Kind: Reads

Read The Fourth Industrial Revolution Won’t Trickle Down, Under Capitalism by Aabid Firdausi (Socialist Economist)

Most economists suffer from misplaced optimism about the oncoming Fourth Industrial Revolution. Some reskilling here and there would suffice to spread its benefits to all workers. They ignore how capitalism invents and employs technology for profits, not people.

I first came across the idea of the third and fourth industrial revolutions (3IR and 4IR) in Jackson Rising, where the technologies of these present and upcoming revolutions were seen as potentially liberatory, if used in the right way.  The possibilities are exciting, with (amongst other things) fablabs enabling manufacture to move local, and an open web allowing information resources to be shared globally.

Unsurprisingly though, there’s a very capitalist potential outcome of 3IR and 4IR too.

Like the previous revolutions, it *could* be liberatory, or it *could* as easily reinforce existing inequalities. The historical record isn’t too great in terms of global equality and liberation.

This article makes the argument for ensuring these revolutions are for liberatory ends.

“how technology is put to use fundamentally remains a social choice and a “global network of resistance” to the way the emerging technologies are utilised “is both necessary and feasible.”

To me that’s a given really – shame the article doesn’t go into much detail on actual strategy. (Which Cooperation Jackson do in great detail.)

There’s much more to 3/4IR, but selectively quoting from the connectivity and communication parts, as they piqued my IndieWeb interest:

“While social networking provides relatively open spaces for public expression, the immense wealth that is generated by the techno-capitalists shows us that even public spaces can become a profitable business model.”

“necessitates the need for resistance against the tendencies of capitalism in general that has historically encroached upon public spaces for profit.”

Here’s to being part of a global network of resistance.

Third and fourth industrial revolutions for liberatory ends

Read Local-first software: You own your data, in spite of the cloud by Ink & Switch (inkandswitch.com)

A new generation of collaborative software that allows users to retain ownership of their data.

I like this concept of “local-first software”.  This is a very comprehensive survey.

Foundational part of it are Conflict-free Replicated Data Types.  Can’t say I know a thing about the details, but they sound pretty good:

CRDTs emerged from academic computer science research in 2011. They are general-purpose data structures, like hash maps and lists, but the special thing about them is that they are multi-user from the ground up.

Just as packet switching was an enabling technology for the Internet and the web, or as capacitive touchscreens were an enabling technology for smartphones, so we think CRDTs may be the foundation for collaborative software that gives users full ownership of their data.

Read Straws in the wind… which future of work are we heading for? – RSA (thersa.org)

Our latest report portrays four alternate futures of work. What clues do current trends give us for the future that awaits us?

I like speculative future scenario planning, as a way of outlining possible alternatives and encouraging agency towards which one we actual want. Peter Frase’s Four Futures is a great book on this, from a general socio-economic view. So I like the idea of doing this from a technological perspective. Cooperatives and mutuals appear in the “Exodus Economy” future, in response to an economic slowdown. (I wouldn’t want the assumption to be that this is the only way they will appear, but I guess that’s not the intention of the authors.)

https://www.thersa.org/discover/publications-and-articles/rsa-blogs/2019/03/straws-in-the-wind-which-future-of-work-are-we-heading-for

Read The Player of Games by Iain M. Banks ( )
Just finished The Player of Games (Iain M Banks) – also really enjoyable.  Less cinematic than Consider Phlebas (though still nicely paced), and a bit more to chew on philosophically.  The contrast of the hierarchical Azadian empire and the egalitarian Culture is interesting.  Gurgeh, the main character, from the Culture, finds some appeal in the way things work in Azad.  Azad feels like a caricature of Western society as it is today – superficially advanced and urbane, but with some real darkness hidden away, out of sight.
Read Consider Phlebas by Iain M. Banks ( )
Really enjoyed Consider Phlebas (Iain M. Banks).  It was a rip-roaring read.  Very visual and cinematic, I can still conjure up a picture of a lot of the scenes in my head.  Enjoyed the brief intro it gives to the Culture, too – the post-scarcity socialist society that are featured in a lot more books in the Culture series.  Interested to see how that’s explored further.  I’ve just started reading the next in the series, The Player of Games.

After this I think I’ll try some Kim Stanley Robinson – more speculative socialist futures as far as I understand.

Read Protocol Cooperativism?: Platform Cooperativism by Matthew Slater (Platform Cooperativism)

To break down capitalism, coops should focus on shared protocols, not platform coops that replicate platform capitalist systems.

Interesting argument that we should view protocols as the digital means of production, more so than platforms. And that ‘protocol cooperatives’ will do more to break down capitalism than platform coops will. I think the main argument being that platform coops are inherently centralised, and that as far as challenging capital goes, we should be striving for decentralised architectures. I think the argument being we should have coops that interoperate on top of a shared protocol; not one coop that dominates an entire market with a platform.

Relates somewhat to the Statebook article, which argued that the state would serve us better if it focused on building and promoting shared protocols, not on building a Facebook alternative.

Read Beyond “Taming” the Tech Giants by Wendy Liu (New Socialist)

To truly challenge the power of the tech giants, we need more than better regulation. We need class struggle.

If neoliberalism is a class project, then Silicon Valley is the industrial manifestation of neoliberalism applied to technology. Silicon Valley is a class project. To abolish it needs large structural transformation. We need to change the balance of class forces, tipping it away from capital and in favour of labour. Worker organisation from below, with a change in conception of what a tech worker is. Start taking lucrative technologies out of the capital-accumulation process.

“Tackling the problem at the root requires that we *abolish* Silicon Valley.”

https://newsocialist.org.uk/beyond-taming-the-tech-giants/

Read Disrupting the climate by Duncan McCann (neweconomics.org)

Digital technology has an impact on climate change in three distinct ways – all of which we need to radically change if we want a chance of preventing climate chaos.

Digital technology’s effect on the environment.

It uses a lot of raw materials; produces a lot of CO2 in manufacture; and the ‘cloud’ uses a vast amount of energy in use.

“What we really need is a whole new way of thinking about digital technology. In a world focused on ownership driven by conspicuous consumption, in the thralls of a digital revolution, we have created a sprawling global beast that might consume our society as well as ever greater amounts of energy and resources.”

Things we should do: use materials more efficiently; make things more repairable; use renewable energy.

I’d probably also add ‘abolish capitalism’ to the list.

https://neweconomics.org/2018/11/disrupting-the-climate

Read What to do once you admit that decentralizing everything never seems to work by Nathan Schneider (Hackernoon)

Lots of tech projects these days, especially crypto-networks, aspire to decentralization. Or their evangelists say they do, because they feel they need to. Decentralization is the new disruption—the thing everything worth its salt (and a huge ICO) is supposed to be doing.

Really good article by @ntnsndr: https://hackernoon.com/decentralizing-everything-never-seems-to-work-2bb0461bd168.

I’m intrigued by the idea of where centralisation arises in decentralised systems. Is the protocol by which decentralised apps communicate a point of centralisation? Maybe you need some things centralised to facilitate decentralisation. Is that then a single point of failure?

Personally think it’s healthy to see a plurality of decentralised protocols, and it’s even better to see them bridging to each other. All about the bridges.