Having clarified my idea with respect to the "Calimeri Patetica", I go back to talking about technology. Because we are observing a very strange phenomenon: of all the things that could be done, of all the possibilities opened up by new discoveries (from 3D printing to Artificial Intelligence, from drones to IoT), almost nothing is coming true.
Those who buy Alexa or other "artificial assistants" find very few functions, which are not very useful: oh, of course, as the advertisement says, a blind girl can ask Alexa if it is raining outside. But a blind person normally has a hearing that does not need Alexa. And if I asked you what is the USEFUL purpose of having these assistants at home, apart from making a talking alarm and playing music, the truth is that they are of no use.
A lot could be done, it's true. We would all have been happy to have devices capable of alerting us when we are too stressed, when we have to get up from the desk, INTELLIGENTLY.
We could talk about drones in all the sauces, about automation in all the sauces, about machines able to recognize our image, and the answer is always this: none of this is happening. Image recognition exists everywhere except where it would be needed, such as calling an ambulance if someone collapses on the ground: we are full of cameras and none that can call a doctor.
We were all delighted with the idea of having sensors on them that could alert us in advance of a heart attack, or of any problem to be addressed in time: today we are afraid of giving up sensitive data to someone who could use them against us. We were all happy to be able to order anything from an endless catalog and receive it tomorrow: today we know what life both the slaves who bring us the stuff and the merchants who use Amazon do. And we are afraid to do the same end on our workplace. Today we are afraid.
This fact, some say, is entirely questionable: but then why do we observe that the military world is proceeding fast? Because a sixth generation plane like the Tempest actually drives a pack of fighting drones, because the last ships mount a radar raised in the air by a drone, ditto for tanks, because the military is driving planes without using pilots and We still can't get a car to go, etc.
The difference between the civil and the military world is simple: politics. The military must not seek the consent of the masses. Their soldiers obey. Whether right or wrong, the point is that civilians have a policy, and today public opinion is afraid of technology.
BUT to say it all, we are not afraid of technology. We are afraid of those who manage it. There was a period, between the 90s and the 2000s, when every new thing was devoured by the market and every new technology made us dream of future developments.
But this was due to the fact that Google seemed to us an honest company and not a prominence of NSA, Facebook seemed to us the lucky parable of a young boy who wanted to make uzna university BBS and had created a colossus, instead of a fascist monster that aims to devastate society, democracy and the rule of law.
When the first social networks arrived in Italy we were under a kind of Stalinist dictatorship that dominated the it hierarchy. of Usenet. Clearly the arrival of online forums and things like Friendfeed were enthusiastically received. Now that Facebook has inscrutable moderators who decide on mysterious criteria and the whole society is moving towards Nazi "American way", we are beginning to think that after all we were not so bad.
We will never give our medical data to these OTTs, because we are afraid that our employer may buy them and decide to fire us before we get sick. We will never give data on our financial situation, regardless of the new European directives, because we are afraid that they will end up becoming a source of further discrimination. We don't want the police with the cameras, because we fear the abuses of the police forces: the Taser would be a beautiful invention, if we didn't fear that the police use it as an instrument of torture that leaves no marks.
But this is not technophobia. Rather, it is plutophobia: the fear of the ruling class that manages this technology.
We were all happy to be able to inform ourselves from endless sources, until some governments decided to fill social networks with terror, fear and anxiety, and we understood that they can really transform the world into a dictatorship of citizens who are closed all day. at home or in the office, for fear of things that don't exist.
But if you have FEAR that the technology ends up in the wrong hands, the problem is not to stop the technology: the problem is cutting hands. If you fear that the police will abuse the taser, the problem is not the taser: the problem is the police. If you are afraid of the misuse of bank data, the problem is not the big data: the problem is the banks.
When Bitcoin arrived and I was able to pay us something in Amsterdam, I became enthusiastic about it. Then the speculators arrived and made an exotic derivative, but the problem is not in bitcoin . It's in the speculators.
The real problem is that the population is attributing to the technology the malformations of the ruling class. There are several reasons.
- So many times he let himself run.
We all knew well that the police and the carabinieri were a bunch of fascists, and we all knew that for the men in uniform our rights are worth nothing. But we let it go, come on, two blows to a fool what do you want them to be? Now we are all opposed to pervasive facial recognition, because we wonder what would happen if such an instrument ended up in the hands of that scum in uniform.
But the question we should ask is "what happens if this technology ends up in the hands of the police we have"? We had to ask ourselves BEFORE "but what will happen when this police has facial recognition in hand?": We should have cleaned up the police, not castrating the technology.
2. So many times it seemed nice too.
For decades we have been deluging these crafty and crafty financiers, these environments where women are always young and perfect even when they are old, men are always powerful and fascinating, and money flows freely.
For decades we have been talking about markets as the home of efficiency, which we use as an "impartial" yardstick to judge everything from politics to personal qualities. It was cool, we liked Gordon Gekko, we would have liked to be him.
And so we let the world of finance grow like a pit of sadistic and power-hungry psychopaths, who enjoy their own superiority and intend to destroy all forms of solidarity between individuals, devastate welfare to make room for competition, and if you are not good enough then fuck and take a seat in the landfill of social waste.
Now that these evil psychopaths have powers like Big Data or artificial intelligence in their hands, we are frightened of all the discrimination they can put in place. Good. But instead of asking us what happens if our medical data ends up in the wrong hands, it would be time to ask ourselves what happens if the wrong hands get their hands on the medical data. And the wrong hands must be cut off, the databases not turned off.
Someone will now say: but then technology can slow down. Then "the bobolo" can do something.
No.
As I said, these technologies are being implemented by the military, at a fast pace. The secret services the techniques of espionage of mass develop them. Within multinationals, big data analytics methods continue to be developed, and we are all being profiled.
What is NOT happening is that the masses can enjoy the advantages of this technology: if a smart tap can save us on the water bill, we can mount it or the supplier can install it.
If we mount US, then WE save on the bill. If we DO NOT mount it, and only the company that supplies us with water mounts it, they save THEY on their bills. But not us.
If the facial recognition technologies only fit the police, the police can abuse them. But if you had this technology at your fingertips, you could easily recognize the violent policeman in the demonstrations, whether he carried the number on the jacket or not.
If you turn and are photographed continuously you can also be afraid that your face is used against you: but imagine that YOU are able to recognize the magistrate's face at the supermarket because the phone can tell you who you are around. Now it's the magistrate who sleeps badly. And the same goes for the drones: what will the police do when they realize that they are used to monitor the streets of the store and warn them when the police arrive?
And you may be afraid of being fired if your company finds that you are at risk of getting sick, but would things happen if you could diasnostate your boss?
The problem of the abuse of a power is that it only happens when power is in the hands of a few. If it is in everyone's hands, power is not such. If I could have the financial details of my insurance, they would be more afraid of me than I have of them. Instead they are the ones who have mine, and this is what provides power.
Curbing consumer technologies is counterproductive: they will be adopted at government level and at corporate level. In practice we are allowing governments, military and large companies to arm themselves with all the technological arsenal possible, while we remain with a sling and a club.
3. We let ourselves be trampled in dignity.
The dignity is the great absent of this century. When the big social networks started to trample people, everyone accepted it. This gave certain ruling classes the feeling that they could do everything.
A friend showed me how Tinder works on the women's side. Now, I don't think I have "secret" information: I had never been interested before, and it struck me. But let's face it: I could not bear the humiliation of being treated this way.
If I already had little interest (for obvious reasons) in social media like Tinder or Grindr, seeing how the relationship between supply and demand is managed has also taken away my curiosity. Honestly, a reproduction on a global scale of "today I throw it" that does not facilitate anything at all: the truth is that with Tinder you save time from entering a pub, ordering beer and sitting, but since everything is made for perpetuating exactly the same mechanism of balance between supply and demand that exists in the real world, Tinder does not facilitate anything.
Of course, Tinder does nothing but hide from the males the humiliation that they would suffer if they knew how it works "on the other side": almost none of those who grew up when the males still had a dignity and self-respect would accept to be treated that way.
The same can be said with social networks, from facebook which changes the conditions of use without being sent to the ass (I'm curious to know what would happen if you changed the conditions of use on the car, instead), to all the abuses successes so far.
The truth is that the vast number of users today is reduced to a commodity: on the one hand, it allows itself to be reduced to merchandise hoping to profit from it, on the other, when it realizes that technology giants take, take, take without giving anything , and there is no profit, so then they are wary of technology rather than those who administer it.
And it's not a problem of "rules": you can enforce all the rules you want, a camel will never win a swim against a dolphin. And then we know well that we are dealing with a class of entrepreneurs who are gangsters, they know they are and they boast of being one. Exactly how they defraud the tax authorities to pay very few taxes, they will defraud the rules that protect our rights to make profit.
It's time to stop asking questions about rules, laws and technologies: we have a problem with people. These ruling classes suck, we don't trust them and we wouldn't give them any advanced technology.
We take the piss out of talking about "rules for social networks" speaking in the plural, when we know well that we have problems with A social network, that in fact we only have ONE, and therefore the problem is not "regulating social networks ", But" disarming Mark Zuckerberg ". We delude ourselves when we say that we have to set "search engines" when "search" and "google" are synonymous: we know very well that the problem is not "to regulate social networks", but to stop Google.
We have no problems with RULES: we have PEOPLE problems. Our problems have a name: Zuckerberg, Bezos, Page, Cook, etc. And we have to start talking not about "the one" that we fear, but about THOSE we fear.
The problem is not to control the technology.
The problem is to control the ruling classes.
