Greed and tech or beyond monetizing eyeballs
Soundtrack "Groundhog" Bryan Sutton and Billy Strings. From Live at the Legion.
What a week for tech
According to CNBC, this past week "...the U.S. tech industry’s eight trillion-dollar companies gained a combined $420 billion in market cap, lifting their total value to $21 trillion..." Also, the White House hosted 33 tech executives paying homage (nice way to say polishing balls) to the president's leadership to power American AI dominance.
Part of the bump up in tech mega cap stocks was the "best case" outcome for Google US search antitrust case. Means everything is full speed ahead for tech in USA as they crow to the administration about the investments they are making in 'Merican AI. Tesla also announced a potential $1T pay package for their CEO. Well bless their hearts as they say down South.
As the US of A gave Google a minor wrist slap, the EU fined Google $3.5 billion for antitrust and as a result of the good ball polishing the White House made ominous noises about EU tariffs.
Finally, AP published "Detailed findings from AP investigation into how US tech firms enabled China’s digital police state", which is a damming indictment of how technology firms are happy to sell their kit to support very nasty use cases.
Dark Patterns
The ubiquitous behavioral and financial surveillance and sales of this information has driven the growth, revenue, and profitability of some of the biggest tech companies. The massive weight of the profit is used to block privacy and other regulation that could impede the money flow.
Since the last century, mega-tech made the case that impediments to their industry such concentration (antitrust), data rape (the collection, exploitation, and sale of private data), and use of imported cheap labor are necessary to ensure American competitiveness and innovation. They have largely been successful heading off antitrust issues, privacy regulation, and restraint on the H1B program (less expensive captive labor.)
The techno-elite believe that existing regulations don't apply to their world "changing" business models (fever visions.) Out running new regulation is part of the playbook. Since their behavioral and financial surveillance machines print money, their many lawyers and lobbyists make those arguments day after day and grind down the opposition. While they do not like regulations applying to them, they like to exploit legalities to stifle competition with endless patent disputes and enforcement of copyright.
Another tireless play is the self-protecting boiler plate terms of service or end users license agreement (EULAs) that can be opaque and are often unread by consumers or even enterprises. Though firms may disclose how they use private information in privacy policies, many over-collect and over-share or monetize private information with data brokers or advertisers.
Starting on the early 2000s, analysts started describing the potential for the mega-tech firms sitting on piles of cash being able to defend their firm's business model by buying smaller innovative companies. It is kinda like a tabloid "catch and kill" strategy. This has become a reality. A reality that provides a pipeline for you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours venture capitalist incest to pump and dump their start ups. Often with a nod and a wink toward their clubish relationships with their other big tech executive friends.
The phrase, "we're just an arms dealer" became prevalent in the technology vernacular in the first decade of this century. It was initially meant to explain that competing channels such as hosting providers and enterprise customers might have different and competing interests but the technology provider was just providing the kit and was neutral. It then evolved into the sense that technology providers cannot be accountable for how their technology is used by some bad actors..."we just provide the technology what our customers do with it is out of our control."
Karma, Bad Business, and the End of the Gravy Train
Information technology and more generally technology is a facet that drives big cycles of human history and warfare. Some of the famous cycle viewpoints are Kondratiev waves or the longer waves described as the Saeculum by Stauss-Howe in their writings about generations and the Fourth Turning.
Though these cyclical theories are not accepted as dogma, they imply the technology cycle associated with information and communication technologies (ICT) which started in the 1970s is concluding in a disruptive context. General views on technology S-curves also imply inevitable commodification or replacement of technologies.
The leadership of the mega-tech firms are not happy with the prospect of ICT commoditization and not being the dominant societal technology wave. They say artificial intelligence (AI) is the new technology wave driving the next Kondratiev wave and they are using their massive influence capabilities to guide society's perspective to align with their wishing and hoping.
Those of you who want a contrarian view on AI read Ed Zitron's Where's your Ed At or listen to his Better Offline podcast. He explains well how the current AI bubble will crash over the next few years. Since he has written a half million words on the topic 'nough said.
AI has some valuable use case such as machine learning for predictive maintenance but it is only an element of traditional ICT. However some of the applications of the technology are just chilling when you read how US tech firms enabled China's digital police state. In a nutshell, when people were inaccurately flagged by predictive policing systems, they were punished anyway without hope of due process because the systems are not explainable because they are black boxes. Today's tech firms are over-hyping similar tech and fervently pitching to government and getting government contracts. Both for policing and warfare. What me worry?
It is trendy for AI-illuminati to have a perspective on AI's chances to kill off humanity, this meme is valuable to its proponents to underline its importance and more importantly unfettered investment in the tech-military-industrial complex. In the end, the AI bubble will deflate and the outsized profits of big tech will erode.
However, there is some non-zero chance we will be saddled with the technology equivalent of the Stasi and have limited means to defend ourselves from opaque algorithms.
