue solutions that depend on everyone agreeing on the same set of terminal values will always fail, and will often generate intense conflict that escalates well beyond the bounds of the original question and causes a great deal of collateral damage.

mistermann 2y ago
This (the last 2 paragraphs) certainly seems correct, but what if the fact of the matter is you have it ~backwards?
- Gormo 2y ago
  Then I supposed I'd have to re-evaluate my priors. Are there any 'facts of the matter' that might substantiate an alternate conclusion?
digging 2y ago
> The moment you try to define a singular "common good", you wind up with a variety of competing factions all putting forth their own wildly divergent and often contradictory notions of what that common good consists of. Yes, that's called compromise. It's basically one of the foundations of society and civilization. It's not a blocker for public-interest projects.
- cheeseomlit 2y ago
  'Compromise' paints an idealistic picture, its often just a euphemism for 'the more powerful/entrenched party gets what they want by default, but they'll let the other side vocally express their frustration to maintain the veneer of an actual conversation.' What you're describing sounds like a top-down restructuring of the internet at large, which is a golden opportunity for any interested party to restructure it in their favor. Whoever has the means will do so, and it will not be motivated by public interest since the public are not the ones with the means. When I hear "an internet that works in support of a credible, pragmatic definition of the common good", to me that translates to "we're going to turn the surveillance up to 11 and ban encryption to combat CSAM", because that's how such projects pan out in reality

atoav 2y ago

I mean to be honest something like the early social media platforms like myspace or even reddit up to a degree were public interest platforms. And back then nobody really thought all that mich about financing, so these spaces weren't about extracting user data or shaping their opinions. The algorithms were simplistic as hell and the timelines still deserved that name. The state runs libraries not just to give people access to books, but also because they are social community spaces. Why not provide something like that, just online. Something that doesn't need to make money, but provide a service that people can trust in a different way that a corporation.