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msgstr "fr"
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:6
msgid "How to Destroy Surveillance Capitalism"
msgstr "Comment détruire le capitalisme de la surveillance"
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><authorgroup><author><firstname>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:11
msgid "Cory"
msgstr "Cory"
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><authorgroup><author><surname>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:12
msgid "Doctorow"
msgstr "Doctorow"
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><publisher><address>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:17
#, no-wrap
msgid "<city>Oslo</city>"
msgstr "<city>Oslo</city>"
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:15
msgid ""
"<publisher> <publishername>Petter Reinholdtsen</publishername> <placeholder "
"type=\"address\" id=\"0\"/> </publisher> <copyright> <year>2020</year> "
"<holder>Petter Reinholdtsen</holder> </copyright>"
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><legalnotice><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:32
msgid "How to Destroy Surveillance Capitalism by Cory Doctorow."
msgstr "Comment détruire le capitalisme de la surveillance par Cory Doctorow."
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><legalnotice><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:35
msgid "Published by Petter Reinholdtsen."
msgstr "Publié par Petter Reinholdtsen."
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><legalnotice><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:39
msgid "ISBN 978-82-93828-XX-X (hard cover)"
msgstr "ISBN 978-82-93828-XX-X (édition reliée)"
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><legalnotice><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:42
msgid "ISBN 978-82-93828-XX-X (paperback)"
msgstr "ISBN 978-82-93828-XX-X (livre de poche)"
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><legalnotice><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:45
msgid "ISBN 978-82-93828-XX-X (ePub)"
msgstr "ISBN 978-82-93828-XX-X (ePub)"
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><legalnotice><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:49
msgid ""
-"This book is available for purchase from <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.lulu.com/\"/>."
+"This book is available for purchase from <ulink url=\"https://www.lulu.com/"
+"\"/>."
msgstr ""
-"Ce livre est disponible à la vente sur <ulink url=\"https://www.lulu.com/\""
-"/>."
+"Ce livre est disponible à la vente sur <ulink url=\"https://www.lulu.com/\"/"
+">."
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msgstr ""
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-"corrections sur le texte traduit, veuillez mettre à jour <ulink url=\"https"
-"://hosted.weblate.org/projects/rms-personal-data-safe/"
-"how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism/fr/\"/>."
+"corrections sur le texte traduit, veuillez mettre à jour <ulink url="
+"\"https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/rms-personal-data-safe/how-to-destroy-"
+"surveillance-capitalism/fr/\"/>."
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#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><legalnotice><para><inlinemediaobject><textobject><phrase>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:68
msgid "Creative Commons, Some rights reserved"
msgstr "Creative Commons, certains droits réservés"
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><legalnotice><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:60
msgid "<placeholder type=\"inlinemediaobject\" id=\"0\"/>"
msgstr "<placeholder type=\"inlinemediaobject\" id=\"0\"/>"
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><legalnotice><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:75
msgid ""
"This book is licensed under a Creative Commons license. This license permits "
"any use of this work, so long as attribution is given and no derivatived "
"visitez <ulink url=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/\"/>."
#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><abstract><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:84
msgid ""
-"Our devices and services gather most of the data that the NSA mines for its "
-"surveillance project. We pay for these devices and the services they connect "
-"to, and then we painstakingly perform the data-entry tasks associated with "
-"logging facts about our lives, opinions, and preferences."
-msgstr ""
-
-#. type: Content of: <article><articleinfo><abstract><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:91
-msgid ""
-"Thanks to Big Tech, Surveillance capitalism is everywhere. This is not "
-"because it is really good at manipulating our behaviour, or the rogue abuse "
-"of corporate power. It is the result of unchecked monopolism and the "
-"abusive behavior it abets. It is the system working as intended and "
-"expected. Cory Doctorow has written an extended critique of Shoshana "
-"Zuboff's The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at "
-"the New Frontier of Power, with a non-magical analysis of the problem "
-"leading to a different proposal for a solution."
+"The Science Fiction author, journalist and technology activist Cory Doctorow "
+"have a look at what really is behind \"Surveillance Capitalism\" and what "
+"should be done to stop it."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:105
msgid "The net of a thousand lies"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:107
msgid ""
"The most surprising thing about the rebirth of flat Earthers in the 21st "
"century is just how widespread the evidence against them is. You can "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:115
msgid ""
"But today, when elementary schools routinely dangle GoPro cameras from "
"balloons and loft them high enough to photograph the Earth’s curve — to say "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:122
msgid ""
"Likewise for white nationalism and eugenics: In an age where you can become "
"a computational genomics datapoint by swabbing your cheek and mailing it to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:128
msgid ""
"We are living through a golden age of both readily available facts and "
"denial of those facts. Terrible ideas that have lingered on the fringes for "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:134
msgid ""
"When an obscure idea gains currency, there are only two things that can "
"explain its ascendance: Either the person expressing that idea has gotten a "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:147
msgid ""
-"The arguments for ridiculous beliefs in odious conspiracies like "
-"anti-vaccination, climate denial, a flat Earth, and eugenics are no better "
-"than they were a generation ago. Indeed, they’re worse because they are "
-"being pitched to people who have at least a background awareness of the "
-"refuting facts."
+"The arguments for ridiculous beliefs in odious conspiracies like anti-"
+"vaccination, climate denial, a flat Earth, and eugenics are no better than "
+"they were a generation ago. Indeed, they’re worse because they are being "
+"pitched to people who have at least a background awareness of the refuting "
+"facts."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:154
msgid ""
-"Anti-vax has been around since the first vaccines, but the early "
-"anti-vaxxers were pitching people who were less equipped to understand even "
-"the most basic ideas from microbiology, and moreover, those people had not "
+"Anti-vax has been around since the first vaccines, but the early anti-"
+"vaxxers were pitching people who were less equipped to understand even the "
+"most basic ideas from microbiology, and moreover, those people had not "
"witnessed the extermination of mass-murdering diseases like polio, smallpox, "
"and measles. Today’s anti-vaxxers are no more eloquent than their forebears, "
"and they have a much harder job."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:163
msgid ""
"So can these far-fetched conspiracy theorists really be succeeding on the "
"basis of superior arguments?"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:167
msgid ""
"Some people think so. Today, there is a widespread belief that machine "
"learning and commercial surveillance can turn even the most fumble-tongued "
"conspiracy theorist into a svengali who can warp your perceptions and win "
-"your belief by locating vulnerable people and then pitching them with "
-"A.I.-refined arguments that bypass their rational faculties and turn "
-"everyday people into flat Earthers, anti-vaxxers, or even Nazis. When the "
-"RAND Corporation <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_reports/RR400/RR453/RAND_RR453.pdf\">blames "
-"Facebook for <quote>radicalization</quote></ulink> and when Facebook’s role "
-"in spreading coronavirus misinformation is <ulink "
-"url=\"https://secure.avaaz.org/campaign/en/facebook_threat_health/\">blamed "
-"on its algorithm</ulink>, the implicit message is that machine learning and "
-"surveillance are causing the changes in our consensus about what’s true."
+"your belief by locating vulnerable people and then pitching them with A.I.-"
+"refined arguments that bypass their rational faculties and turn everyday "
+"people into flat Earthers, anti-vaxxers, or even Nazis. When the RAND "
+"Corporation <ulink url=\"https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/"
+"research_reports/RR400/RR453/RAND_RR453.pdf\">blames Facebook for "
+"<quote>radicalization</quote></ulink> and when Facebook’s role in spreading "
+"coronavirus misinformation is <ulink url=\"https://secure.avaaz.org/campaign/"
+"en/facebook_threat_health/\">blamed on its algorithm</ulink>, the implicit "
+"message is that machine learning and surveillance are causing the changes in "
+"our consensus about what’s true."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:183
msgid ""
"After all, in a world where sprawling and incoherent conspiracy theories "
"like Pizzagate and its successor, QAnon, have widespread followings, "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:188
msgid ""
"But what if there’s another explanation? What if it’s the material "
"circumstances, and not the arguments, that are making the difference for "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:198
msgid ""
"If it’s trauma and not contagion — material conditions and not ideology — "
"that is making the difference today and enabling a rise of repulsive "
"misinformation in the face of easily observed facts, that doesn’t mean our "
"computer networks are blameless. They’re still doing the heavy work of "
-"locating vulnerable people and guiding them through a series of "
-"ever-more-extreme ideas and communities."
+"locating vulnerable people and guiding them through a series of ever-more-"
+"extreme ideas and communities."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:206
msgid ""
"Belief in conspiracy is a raging fire that has done real damage and poses "
-"real danger to our planet and species, from epidemics <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.cdc.gov/measles/cases-outbreaks.html\">kicked off by "
-"vaccine denial</ulink> to genocides <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/15/technology/myanmar-facebook-genocide.html\">kicked "
-"off by racist conspiracies</ulink> to planetary meltdown caused by "
-"denial-inspired climate inaction. Our world is on fire, and so we have to "
-"put the fires out — to figure out how to help people see the truth of the "
-"world through the conspiracies they’ve been confused by."
+"real danger to our planet and species, from epidemics <ulink url=\"https://"
+"www.cdc.gov/measles/cases-outbreaks.html\">kicked off by vaccine denial</"
+"ulink> to genocides <ulink url=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/15/"
+"technology/myanmar-facebook-genocide.html\">kicked off by racist "
+"conspiracies</ulink> to planetary meltdown caused by denial-inspired climate "
+"inaction. Our world is on fire, and so we have to put the fires out — to "
+"figure out how to help people see the truth of the world through the "
+"conspiracies they’ve been confused by."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:218
msgid ""
-"But firefighting is reactive. We need fire "
-"<emphasis>prevention</emphasis>. We need to strike at the traumatic material "
-"conditions that make people vulnerable to the contagion of conspiracy. Here, "
-"too, tech has a role to play."
+"But firefighting is reactive. We need fire <emphasis>prevention</emphasis>. "
+"We need to strike at the traumatic material conditions that make people "
+"vulnerable to the contagion of conspiracy. Here, too, tech has a role to "
+"play."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:224
msgid ""
-"There’s no shortage of proposals to address this. From the EU’s <ulink "
-"url=\"https://edri.org/tag/terreg/\">Terrorist Content Regulation</ulink>, "
-"which requires platforms to police and remove <quote>extremist</quote> "
-"content, to the U.S. proposals to <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/03/earn-it-act-violates-constitution\">force "
-"tech companies to spy on their users</ulink> and hold them liable <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.natlawreview.com/article/repeal-cda-section-230\">for "
-"their users’ bad speech</ulink>, there’s a lot of energy to force tech "
-"companies to solve the problems they created."
+"There’s no shortage of proposals to address this. From the EU’s <ulink url="
+"\"https://edri.org/tag/terreg/\">Terrorist Content Regulation</ulink>, which "
+"requires platforms to police and remove <quote>extremist</quote> content, to "
+"the U.S. proposals to <ulink url=\"https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/03/"
+"earn-it-act-violates-constitution\">force tech companies to spy on their "
+"users</ulink> and hold them liable <ulink url=\"https://www.natlawreview.com/"
+"article/repeal-cda-section-230\">for their users’ bad speech</ulink>, "
+"there’s a lot of energy to force tech companies to solve the problems they "
+"created."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:235
msgid ""
"There’s a critical piece missing from the debate, though. All these "
"solutions assume that tech companies are a fixture, that their dominance "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:245
msgid ""
"Figuring out what we want our tech to look like is crucial if we’re going to "
"get out of this mess. Today, we’re at a crossroads where we’re trying to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:253
msgid ""
"I want us to choose wisely. Taming Big Tech is integral to fixing the "
"Internet, and for that, we need digital rights activism."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:257
msgid "Digital rights activism, a quarter-century on"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:259
msgid ""
"Digital rights activism is more than 30 years old now. The Electronic "
"Frontier Foundation turned 30 this year; the Free Software Foundation "
"launched in 1985. For most of the history of the movement, the most "
"prominent criticism leveled against it was that it was irrelevant: The real "
"activist causes were real-world causes (think of the skepticism when <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.loc.gov/law/foreign-news/article/finland-legal-right-to-broadband-for-all-citizens/#:~:text=Global%20Legal%20Monitor,-Home%20%7C%20Search%20%7C%20Browse&text=(July%206%2C%202010)%20On,connection%20100%20MBPS%20by%202015.\">Finland "
-"declared broadband a human right in 2010</ulink>), and real-world activism "
-"was shoe-leather activism (think of Malcolm Gladwell’s <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/10/04/small-change-malcolm-gladwell\">contempt "
-"for <quote>clicktivism</quote></ulink>). But as tech has grown more central "
-"to our daily lives, these accusations of irrelevance have given way first to "
+"url=\"https://www.loc.gov/law/foreign-news/article/finland-legal-right-to-"
+"broadband-for-all-citizens/#:~:text=Global%20Legal%20Monitor,-Home%20%7C"
+"%20Search%20%7C%20Browse&text=(July%206%2C%202010)%20On,connection"
+"%20100%20MBPS%20by%202015.\">Finland declared broadband a human right in "
+"2010</ulink>), and real-world activism was shoe-leather activism (think of "
+"Malcolm Gladwell’s <ulink url=\"https://www.newyorker.com/"
+"magazine/2010/10/04/small-change-malcolm-gladwell\">contempt for "
+"<quote>clicktivism</quote></ulink>). But as tech has grown more central to "
+"our daily lives, these accusations of irrelevance have given way first to "
"accusations of insincerity (<quote>You only care about tech because you’re "
-"<ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.ipwatchdog.com/2018/06/04/report-engine-eff-shills-google-patent-reform/id=98007/\">shilling "
-"for tech companies</ulink></quote>) to accusations of negligence (<quote>Why "
-"didn’t you foresee that tech could be such a destructive force?</quote>). "
-"But digital rights activism is right where it’s always been: looking out for "
-"the humans in a world where tech is inexorably taking over."
+"<ulink url=\"https://www.ipwatchdog.com/2018/06/04/report-engine-eff-shills-"
+"google-patent-reform/id=98007/\">shilling for tech companies</ulink></"
+"quote>) to accusations of negligence (<quote>Why didn’t you foresee that "
+"tech could be such a destructive force?</quote>). But digital rights "
+"activism is right where it’s always been: looking out for the humans in a "
+"world where tech is inexorably taking over."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:280
msgid ""
"The latest version of this critique comes in the form of <quote>surveillance "
"capitalism,</quote> a term coined by business professor Shoshana Zuboff in "
"her long and influential 2019 book, <emphasis>The Age of Surveillance "
-"Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of "
-"Power</emphasis>. Zuboff argues that <quote>surveillance capitalism</quote> "
-"is a unique creature of the tech industry and that it is unlike any other "
-"abusive commercial practice in history, one that is <quote>constituted by "
-"unexpected and often illegible mechanisms of extraction, commodification, "
-"and control that effectively exile persons from their own behavior while "
-"producing new markets of behavioral prediction and "
-"modification. Surveillance capitalism challenges democratic norms and "
-"departs in key ways from the centuries-long evolution of market "
-"capitalism.</quote> It is a new and deadly form of capitalism, a "
-"<quote>rogue capitalism,</quote> and our lack of understanding of its unique "
-"capabilities and dangers represents an existential, species-wide "
-"threat. She’s right that capitalism today threatens our species, and she’s "
-"right that tech poses unique challenges to our species and civilization, but "
-"she’s really wrong about how tech is different and why it threatens our "
-"species."
-msgstr ""
-
-#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:301
+"Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power</"
+"emphasis>. Zuboff argues that <quote>surveillance capitalism</quote> is a "
+"unique creature of the tech industry and that it is unlike any other abusive "
+"commercial practice in history, one that is <quote>constituted by unexpected "
+"and often illegible mechanisms of extraction, commodification, and control "
+"that effectively exile persons from their own behavior while producing new "
+"markets of behavioral prediction and modification. Surveillance capitalism "
+"challenges democratic norms and departs in key ways from the centuries-long "
+"evolution of market capitalism.</quote> It is a new and deadly form of "
+"capitalism, a <quote>rogue capitalism,</quote> and our lack of understanding "
+"of its unique capabilities and dangers represents an existential, species-"
+"wide threat. She’s right that capitalism today threatens our species, and "
+"she’s right that tech poses unique challenges to our species and "
+"civilization, but she’s really wrong about how tech is different and why it "
+"threatens our species."
+msgstr ""
+
+#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
msgid ""
"What’s more, I think that her incorrect diagnosis will lead us down a path "
"that ends up making Big Tech stronger, not weaker. We need to take down Big "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:307
msgid "Tech exceptionalism, then and now"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:309
msgid ""
"Early critics of the digital rights movement — perhaps best represented by "
"campaigning organizations like the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Free "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:324
msgid ""
"In the decades since, accusations of <quote>tech exceptionalism</quote> have "
"only sharpened as tech’s role in everyday life has expanded: Now that tech "
"has infiltrated every corner of our life and our online lives have been "
"monopolized by a handful of giants, defenders of digital freedoms are "
-"accused of carrying water for Big Tech, providing cover for its "
-"self-interested negligence (or worse, nefarious plots)."
+"accused of carrying water for Big Tech, providing cover for its self-"
+"interested negligence (or worse, nefarious plots)."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:332
msgid ""
"From my perspective, the digital rights movement has remained stationary "
"while the rest of the world has moved. From the earliest days, the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:343
msgid ""
"The <quote>surveillance capitalism</quote> critique recasts the digital "
"rights movement in a new light again: not as alarmists who overestimate the "
-"importance of their shiny toys nor as shills for big tech but as serene "
-"deck-chair rearrangers whose long-standing activism is a liability because "
-"it makes them incapable of perceiving novel threats as they continue to "
-"fight the last century’s tech battles."
+"importance of their shiny toys nor as shills for big tech but as serene deck-"
+"chair rearrangers whose long-standing activism is a liability because it "
+"makes them incapable of perceiving novel threats as they continue to fight "
+"the last century’s tech battles."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:351
msgid "But tech exceptionalism is a sin no matter who practices it."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:354
msgid "Don’t believe the hype"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:356
msgid ""
"You’ve probably heard that <quote>if you’re not paying for the product, "
"you’re the product.</quote> As we’ll see below, that’s true, if incomplete. "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:366
msgid ""
"The fear of surveillance capitalism starts from the (correct) presumption "
"that everything Big Tech says about itself is probably a lie. But the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:378
msgid ""
"Surveillance capitalism assumes that because advertisers buy a lot of what "
"Big Tech is selling, Big Tech must be selling something real. But Big Tech’s "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:385
msgid ""
"Being watched changes your behavior, and not for the better. It creates "
"risks for our social progress. Zuboff’s book features beautifully wrought "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:399
msgid "What is persuasion?"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:401
msgid ""
"To understand why you shouldn’t worry about mind-control rays — but why you "
-"<emphasis>should</emphasis> worry about surveillance "
-"<emphasis>and</emphasis> Big Tech — we must start by unpacking what we mean "
-"by <quote>persuasion.</quote>"
+"<emphasis>should</emphasis> worry about surveillance <emphasis>and</"
+"emphasis> Big Tech — we must start by unpacking what we mean by "
+"<quote>persuasion.</quote>"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:407
msgid ""
"Google, Facebook, and other surveillance capitalists promise their customers "
"(the advertisers) that if they use machine-learning tools trained on "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><blockquote><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:416
msgid ""
"The impact of dominance far exceeds the impact of manipulation and should be "
"central to our analysis and any remedies we seek."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:421
msgid ""
"But there’s little evidence that this is happening. Instead, the predictions "
"that surveillance capitalism delivers to its customers are much less "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:428
msgid "1. Segmenting"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:430
msgid ""
"If you’re selling diapers, you have better luck if you pitch them to people "
"in maternity wards. Not everyone who enters or leaves a maternity ward just "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:441
msgid ""
"Surveillance capitalism is segmenting times a billion. Diaper vendors can go "
"way beyond people in maternity wards (though they can do that, too, with "
"things like location-based mobile ads). They can target you based on "
"whether you’re reading articles about child-rearing, diapers, or a host of "
"other subjects, and data mining can suggest unobvious keywords to advertise "
-"against. They can target you based on the articles you’ve recently "
-"read. They can target you based on what you’ve recently purchased. They can "
-"target you based on whether you receive emails or private messages about "
-"these subjects — or even if you speak aloud about them (though Facebook and "
-"the like convincingly claim that’s not happening — yet)."
+"against. They can target you based on the articles you’ve recently read. "
+"They can target you based on what you’ve recently purchased. They can target "
+"you based on whether you receive emails or private messages about these "
+"subjects — or even if you speak aloud about them (though Facebook and the "
+"like convincingly claim that’s not happening — yet)."
msgstr ""
"Le capitalisme de surveillance se segmente par milliard. Les vendeurs de "
"couches peuvent aller bien au-delà des personnes dans les maternités (bien "
"manière convaincante que cela ne se produit pas encore)."
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:455
msgid "This is seriously creepy."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:458
msgid "But it’s not mind control."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:461
msgid "It doesn’t deprive you of your free will. It doesn’t trick you."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:464
msgid ""
"Think of how surveillance capitalism works in politics. Surveillance "
"capitalist companies sell political operatives the power to locate people "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:475
msgid ""
"But this is an inexact and thus wasteful practice. The union organizer can’t "
"know which worker to approach on the way out of the factory gates and may "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:485
msgid ""
"Because targeting improves the yields on political pitches, it can "
"accelerate the pace of political upheaval by making it possible for everyone "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:496
msgid ""
"It’s important to differentiate this kind of political organizing from "
"influence campaigns; finding people who secretly agree with you isn’t the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:505
msgid ""
"But the personal accounts of those who have come out tell a different story "
"where people who long harbored a secret about their gender were emboldened "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:514
msgid "2. Deception"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:516
msgid ""
"Lies and fraud are pernicious, and surveillance capitalism supercharges them "
"through targeting. If you want to sell a fraudulent payday loan or subprime "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:528
msgid ""
"Surveillance capitalism also abets fraud by making it easy to locate other "
"people who have been similarly deceived, forming a community of people who "
-"reinforce one another’s false beliefs. Think of <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.vulture.com/2020/01/the-dream-podcast-review.html\">the "
-"forums</ulink> where people who are being victimized by multilevel marketing "
-"frauds gather to trade tips on how to improve their luck in peddling the "
-"product."
+"reinforce one another’s false beliefs. Think of <ulink url=\"https://www."
+"vulture.com/2020/01/the-dream-podcast-review.html\">the forums</ulink> where "
+"people who are being victimized by multilevel marketing frauds gather to "
+"trade tips on how to improve their luck in peddling the product."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:538
msgid ""
"Sometimes, online deception involves replacing someone’s correct beliefs "
"with incorrect ones, as it does in the anti-vaccination movement, whose "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:545
msgid ""
"But it’s much more common for fraud to succeed when it doesn’t have to "
"displace a true belief. When my daughter contracted head lice at daycare, "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:556
msgid ""
"This is pernicious and difficult — and it’s also the kind of thing the "
"internet can help guard against by making true information available, "
"especially in a form that exposes the underlying deliberations among parties "
"with sharply divergent views, such as Wikipedia. But it’s not brainwashing; "
-"it’s fraud. In the <ulink "
-"url=\"https://datasociety.net/library/data-voids/\">majority of "
-"cases</ulink>, the victims of these fraud campaigns have an informational "
-"void filled in the customary way, by consulting a seemingly reliable "
-"source. If I look up the length of the Brooklyn Bridge and learn that it is "
-"5,800 feet long, but in reality, it is 5,989 feet long, the underlying "
-"deception is a problem, but it’s a problem with a simple remedy. It’s a very "
-"different problem from the anti-vax issue in which someone’s true belief is "
-"displaced by a false one by means of sophisticated persuasion."
+"it’s fraud. In the <ulink url=\"https://datasociety.net/library/data-voids/"
+"\">majority of cases</ulink>, the victims of these fraud campaigns have an "
+"informational void filled in the customary way, by consulting a seemingly "
+"reliable source. If I look up the length of the Brooklyn Bridge and learn "
+"that it is 5,800 feet long, but in reality, it is 5,989 feet long, the "
+"underlying deception is a problem, but it’s a problem with a simple remedy. "
+"It’s a very different problem from the anti-vax issue in which someone’s "
+"true belief is displaced by a false one by means of sophisticated persuasion."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:573
msgid "3. Domination"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:575
msgid ""
"Surveillance capitalism is the result of monopoly. Monopoly is the cause, "
"and surveillance capitalism and its negative outcomes are the effects of "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:584
msgid ""
"One example of how monopolism aids in persuasion is through dominance: "
"Google makes editorial decisions about its algorithms that determine the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:597
msgid ""
"Google’s dominance over search — more than 86% of web searches are performed "
"through Google — means that the way it orders its search results has an "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:609
msgid ""
"Zuboff calls surveillance capitalism a <quote>rogue capitalism</quote> whose "
"data-hoarding and machine-learning techniques rob us of our free will. But "
"influence campaigns that seek to displace existing, correct beliefs with "
"false ones have an effect that is small and temporary while monopolistic "
-"dominance over informational systems has massive, enduring "
-"effects. Controlling the results to the world’s search queries means "
-"controlling access both to arguments and their rebuttals and, thus, control "
-"over much of the world’s beliefs. If our concern is how corporations are "
-"foreclosing on our ability to make up our own minds and determine our own "
-"futures, the impact of dominance far exceeds the impact of manipulation and "
-"should be central to our analysis and any remedies we seek."
+"dominance over informational systems has massive, enduring effects. "
+"Controlling the results to the world’s search queries means controlling "
+"access both to arguments and their rebuttals and, thus, control over much of "
+"the world’s beliefs. If our concern is how corporations are foreclosing on "
+"our ability to make up our own minds and determine our own futures, the "
+"impact of dominance far exceeds the impact of manipulation and should be "
+"central to our analysis and any remedies we seek."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:624
msgid "4. Bypassing our rational faculties"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:626
msgid ""
"<emphasis>This</emphasis> is the good stuff: using machine learning, "
"<quote>dark patterns,</quote> engagement hacking, and other techniques to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:632
msgid ""
"Some of these techniques have proven devastatingly effective (if only in the "
"short term). The use of countdown timers on a purchase completion page can "
"create a sense of urgency that causes you to ignore the nagging internal "
"voice suggesting that you should shop around or sleep on your decision. The "
-"use of people from your social graph in ads can provide <quote>social "
-"proof</quote> that a purchase is worth making. Even the auction system "
-"pioneered by eBay is calculated to play on our cognitive blind spots, "
-"letting us feel like we <quote>own</quote> something because we bid on it, "
-"thus encouraging us to bid again when we are outbid to ensure that "
-"<quote>our</quote> things stay ours."
+"use of people from your social graph in ads can provide <quote>social proof</"
+"quote> that a purchase is worth making. Even the auction system pioneered by "
+"eBay is calculated to play on our cognitive blind spots, letting us feel "
+"like we <quote>own</quote> something because we bid on it, thus encouraging "
+"us to bid again when we are outbid to ensure that <quote>our</quote> things "
+"stay ours."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:645
msgid ""
"Games are extraordinarily good at this. <quote>Free to play</quote> games "
"manipulate us through many techniques, such as presenting players with a "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:656
msgid ""
-"Companies have risen and fallen on these techniques, and the "
-"<quote>fallen</quote> part is worth paying attention to. In general, living "
-"things adapt to stimulus: Something that is very compelling or noteworthy "
-"when you first encounter it fades with repetition until you stop noticing it "
-"altogether. Consider the refrigerator hum that irritates you when it starts "
-"up but disappears into the background so thoroughly that you only notice it "
-"when it stops again."
+"Companies have risen and fallen on these techniques, and the <quote>fallen</"
+"quote> part is worth paying attention to. In general, living things adapt to "
+"stimulus: Something that is very compelling or noteworthy when you first "
+"encounter it fades with repetition until you stop noticing it altogether. "
+"Consider the refrigerator hum that irritates you when it starts up but "
+"disappears into the background so thoroughly that you only notice it when it "
+"stops again."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:666
msgid ""
"That’s why behavioral conditioning uses <quote>intermittent reinforcement "
"schedules.</quote> Instead of giving you a steady drip of encouragement or "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:674
msgid ""
"Intermittent reinforcement is a powerful behavioral tool, but it also "
"represents a collective action problem for surveillance capitalism. The "
"so that what starts as a mysteriously compelling fillip in the design of a "
"service—like <quote>pull to refresh</quote> or alerts when someone likes "
"your posts or side quests that your characters get invited to while in the "
-"midst of main quests—quickly becomes dully ubiquitous. The "
-"impossible-to-nail-down nonpattern of randomized drips from your phone "
-"becomes a grey-noise wall of sound as every single app and site starts to "
-"make use of whatever seems to be working at the time."
+"midst of main quests—quickly becomes dully ubiquitous. The impossible-to-"
+"nail-down nonpattern of randomized drips from your phone becomes a grey-"
+"noise wall of sound as every single app and site starts to make use of "
+"whatever seems to be working at the time."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:689
msgid ""
"From the surveillance capitalist’s point of view, our adaptive capacity is "
"like a harmful bacterium that deprives it of its food source — our attention "
"— and novel techniques for snagging that attention are like new antibiotics "
-"that can be used to breach our defenses and destroy our "
-"self-determination. And there <emphasis>are</emphasis> techniques like "
-"that. Who can forget the Great Zynga Epidemic, when all of our friends were "
-"caught in <emphasis>FarmVille</emphasis>’s endless, mindless dopamine loops? "
-"But every new attention-commanding technique is jumped on by the whole "
-"industry and used so indiscriminately that antibiotic resistance sets "
-"in. Given enough repetition, almost all of us develop immunity to even the "
-"most powerful techniques — by 2013, two years after Zynga’s peak, its user "
-"base had halved."
+"that can be used to breach our defenses and destroy our self-determination. "
+"And there <emphasis>are</emphasis> techniques like that. Who can forget the "
+"Great Zynga Epidemic, when all of our friends were caught in "
+"<emphasis>FarmVille</emphasis>’s endless, mindless dopamine loops? But every "
+"new attention-commanding technique is jumped on by the whole industry and "
+"used so indiscriminately that antibiotic resistance sets in. Given enough "
+"repetition, almost all of us develop immunity to even the most powerful "
+"techniques — by 2013, two years after Zynga’s peak, its user base had halved."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:704
msgid ""
"Not everyone, of course. Some people never adapt to stimulus, just as some "
"people never stop hearing the hum of the refrigerator. This is why most "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:712
msgid ""
-"But surveillance capitalism’s margins on behavioral modification "
-"suck. Tripling the rate at which someone buys a widget sounds great <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.forbes.com/sites/priceonomics/2018/03/09/the-advertising-conversion-rates-for-every-major-tech-platform/#2f6a67485957\">unless "
-"the base rate is way less than 1%</ulink> with an improved rate of… still "
-"less than 1%. Even penny slot machines pull down pennies for every spin "
-"while surveillance capitalism rakes in infinitesimal penny fractions."
+"But surveillance capitalism’s margins on behavioral modification suck. "
+"Tripling the rate at which someone buys a widget sounds great <ulink url="
+"\"https://www.forbes.com/sites/priceonomics/2018/03/09/the-advertising-"
+"conversion-rates-for-every-major-tech-platform/#2f6a67485957\">unless the "
+"base rate is way less than 1%</ulink> with an improved rate of… still less "
+"than 1%. Even penny slot machines pull down pennies for every spin while "
+"surveillance capitalism rakes in infinitesimal penny fractions."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:722
msgid ""
"Slot machines’ high returns mean that they can be profitable just by "
"draining the fortunes of the small rump of people who are pathologically "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><sect2><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:740
msgid ""
"The vulnerability of small segments of the population to dramatic, efficient "
"corporate manipulation is a real concern that’s worthy of our attention and "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:747
-msgid "If data is the new oil, then surveillance capitalism’s engine has a leak"
+msgid ""
+"If data is the new oil, then surveillance capitalism’s engine has a leak"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:750
msgid ""
"This adaptation problem offers an explanation for one of surveillance "
"capitalism’s most alarming traits: its relentless hunger for data and its "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:757
msgid ""
"Zuboff observes this phenomenon and concludes that data must be very "
"valuable if surveillance capitalism is so hungry for it. (In her words: "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:772
msgid ""
"Of course, all of Big Tech’s persuasion techniques work in concert with one "
"another, and collecting data is useful beyond mere behavioral trickery."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:777
msgid ""
"If someone wants to recruit you to buy a refrigerator or join a pogrom, they "
"might use profiling and targeting to send messages to people they judge to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:791
msgid ""
"Each phase of this process benefits from surveillance: The more data they "
"have, the more precisely they can profile you and target you with specific "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:798
msgid ""
"Also, the more data they have, the better they can craft deceptive messages "
"— if I know that you’re into genealogy, I might not try to feed you "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:805
msgid ""
"Facebook also helps you locate people who have the same odious or antisocial "
"views as you. It makes it possible to find other people who want to carry "
-"tiki torches through the streets of Charlottesville in Confederate "
-"cosplay. It can help you find other people who want to join your militia and "
-"go to the border to look for undocumented migrants to terrorize. It can help "
-"you find people who share your belief that vaccines are poison and that the "
+"tiki torches through the streets of Charlottesville in Confederate cosplay. "
+"It can help you find other people who want to join your militia and go to "
+"the border to look for undocumented migrants to terrorize. It can help you "
+"find people who share your belief that vaccines are poison and that the "
"Earth is flat."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:815
msgid ""
"There is one way in which targeted advertising uniquely benefits those "
"advocating for socially unacceptable causes: It is invisible. Racism is "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:830
msgid ""
"But even if you wanted to advertise your Nazi movement on a billboard or "
"prime-time TV or the sports section, you would struggle to find anyone "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:838
msgid ""
"Targeted ads solve this problem: On the internet, every ad unit can be "
"different for every person, meaning that you can buy ads that are only shown "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:849
msgid ""
"Online ads are placed by algorithms that broker between a diverse ecosystem "
"of self-serve ad platforms that anyone can buy an ad through, so the Nazi ad "
"failing but rather as a failure in some distant, upstream ad supplier. When "
"a publication gets a complaint about an offensive ad that’s appearing in one "
"of its units, it can take some steps to block that ad, but the Nazi might "
-"buy a slightly different ad from a different broker serving the same "
-"unit. And in any event, internet users increasingly understand that when "
-"they see an ad, it’s likely that the advertiser did not choose that "
-"publication and that the publication has no idea who its advertisers are."
+"buy a slightly different ad from a different broker serving the same unit. "
+"And in any event, internet users increasingly understand that when they see "
+"an ad, it’s likely that the advertiser did not choose that publication and "
+"that the publication has no idea who its advertisers are."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:863
msgid ""
"These layers of indirection between advertisers and publishers serve as "
"moral buffers: Today’s moral consensus is largely that publishers shouldn’t "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:871
msgid ""
"Data has a complex relationship with domination. Being able to spy on your "
"customers can alert you to their preferences for your rivals and allow you "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:876
msgid ""
"More importantly, if you can dominate the information space while also "
"gathering data, then you make other deceptive tactics stronger because it’s "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:885
msgid ""
"If you’re a Nazi who wants to ensure that your prospects primarily see "
"deceptive, confirming information when they search for more, you can improve "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:894
msgid ""
"Surveillance capitalists are like stage mentalists who claim that their "
"extraordinary insights into human behavior let them guess the word that you "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:901
msgid ""
"Or perhaps they’re more like pick-up artists, the misogynistic cult that "
"promises to help awkward men have sex with women by teaching them "
"<quote>neurolinguistic programming</quote> phrases, body language "
-"techniques, and psychological manipulation tactics like "
-"<quote>negging</quote> — offering unsolicited negative feedback to women to "
-"lower their self-esteem and prick their interest."
+"techniques, and psychological manipulation tactics like <quote>negging</"
+"quote> — offering unsolicited negative feedback to women to lower their self-"
+"esteem and prick their interest."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:909
msgid ""
"Some pick-up artists eventually manage to convince women to go home with "
"them, but it’s not because these men have figured out how to bypass women’s "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:920
msgid ""
"Pick-up artists <emphasis>believe</emphasis> they have figured out a secret "
"back door that bypasses women’s critical faculties, but they haven’t. Many "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:929
msgid ""
"Pick-up artists are proof that people can believe they have developed a "
-"system of mind control <emphasis>even when it doesn’t "
-"work</emphasis>. Pick-up artists simply exploit the fact that "
-"one-in-a-million chances can come through for you if you make a million "
-"attempts, and then they assume that the other 999,999 times, they simply "
-"performed the technique incorrectly and commit themselves to doing better "
-"next time. There’s only one group of people who find pick-up artist lore "
-"reliably convincing: other would-be pick-up artists whose anxiety and "
-"insecurity make them vulnerable to scammers and delusional men who convince "
-"them that if they pay for tutelage and follow instructions, then they will "
-"someday succeed. Pick-up artists assume they fail to entice women because "
-"they are bad at being pick-up artists, not because pick-up artistry is "
-"bullshit. Pick-up artists are bad at selling themselves to women, but "
-"they’re much better at selling themselves to men who pay to learn the "
-"secrets of pick-up artistry."
+"system of mind control <emphasis>even when it doesn’t work</emphasis>. Pick-"
+"up artists simply exploit the fact that one-in-a-million chances can come "
+"through for you if you make a million attempts, and then they assume that "
+"the other 999,999 times, they simply performed the technique incorrectly and "
+"commit themselves to doing better next time. There’s only one group of "
+"people who find pick-up artist lore reliably convincing: other would-be pick-"
+"up artists whose anxiety and insecurity make them vulnerable to scammers and "
+"delusional men who convince them that if they pay for tutelage and follow "
+"instructions, then they will someday succeed. Pick-up artists assume they "
+"fail to entice women because they are bad at being pick-up artists, not "
+"because pick-up artistry is bullshit. Pick-up artists are bad at selling "
+"themselves to women, but they’re much better at selling themselves to men "
+"who pay to learn the secrets of pick-up artistry."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:947
msgid ""
"Department store pioneer John Wanamaker is said to have lamented, "
"<quote>Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:957
msgid "What is Facebook?"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:959
msgid ""
"Facebook is heralded as the origin of all of our modern plagues, and it’s "
"not hard to see why. Some tech companies want to lock their users in but "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:971
msgid ""
"Facebook’s surveillance regime is really without parallel in the Western "
"world. Though Facebook tries to prevent itself from being visible on the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><blockquote><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:985
msgid ""
"Big Tech is able to practice surveillance not just because it is tech but "
"because it is <emphasis>big</emphasis>."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:990
msgid ""
"Facebook offers similar tools to app developers, so the apps — games, fart "
"machines, business review services, apps for keeping abreast of your kid’s "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1001
msgid ""
"Though it’s easy to integrate the web with Facebook — linking to news "
"stories and such — Facebook products are generally not available to be "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1013
msgid ""
"And Facebook is incredibly popular, with 2.3 billion claimed users (though "
"many believe this figure to be inflated). Facebook has been used to organize "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1024
msgid ""
"To understand what role Facebook plays in the formulation and mobilization "
"of antisocial movements, we need to understand the dual nature of Facebook."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1029
msgid ""
"Because it has a lot of users and a lot of data about those users, Facebook "
"is a very efficient tool for locating people with hard-to-find traits, the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1044
msgid ""
-"Facebook makes finding people shopping for refrigerators a "
-"<emphasis>lot</emphasis> easier. It can target ads to people who’ve "
-"registered a new home purchase, to people who’ve searched for refrigerator "
-"buying advice, to people who have complained about their fridge dying, or "
-"any combination thereof. It can even target people who’ve recently bought "
-"<emphasis>other</emphasis> kitchen appliances on the theory that someone "
-"who’s just replaced their stove and dishwasher might be in a fridge-buying "
-"kind of mood. The vast majority of people who are reached by these ads will "
-"not be in the market for a new fridge, but — crucially — the percentage of "
-"people who <emphasis>are</emphasis> looking for fridges that these ads reach "
-"is <emphasis>much</emphasis> larger than it is than for any group that might "
-"be subjected to traditional, offline targeted refrigerator marketing."
+"Facebook makes finding people shopping for refrigerators a <emphasis>lot</"
+"emphasis> easier. It can target ads to people who’ve registered a new home "
+"purchase, to people who’ve searched for refrigerator buying advice, to "
+"people who have complained about their fridge dying, or any combination "
+"thereof. It can even target people who’ve recently bought <emphasis>other</"
+"emphasis> kitchen appliances on the theory that someone who’s just replaced "
+"their stove and dishwasher might be in a fridge-buying kind of mood. The "
+"vast majority of people who are reached by these ads will not be in the "
+"market for a new fridge, but — crucially — the percentage of people who "
+"<emphasis>are</emphasis> looking for fridges that these ads reach is "
+"<emphasis>much</emphasis> larger than it is than for any group that might be "
+"subjected to traditional, offline targeted refrigerator marketing."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1060
msgid ""
"Facebook also makes it a lot easier to find people who have the same rare "
"disease as you, which might have been impossible in earlier eras — the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1068
msgid ""
"Facebook also makes it much easier to find people who hold the same rare "
"political beliefs as you. If you’ve always harbored a secret affinity for "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1081
msgid ""
"All of this presents a dilemma for Facebook: Targeting makes the company’s "
"ads more effective than traditional ads, but it also lets advertisers see "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1092
msgid ""
-"To make things worse, many Facebook groups spark precious little "
-"discussion. Your little-league soccer team, the people with the same rare "
-"disease as you, and the people you share a political affinity with may "
-"exchange the odd flurry of messages at critical junctures, but on a daily "
-"basis, there’s not much to say to your old high school chums or other "
-"hockey-card collectors."
+"To make things worse, many Facebook groups spark precious little discussion. "
+"Your little-league soccer team, the people with the same rare disease as "
+"you, and the people you share a political affinity with may exchange the odd "
+"flurry of messages at critical junctures, but on a daily basis, there’s not "
+"much to say to your old high school chums or other hockey-card collectors."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1100
msgid ""
"With nothing but <quote>organic</quote> discussion, Facebook would not "
"generate enough traffic to sell enough ads to make the money it needs to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1106
msgid ""
"So Facebook has to gin up traffic by sidetracking its own forums: Every time "
"Facebook’s algorithm injects controversial materials — inflammatory "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1117
msgid ""
"Facebook <emphasis>can</emphasis> modify our behavior but only in a couple "
"of trivial ways. First, it can lock in all your friends and family members "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1128
msgid ""
"This is why Facebook’s targeting systems — both the ones it shows to "
"advertisers and the ones that let users find people who share their "
"interests — are so next-gen and smooth and easy to use as well as why its "
"message boards have a toolset that seems like it hasn’t changed since the "
-"mid-2000s. If Facebook delivered an equally flexible, sophisticated "
-"message-reading system to its users, those users could defend themselves "
-"against being nonconsensually eyeball-fucked with Donald Trump headlines."
+"mid-2000s. If Facebook delivered an equally flexible, sophisticated message-"
+"reading system to its users, those users could defend themselves against "
+"being nonconsensually eyeball-fucked with Donald Trump headlines."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1138
msgid ""
"The more time you spend on Facebook, the more ads it gets to show you. The "
"solution to Facebook’s ads only working one in a thousand times is for the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1150
msgid "Monopoly and the right to the future tense"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1152
msgid ""
"Zuboff and her cohort are particularly alarmed at the extent to which "
"surveillance allows corporations to influence our decisions, taking away "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1159
msgid ""
"It’s true that advertising can tip the scales one way or another: When "
"you’re thinking of buying a fridge, a timely fridge ad might end the search "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1170
msgid ""
"By contrast, Zuboff is rather sanguine about 40 years of lax antitrust "
"practice that has allowed a handful of companies to dominate the internet, "
-"ushering in an information age with, <ulink "
-"url=\"https://twitter.com/tveastman/status/1069674780826071040\">as one "
-"person on Twitter noted</ulink>, five giant websites each filled with "
-"screenshots of the other four."
+"ushering in an information age with, <ulink url=\"https://twitter.com/"
+"tveastman/status/1069674780826071040\">as one person on Twitter noted</"
+"ulink>, five giant websites each filled with screenshots of the other four."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1178
msgid ""
"However, if we are to be alarmed that we might lose the right to choose for "
"ourselves what our future will hold, then monopoly’s nonspeculative, "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1184
msgid ""
"Start with <quote>digital rights management.</quote> In 1998, Bill Clinton "
"signed the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) into law. It’s a complex "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1190
msgid ""
"This is a blanket ban on tampering with systems that restrict access to "
"copyrighted works. The ban is so thoroughgoing that it prohibits removing a "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1198
msgid ""
"For example, Section 1201’s first major application was on DVD players as a "
"means of enforcing the region coding built into those devices. DVD-CCA, the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1210
msgid ""
"However, watching a lawfully produced disc in a country other than the one "
-"where you purchased it is not copyright infringement — it’s the "
-"opposite. Copyright law imposes this duty on customers for a movie: You must "
-"go into a store, find a licensed disc, and pay the asking price. Do that — "
-"and <emphasis>nothing else</emphasis> — and you and copyright are square "
-"with one another."
+"where you purchased it is not copyright infringement — it’s the opposite. "
+"Copyright law imposes this duty on customers for a movie: You must go into a "
+"store, find a licensed disc, and pay the asking price. Do that — and "
+"<emphasis>nothing else</emphasis> — and you and copyright are square with "
+"one another."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1218
msgid ""
"The fact that a movie studio wants to charge Indians less than Americans or "
"release in Australia later than it releases in the U.K. has no bearing on "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1225
msgid ""
"So DVD and DVD player manufacturers would not be able to use accusations of "
"abetting copyright infringement to punish manufacturers who made "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1233
msgid ""
"That’s where Section 1201 of the DMCA comes in: By banning tampering with an "
"<quote>access control,</quote> the rule gave manufacturers and rights "
"holders standing to sue competitors who released superior products with "
-"lawful features that the market demanded (in this case, region-free "
-"players)."
+"lawful features that the market demanded (in this case, region-free players)."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1240
msgid ""
"This is an odious scam against consumers, but as time went by, Section 1201 "
"grew to encompass a rapidly expanding constellation of devices and services "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><itemizedlist><listitem><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1248
msgid ""
"Any device with software in it contains a <quote>copyrighted work</quote> — "
"i.e., the software."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><itemizedlist><listitem><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1254
msgid ""
"A device can be designed so that reconfiguring the software requires "
"bypassing an <quote>access control for copyrighted works,</quote> which is a "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><itemizedlist><listitem><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1261
msgid ""
"Thus, companies can control their customers’ behavior after they take home "
"their purchases by designing products so that all unpermitted uses require "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1269
msgid ""
"Section 1201 then becomes a means for manufacturers of all descriptions to "
"force their customers to arrange their affairs to benefit the manufacturers’ "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1274
msgid ""
"This manifests in many ways: from a new generation of inkjet printers that "
"use countermeasures to prevent third-party ink that cannot be bypassed "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1283
msgid ""
-"Closer to home, Apple’s iPhones use these measures to prevent both "
-"third-party service and third-party software installation. This allows Apple "
-"to decide when an iPhone is beyond repair and must be shredded and "
-"landfilled as opposed to the iPhone’s purchaser. (Apple is notorious for its "
+"Closer to home, Apple’s iPhones use these measures to prevent both third-"
+"party service and third-party software installation. This allows Apple to "
+"decide when an iPhone is beyond repair and must be shredded and landfilled "
+"as opposed to the iPhone’s purchaser. (Apple is notorious for its "
"environmentally catastrophic policy of destroying old electronics rather "
"than permitting them to be cannibalized for parts.) This is a very useful "
"power to wield, especially in light of CEO Tim Cook’s January 2019 warning "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1296
msgid ""
"Apple’s use of copyright locks also allows it to establish a monopoly over "
"how its customers acquire software for their mobile devices. The App Store’s "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1306
msgid ""
"Crucially, Apple’s use of copyright locks gives it the power to make "
"editorial decisions about which apps you may and may not install on your own "
-"device. Apple has used this power to <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/apple/5982243/Apple-bans-dictionary-from-App-Store-over-swear-words.html\">reject "
-"dictionaries</ulink> for containing obscene words; to <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/538kan/apple-just-banned-the-app-that-tracks-us-drone-strikes-again\">limit "
-"political speech</ulink>, especially from apps that make sensitive political "
-"commentary such as an app that notifies you every time a U.S. drone kills "
-"someone somewhere in the world; and to <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2016-05-19-palestinian-indie-game-must-not-be-called-a-game-apple-says\">object "
-"to a game</ulink> that commented on the Israel-Palestine conflict."
+"device. Apple has used this power to <ulink url=\"https://www.telegraph.co."
+"uk/technology/apple/5982243/Apple-bans-dictionary-from-App-Store-over-swear-"
+"words.html\">reject dictionaries</ulink> for containing obscene words; to "
+"<ulink url=\"https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/538kan/apple-just-banned-the-"
+"app-that-tracks-us-drone-strikes-again\">limit political speech</ulink>, "
+"especially from apps that make sensitive political commentary such as an app "
+"that notifies you every time a U.S. drone kills someone somewhere in the "
+"world; and to <ulink url=\"https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2016-05-19-"
+"palestinian-indie-game-must-not-be-called-a-game-apple-says\">object to a "
+"game</ulink> that commented on the Israel-Palestine conflict."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1319
msgid ""
"Apple often justifies monopoly power over software installation in the name "
"of security, arguing that its vetting of apps for its store means that it "
"can guard its users against apps that contain surveillance code. But this "
-"cuts both ways. In China, the government <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.ft.com/content/ad42e536-cf36-11e7-b781-794ce08b24dc\">ordered "
-"Apple to prohibit the sale of privacy tools</ulink> like VPNs with the "
-"exception of VPNs that had deliberately introduced flaws designed to let the "
-"Chinese state eavesdrop on users. Because Apple uses technological "
-"countermeasures — with legal backstops — to block customers from installing "
-"unauthorized apps, Chinese iPhone owners cannot readily (or legally) acquire "
-"VPNs that would protect them from Chinese state snooping."
+"cuts both ways. In China, the government <ulink url=\"https://www.ft.com/"
+"content/ad42e536-cf36-11e7-b781-794ce08b24dc\">ordered Apple to prohibit the "
+"sale of privacy tools</ulink> like VPNs with the exception of VPNs that had "
+"deliberately introduced flaws designed to let the Chinese state eavesdrop on "
+"users. Because Apple uses technological countermeasures — with legal "
+"backstops — to block customers from installing unauthorized apps, Chinese "
+"iPhone owners cannot readily (or legally) acquire VPNs that would protect "
+"them from Chinese state snooping."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1333
msgid ""
"Zuboff calls surveillance capitalism a <quote>rogue capitalism.</quote> "
-"Theoreticians of capitalism claim that its virtue is that it <ulink "
-"url=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_signal\">aggregates information in "
-"the form of consumers’ decisions</ulink>, producing efficient "
-"markets. Surveillance capitalism’s supposed power to rob its victims of "
-"their free will through computationally supercharged influence campaigns "
-"means that our markets no longer aggregate customers’ decisions because we "
-"customers no longer decide — we are given orders by surveillance "
-"capitalism’s mind-control rays."
+"Theoreticians of capitalism claim that its virtue is that it <ulink url="
+"\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_signal\">aggregates information in the "
+"form of consumers’ decisions</ulink>, producing efficient markets. "
+"Surveillance capitalism’s supposed power to rob its victims of their free "
+"will through computationally supercharged influence campaigns means that our "
+"markets no longer aggregate customers’ decisions because we customers no "
+"longer decide — we are given orders by surveillance capitalism’s mind-"
+"control rays."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1344
msgid ""
"If our concern is that markets cease to function when consumers can no "
"longer make choices, then copyright locks should concern us at "
"<emphasis>least</emphasis> as much as influence campaigns. An influence "
"campaign might nudge you to buy a certain brand of phone; but the copyright "
"locks on that phone absolutely determine where you get it serviced, which "
-"apps can run on it, and when you have to throw it away rather than fixing "
-"it."
+"apps can run on it, and when you have to throw it away rather than fixing it."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1353
msgid "Search order and the right to the future tense"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1355
msgid ""
"Markets are posed as a kind of magic: By discovering otherwise hidden "
"information conveyed by the free choices of consumers, those consumers’ "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1367
msgid ""
"This ballot rigging is made more pernicious by the existence of monopolies "
"over search order. Google’s search market share is about 90%. When Google’s "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1379
msgid ""
"Google’s algorithm is often tricked into serving disinformation as a "
"prominent search result. But in these cases, Google isn’t persuading people "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1385
msgid ""
-"This is true whether the search is for <quote>Are vaccines "
-"dangerous?</quote> or <quote>best restaurants near me.</quote> Most users "
-"will never look past the first page of search results, and when the "
-"overwhelming majority of people all use the same search engine, the ranking "
-"algorithm deployed by that search engine will determine myriad outcomes "
-"(whether to adopt a child, whether to have cancer surgery, where to eat "
-"dinner, where to move, where to apply for a job) to a degree that vastly "
-"outstrips any behavioral outcomes dictated by algorithmic persuasion "
-"techniques."
+"This is true whether the search is for <quote>Are vaccines dangerous?</"
+"quote> or <quote>best restaurants near me.</quote> Most users will never "
+"look past the first page of search results, and when the overwhelming "
+"majority of people all use the same search engine, the ranking algorithm "
+"deployed by that search engine will determine myriad outcomes (whether to "
+"adopt a child, whether to have cancer surgery, where to eat dinner, where to "
+"move, where to apply for a job) to a degree that vastly outstrips any "
+"behavioral outcomes dictated by algorithmic persuasion techniques."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1396
msgid ""
"Many of the questions we ask search engines have no empirically correct "
"answers: <quote>Where should I eat dinner?</quote> is not an objective "
"answer. Many pages affirm the safety of vaccines, so which one goes first? "
"Under conditions of competition, consumers can choose from many search "
"engines and stick with the one whose algorithmic judgment suits them best, "
-"but under conditions of monopoly, we all get our answers from the same "
-"place."
+"but under conditions of monopoly, we all get our answers from the same place."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1407
msgid ""
"Google’s search dominance isn’t a matter of pure merit: The company has "
-"leveraged many tactics that would have been prohibited under classical, "
-"pre-Ronald-Reagan antitrust enforcement standards to attain its "
-"dominance. After all, this is a company that has developed two major "
-"products: a really good search engine and a pretty good Hotmail clone. Every "
-"other major success it’s had — Android, YouTube, Google Maps, etc. — has "
-"come through an acquisition of a nascent competitor. Many of the company’s "
-"key divisions, such as the advertising technology of DoubleClick, violate "
-"the historical antitrust principle of structural separation, which forbade "
-"firms from owning subsidiaries that competed with their "
-"customers. Railroads, for example, were barred from owning freight companies "
-"that competed with the shippers whose freight they carried."
+"leveraged many tactics that would have been prohibited under classical, pre-"
+"Ronald-Reagan antitrust enforcement standards to attain its dominance. After "
+"all, this is a company that has developed two major products: a really good "
+"search engine and a pretty good Hotmail clone. Every other major success "
+"it’s had — Android, YouTube, Google Maps, etc. — has come through an "
+"acquisition of a nascent competitor. Many of the company’s key divisions, "
+"such as the advertising technology of DoubleClick, violate the historical "
+"antitrust principle of structural separation, which forbade firms from "
+"owning subsidiaries that competed with their customers. Railroads, for "
+"example, were barred from owning freight companies that competed with the "
+"shippers whose freight they carried."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1423
msgid ""
"If we’re worried about giant companies subverting markets by stripping "
"consumers of their ability to make free choices, then vigorous antitrust "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1433
msgid ""
"This goes for many other companies. Amazon, a classic surveillance "
"capitalist, is obviously the dominant tool for searching Amazon — though "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1448
msgid ""
"Not every monopolist is a surveillance capitalist, but that doesn’t mean "
"they’re not able to shape consumer choices in wide-ranging ways. Zuboff "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1463
msgid ""
"Because of its use of copyright locks, Apple’s mobile customers are not "
"legally allowed to switch to a rival retailer for its apps if they want to "
"do so on an iPhone. Apple, obviously, is the only entity that gets to decide "
"how it ranks the results of search queries in its stores. These decisions "
"ensure that some apps are often installed (because they appear on page one) "
-"and others are never installed (because they appear on page one "
-"million). Apple’s search-ranking design decisions have a vastly more "
-"significant effect on consumer behaviors than influence campaigns delivered "
-"by surveillance capitalism’s ad-serving bots."
+"and others are never installed (because they appear on page one million). "
+"Apple’s search-ranking design decisions have a vastly more significant "
+"effect on consumer behaviors than influence campaigns delivered by "
+"surveillance capitalism’s ad-serving bots."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1475
msgid "Monopolists can afford sleeping pills for watchdogs"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1477
msgid ""
"Only the most extreme market ideologues think that markets can self-regulate "
"without state oversight. Markets need watchdogs — regulators, lawmakers, and "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1487
msgid ""
"But this kind of regulatory capture doesn’t come cheap. In competitive "
"sectors, where rivals are constantly eroding one another’s margins, "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1493
msgid ""
"Many of the harms of surveillance capitalism are the result of weak or "
"nonexistent regulation. Those regulatory vacuums spring from the power of "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1499
msgid ""
"Here’s an example: When firms over-collect and over-retain our data, they "
"are at increased risk of suffering a breach — you can’t leak data you never "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1508
msgid ""
"But still, firms continue to over-collect and over-retain our data for three "
"reasons:"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1512
msgid ""
"<emphasis role=\"strong\">1. They are locked in the aforementioned limbic "
"arms race with our capacity to shore up our attentional defense systems to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1524
msgid ""
-"<emphasis role=\"strong\">2. They believe the surveillance capitalism "
-"story.</emphasis> Data is cheap to aggregate and store, and both proponents "
-"and opponents of surveillance capitalism have assured managers and product "
+"<emphasis role=\"strong\">2. They believe the surveillance capitalism story."
+"</emphasis> Data is cheap to aggregate and store, and both proponents and "
+"opponents of surveillance capitalism have assured managers and product "
"designers that if you collect enough data, you will be able to perform "
"sorcerous acts of mind control, thus supercharging your sales. Even if you "
"never figure out how to profit from the data, someone else will eventually "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1537
msgid ""
-"<emphasis role=\"strong\">3. The penalties for leaking data are "
-"negligible.</emphasis> Most countries limit these penalties to actual "
-"damages, meaning that consumers who’ve had their data breached have to show "
-"actual monetary harms to get a reward. In 2014, Home Depot disclosed that it "
-"had lost credit-card data for 53 million of its customers, but it settled "
-"the matter by paying those customers about $0.34 each — and a third of that "
-"$0.34 wasn’t even paid in cash. It took the form of a credit to procure a "
-"largely ineffectual credit-monitoring service."
+"<emphasis role=\"strong\">3. The penalties for leaking data are negligible.</"
+"emphasis> Most countries limit these penalties to actual damages, meaning "
+"that consumers who’ve had their data breached have to show actual monetary "
+"harms to get a reward. In 2014, Home Depot disclosed that it had lost credit-"
+"card data for 53 million of its customers, but it settled the matter by "
+"paying those customers about $0.34 each — and a third of that $0.34 wasn’t "
+"even paid in cash. It took the form of a credit to procure a largely "
+"ineffectual credit-monitoring service."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1548
msgid ""
-"But the harms from breaches are much more extensive than these "
-"actual-damages rules capture. Identity thieves and fraudsters are wily and "
+"But the harms from breaches are much more extensive than these actual-"
+"damages rules capture. Identity thieves and fraudsters are wily and "
"endlessly inventive. All the vast breaches of our century are being "
"continuously recombined, the data sets merged and mined for new ways to "
"victimize the people whose data was present in them. Any reasonable, "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1558
msgid ""
"However, even the most ambitious privacy rules, such as the EU General Data "
"Protection Regulation, fall far short of capturing the negative "
-"externalities of the platforms’ negligent over-collection and "
-"over-retention, and what penalties they do provide are not aggressively "
-"pursued by regulators."
+"externalities of the platforms’ negligent over-collection and over-"
+"retention, and what penalties they do provide are not aggressively pursued "
+"by regulators."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1565
msgid ""
-"This tolerance of — or indifference to — data over-collection and "
-"over-retention can be ascribed in part to the sheer lobbying muscle of the "
+"This tolerance of — or indifference to — data over-collection and over-"
+"retention can be ascribed in part to the sheer lobbying muscle of the "
"platforms. They are so profitable that they can handily afford to divert "
"gigantic sums to fight any real change — that is, change that would force "
"them to internalize the costs of their surveillance activities."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1573
msgid ""
"And then there’s state surveillance, which the surveillance capitalism story "
"dismisses as a relic of another era when the big worry was being jailed for "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1579
msgid ""
"But state surveillance and private surveillance are intimately related. As "
"we saw when Apple was conscripted by the Chinese government as a vital "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1587
msgid ""
"Whether it’s Google being used as a location tracking tool by local law "
"enforcement across the U.S. or the use of social media tracking by the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1605
msgid ""
"Monopolism is key to the project of mass state surveillance. It’s true that "
"smaller tech firms are apt to be less well-defended than Big Tech, whose "
"security experts are drawn from the tops of their field and who are given "
-"enormous resources to secure and monitor their systems against "
-"intruders. But smaller firms also have less to protect: fewer users whose "
-"data is more fragmented across more systems and have to be suborned one at a "
-"time by state actors."
+"enormous resources to secure and monitor their systems against intruders. "
+"But smaller firms also have less to protect: fewer users whose data is more "
+"fragmented across more systems and have to be suborned one at a time by "
+"state actors."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1614
msgid ""
"A concentrated tech sector that works with authorities is a much more "
"powerful ally in the project of mass state surveillance than a fragmented "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1628
msgid ""
"They can even make a good case for doing this: After all, when there are "
"only four or five big companies in an industry, everyone qualified to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><blockquote><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1637
msgid ""
"While surveillance doesn’t cause monopolies, monopolies certainly abet "
"surveillance."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1642
msgid ""
"Industries that are competitive are fragmented — composed of companies that "
"are at each other’s throats all the time and eroding one another’s margins "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1650
msgid ""
"Surveillance combined with machine learning is supposed to be an existential "
"crisis, a species-defining moment at which our free will is just a few more "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1658
msgid "But that threat grows out of monopoly."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1661
msgid ""
"One of the consequences of tech’s regulatory capture is that it can shift "
"liability for poor security decisions onto its customers and the wider "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1669
msgid ""
"IT is the only field in which this is practiced: No one builds a bridge or a "
"hospital and keeps the composition of the steel or the equations used to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1678
msgid ""
"The monopoly power that keeps any meaningful consequences for breaches at "
"bay means that tech companies continue to build terrible products that are "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1688
msgid ""
"These bad security decisions are compounded yet again by the use of "
-"copyright locks to enforce business-model decisions against "
-"consumers. Recall that these locks have become the go-to means for shaping "
-"consumer behavior, making it technically impossible to use third-party ink, "
-"insulin, apps, or service depots in connection with your lawfully acquired "
-"property."
+"copyright locks to enforce business-model decisions against consumers. "
+"Recall that these locks have become the go-to means for shaping consumer "
+"behavior, making it technically impossible to use third-party ink, insulin, "
+"apps, or service depots in connection with your lawfully acquired property."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1696
msgid ""
"Recall also that these copyright locks are backstopped by legislation (such "
"as Section 1201 of the DMCA or Article 6 of the 2001 EU Copyright Directive) "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1704
msgid ""
-"This amounts to a manufacturer’s veto over safety warnings and "
-"criticism. While this is far from the legislative intent of the DMCA and its "
-"sister statutes around the world, Congress has not intervened to clarify the "
+"This amounts to a manufacturer’s veto over safety warnings and criticism. "
+"While this is far from the legislative intent of the DMCA and its sister "
+"statutes around the world, Congress has not intervened to clarify the "
"statute nor will it because to do so would run counter to the interests of "
"powerful, large firms whose lobbying muscle is unstoppable."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1712
msgid ""
"Copyright locks are a double whammy: They create bad security decisions that "
"can’t be freely investigated or discussed. If markets are supposed to be "
"machines for aggregating information (and if surveillance capitalism’s "
-"notional mind-control rays are what make it a <quote>rogue "
-"capitalism</quote> because it denies consumers the power to make decisions), "
-"then a program of legally enforced ignorance of the risks of products makes "
+"notional mind-control rays are what make it a <quote>rogue capitalism</"
+"quote> because it denies consumers the power to make decisions), then a "
+"program of legally enforced ignorance of the risks of products makes "
"monopolism even more of a <quote>rogue capitalism</quote> than surveillance "
"capitalism’s influence campaigns."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1722
msgid ""
"And unlike mind-control rays, enforced silence over security is an "
"immediate, documented problem, and it <emphasis>does</emphasis> constitute "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1731
msgid ""
"In software design, <quote>technology debt</quote> refers to old, baked-in "
"decisions that turn out to be bad ones in hindsight. Perhaps a long-ago "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1749
msgid ""
"Typically, technology debt results in a technological bankruptcy: The "
-"product gets so brittle and unsustainable that it fails "
-"catastrophically. Think of the antiquated COBOL-based banking and accounting "
-"systems that fell over at the start of the pandemic emergency when "
-"confronted with surges of unemployment claims. Sometimes that ends the "
-"product; sometimes it takes the company down with it. Being caught in the "
-"default of a technology debt is scary and traumatic, just like losing your "
-"house due to bankruptcy is scary and traumatic."
+"product gets so brittle and unsustainable that it fails catastrophically. "
+"Think of the antiquated COBOL-based banking and accounting systems that fell "
+"over at the start of the pandemic emergency when confronted with surges of "
+"unemployment claims. Sometimes that ends the product; sometimes it takes "
+"the company down with it. Being caught in the default of a technology debt "
+"is scary and traumatic, just like losing your house due to bankruptcy is "
+"scary and traumatic."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1760
msgid ""
"But the technology debt created by copyright locks isn’t individual debt; "
"it’s systemic. Everyone in the world is exposed to this over-leverage, as "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1772
msgid "Privacy and monopoly"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1774
msgid ""
"Many tech companies are gripped by an orthodoxy that holds that if they just "
"gather enough data on enough of our activities, everything else is possible "
"— the mind control and endless profits. This is an unfalsifiable hypothesis: "
"If data gives a tech company even a tiny improvement in behavior prediction "
"and modification, the company declares that it has taken the first step "
-"toward global domination with no end in sight. If a company "
-"<emphasis>fails</emphasis> to attain any improvements from gathering and "
-"analyzing data, it declares success to be just around the corner, attainable "
-"once more data is in hand."
+"toward global domination with no end in sight. If a company <emphasis>fails</"
+"emphasis> to attain any improvements from gathering and analyzing data, it "
+"declares success to be just around the corner, attainable once more data is "
+"in hand."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1786
msgid ""
"Surveillance tech is far from the first industry to embrace a nonsensical, "
"self-serving belief that harms the rest of the world, and it is not the "
-"first industry to profit handsomely from such a delusion. Long before "
-"hedge-fund managers were claiming (falsely) that they could beat the "
-"S&P 500, there were plenty of other <quote>respectable</quote> "
-"industries that have been revealed as quacks in hindsight. From the makers "
-"of radium suppositories (a real thing!) to the cruel sociopaths who claimed "
-"they could <quote>cure</quote> gay people, history is littered with the "
-"formerly respectable titans of discredited industries."
+"first industry to profit handsomely from such a delusion. Long before hedge-"
+"fund managers were claiming (falsely) that they could beat the S&P 500, "
+"there were plenty of other <quote>respectable</quote> industries that have "
+"been revealed as quacks in hindsight. From the makers of radium "
+"suppositories (a real thing!) to the cruel sociopaths who claimed they "
+"could <quote>cure</quote> gay people, history is littered with the formerly "
+"respectable titans of discredited industries."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1798
msgid ""
"This is not to say that there’s nothing wrong with Big Tech and its "
"ideological addiction to data. While surveillance’s benefits are mostly "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1804
msgid ""
"There’s real irony here. The belief in surveillance capitalism as a "
"<quote>rogue capitalism</quote> is driven by the belief that markets "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1811
msgid ""
"But monopolists get to do terrible things for a long time before they pay "
"the price. Think of how concentration in the finance sector allowed the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1826
msgid ""
"Big Tech is able to practice surveillance not just because it is tech but "
"because it is <emphasis>big</emphasis>. The reason every web publisher "
"embeds a Facebook <quote>Like</quote> button is that Facebook dominates the "
-"internet’s social media referrals — and every one of those "
-"<quote>Like</quote> buttons spies on everyone who lands on a page that "
-"contains them (see also: Google Analytics embeds, Twitter buttons, etc.)."
+"internet’s social media referrals — and every one of those <quote>Like</"
+"quote> buttons spies on everyone who lands on a page that contains them (see "
+"also: Google Analytics embeds, Twitter buttons, etc.)."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1835
msgid ""
"The reason the world’s governments have been slow to create meaningful "
"penalties for privacy breaches is that Big Tech’s concentration produces "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1843
msgid ""
"The reason that the smartest engineers in the world want to work for Big "
"Tech is that Big Tech commands the lion’s share of tech industry jobs."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1848
msgid ""
"The reason people who are aghast at Facebook’s and Google’s and Amazon’s "
"data-handling practices continue to use these services is that all their "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1854
msgid ""
"Competitive markets would weaken the companies’ lobbying muscle by reducing "
"their profits and pitting them against each other in regulatory forums. It "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1865
msgid ""
"In other words, while surveillance doesn’t cause monopolies, monopolies "
"certainly abet surveillance."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1869
msgid "Ronald Reagan, pioneer of tech monopolism"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1871
msgid ""
"Technology exceptionalism is a sin, whether it’s practiced by technology’s "
"blind proponents or by its critics. Both of these camps are prone to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1883
msgid ""
"To understand how tech became so monopolistic, it’s useful to look at the "
"dawn of the consumer tech industry: 1979, the year the Apple II Plus "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1895
msgid ""
"Antitrust’s story began nearly a century before all that with laws like the "
"Sherman Act, which took aim at monopolists on the grounds that monopolies "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1904
msgid ""
"Then came a fabulist named Robert Bork, a former solicitor general who "
"Reagan appointed to the powerful U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1914
msgid ""
"Bork was a crank, but he was a crank with a theory that rich people really "
"liked. Monopolies are a great way to make rich people richer by allowing "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1922
msgid ""
"Bork’s theories were especially palatable to the same power brokers who "
"backed Reagan, and Reagan’s Department of Justice and other agencies began "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1931
msgid ""
"Little by little, Bork’s theories entered the mainstream, and their backers "
"began to infiltrate the legal education field, even putting on junkets where "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1941
msgid ""
"The history of Bork’s antitrust theories is a really good example of the "
"kind of covertly engineered shifts in public opinion that Zuboff warns us "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1953
msgid ""
"Today, many fear that machine learning allows surveillance capitalism to "
"sell <quote>Bork-as-a-Service,</quote> at internet speeds, so that you can "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1966
msgid ""
"The idea that tech forms <quote>natural monopolies</quote> (monopolies that "
"are the inevitable result of the realities of an industry, such as the "
"monopolies that accrue the first company to run long-haul phone lines or "
-"rail lines) is belied by tech’s own history: In the absence of "
-"anti-competitive tactics, Google was able to unseat AltaVista and Yahoo; "
-"Facebook was able to head off Myspace. There are some advantages to "
-"gathering mountains of data, but those mountains of data also have "
-"disadvantages: liability (from leaking), diminishing returns (from old "
-"data), and institutional inertia (big companies, like science, progress one "
-"funeral at a time)."
+"rail lines) is belied by tech’s own history: In the absence of anti-"
+"competitive tactics, Google was able to unseat AltaVista and Yahoo; Facebook "
+"was able to head off Myspace. There are some advantages to gathering "
+"mountains of data, but those mountains of data also have disadvantages: "
+"liability (from leaking), diminishing returns (from old data), and "
+"institutional inertia (big companies, like science, progress one funeral at "
+"a time)."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1978
msgid ""
"Indeed, the birth of the web saw a mass-extinction event for the existing "
"giant, wildly profitable proprietary technologies that had capital, network "
"effects, and walls and moats surrounding their businesses. The web showed "
"that when a new industry is built around a protocol, rather than a product, "
"the combined might of everyone who uses the protocol to reach their "
-"customers or users or communities outweighs even the most massive "
-"products. CompuServe, AOL, MSN, and a host of other proprietary walled "
-"gardens learned this lesson the hard way: Each believed it could stay "
-"separate from the web, offering <quote>curation</quote> and a guarantee of "
-"consistency and quality instead of the chaos of an open system. Each was "
-"wrong and ended up being absorbed into the public web."
+"customers or users or communities outweighs even the most massive products. "
+"CompuServe, AOL, MSN, and a host of other proprietary walled gardens learned "
+"this lesson the hard way: Each believed it could stay separate from the web, "
+"offering <quote>curation</quote> and a guarantee of consistency and quality "
+"instead of the chaos of an open system. Each was wrong and ended up being "
+"absorbed into the public web."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:1992
msgid ""
"Yes, tech is heavily monopolized and is now closely associated with industry "
"concentration, but this has more to do with a matter of timing than its "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2004
msgid ""
"In support of this thesis, I offer the concentration that every "
"<emphasis>other</emphasis> industry has undergone over the same period. From "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2019
msgid ""
"Again: When you change the laws intended to prevent monopolies and then "
"monopolies form in exactly the way the law was supposed to prevent, it is "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2031
msgid "Steering with the windshield wipers"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2033
msgid ""
"It’s been 40 years since Bork’s project to rehabilitate monopolies achieved "
"liftoff, and that is a generation and a half, which is plenty of time to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2043
msgid ""
"After 40 years of studiously ignoring antitrust analysis and enforcement, "
"it’s not surprising that we’ve all but forgotten that antitrust exists, that "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2051
msgid ""
"Antitrust is a market society’s steering wheel, the control of first resort "
"to keep would-be masters of the universe in their lanes. But Bork and his "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2061
msgid ""
"It’s like a 1960s science-fiction plot come to life: People stuck in a "
"<quote>generation ship,</quote> plying its way across the stars, a ship once "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2071
msgid "Surveillance still matters"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2073
msgid ""
"None of this is to minimize the problems with surveillance. Surveillance "
"matters, and Big Tech’s use of surveillance <emphasis>is</emphasis> an "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2080
msgid ""
"Surveillance has become <emphasis>much</emphasis> more efficient thanks to "
"Big Tech. In 1989, the Stasi — the East German secret police — had the whole "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2087
msgid ""
"Today, we know that the NSA is spying on a significant fraction of the "
"entire world’s population, and its ratio of surveillance operatives to the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2096
msgid ""
"How did the ratio of surveillable citizens expand from 1:60 to 1:10,000 in "
"less than 30 years? It’s thanks to Big Tech. Our devices and services gather "
"these devices and the services they connect to, and then we painstakingly "
"perform the data-entry tasks associated with logging facts about our lives, "
"opinions, and preferences. This mass surveillance project has been largely "
-"useless for fighting terrorism: The NSA can <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/nsa-cites-case-as-success-of-phone-data-collection-program/2013/08/08/fc915e5a-feda-11e2-96a8-d3b921c0924a_story.html\">only "
-"point to a single minor success story</ulink> in which it used its data "
-"collection program to foil an attempt by a U.S. resident to wire a few "
-"thousand dollars to an overseas terror group. It’s ineffective for much the "
-"same reason that commercial surveillance projects are largely ineffective at "
-"targeting advertising: The people who want to commit acts of terror, like "
-"people who want to buy a refrigerator, are extremely rare. If you’re trying "
-"to detect a phenomenon whose base rate is one in a million with an "
-"instrument whose accuracy is only 99%, then every true positive will come at "
-"the cost of 9,999 false positives."
+"useless for fighting terrorism: The NSA can <ulink url=\"https://www."
+"washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/nsa-cites-case-as-success-of-"
+"phone-data-collection-program/2013/08/08/fc915e5a-feda-11e2-96a8-"
+"d3b921c0924a_story.html\">only point to a single minor success story</ulink> "
+"in which it used its data collection program to foil an attempt by a U.S. "
+"resident to wire a few thousand dollars to an overseas terror group. It’s "
+"ineffective for much the same reason that commercial surveillance projects "
+"are largely ineffective at targeting advertising: The people who want to "
+"commit acts of terror, like people who want to buy a refrigerator, are "
+"extremely rare. If you’re trying to detect a phenomenon whose base rate is "
+"one in a million with an instrument whose accuracy is only 99%, then every "
+"true positive will come at the cost of 9,999 false positives."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2117
msgid ""
"Let me explain that again: If one in a million people is a terrorist, then "
"there will only be about one terrorist in a random sample of one million "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2125
msgid ""
"In reality, the accuracy of algorithmic terrorism detection falls far short "
"of the 99% mark, as does refrigerator ad targeting. The difference is that "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2132
msgid ""
"Mass state surveillance is only feasible because of surveillance capitalism "
"and its extremely low-yield ad-targeting systems, which require a constant "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2140
msgid ""
"State surveillance is no mere parasite on Big Tech, sucking up its data and "
"giving nothing in return. In truth, the two are symbiotes: Big Tech sucks up "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2149
msgid ""
"To see this at work today, look no further than Amazon’s home surveillance "
"device, the Ring doorbell, and its associated app, Neighbors. Ring — a "
-"product that Amazon acquired and did not develop in house — makes a "
-"camera-enabled doorbell that streams footage from your front door to your "
-"mobile device. The Neighbors app allows you to form a neighborhood-wide "
+"product that Amazon acquired and did not develop in house — makes a camera-"
+"enabled doorbell that streams footage from your front door to your mobile "
+"device. The Neighbors app allows you to form a neighborhood-wide "
"surveillance grid with your fellow Ring owners through which you can share "
"clips of <quote>suspicious characters.</quote> If you’re thinking that this "
"sounds like a recipe for letting curtain-twitching racists supercharge their "
-"suspicions of people with brown skin who walk down their blocks, <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/07/amazons-ring-enables-over-policing-efforts-some-americas-deadliest-law-enforcement\">you’re "
-"right</ulink>. Ring has become a <emphasis>de facto,</emphasis> "
-"off-the-books arm of the police without any of the pesky oversight or rules."
+"suspicions of people with brown skin who walk down their blocks, <ulink url="
+"\"https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/07/amazons-ring-enables-over-policing-"
+"efforts-some-americas-deadliest-law-enforcement\">you’re right</ulink>. Ring "
+"has become a <emphasis>de facto,</emphasis> off-the-books arm of the police "
+"without any of the pesky oversight or rules."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2165
msgid ""
"In mid-2019, a series of public records requests revealed that Amazon had "
"struck confidential deals with more than 400 local law enforcement agencies "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2177
msgid ""
"Ring and law enforcement have found many ways to intertwine their "
"activities. Ring strikes secret deals to acquire real-time access to 911 "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2185
msgid ""
"The more the cops buzz-market the surveillance capitalist Ring, the more "
"surveillance capability the state gets. Cops who rely on private entities "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2196
msgid "Dignity and sanctuary"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2198
msgid ""
"But even if we could exercise democratic control over our states and force "
"them to stop raiding surveillance capitalism’s reservoirs of behavioral "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2203
msgid ""
"This is an area where Zuboff shines. Her chapter on <quote>sanctuary</quote> "
"— the feeling of being unobserved — is a beautiful hymn to introspection, "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2208
msgid ""
"When you are watched, something changes. Anyone who has ever raised a child "
"knows this. You might look up from your book (or more realistically, from "
"your authentic self, and in that moment, you are vulnerable like a hermit "
"crab scuttling from one shell to the next. The tender, unprotected tissues "
"you expose in that moment are too delicate to reveal in the presence of "
-"another, even someone you trust as implicitly as a child trusts their "
-"parent."
+"another, even someone you trust as implicitly as a child trusts their parent."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2224
msgid ""
"In the digital age, our authentic selves are inextricably tied to our "
"digital lives. Your search history is a running ledger of the questions "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2232
msgid ""
"To be observed in these activities is to lose the sanctuary of your "
"authentic self."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2236
msgid ""
"There’s another way in which surveillance capitalism robs us of our capacity "
"to be our authentic selves: by making us anxious. Surveillance capitalism "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2247
msgid ""
"Our devices and services are <quote>general purpose</quote> in that they can "
"connect anything or anyone to anything or anyone else and that they can run "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2257
msgid ""
"All day and all night, our pockets buzz, shattering our concentration and "
"tearing apart the fragile webs of connection we spin as we think through "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2266
msgid "Afflicting the afflicted"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2268
msgid ""
"The effects of surveillance on our ability to be our authentic selves are "
"not equal for all people. Some of us are lucky enough to live in a time and "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2275
msgid ""
"But for many of us, this is not true. Recall that in living memory, many of "
"the ways of being that we think of as socially acceptable today were once "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2285
msgid ""
"Today, these activities aren’t just decriminalized in much of the world, "
"they’re considered normal, and the fallen prohibitions are viewed as "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2290
msgid ""
"How did we get from prohibition to normalization? Through private, personal "
"activity: People who were secretly gay or secret pot-smokers or who secretly "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2303
msgid ""
"The right to choose the time and manner of these conversations was key to "
"their success. It’s one thing to come out to your dad while you’re on a "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2310
msgid ""
"Without a private sphere, there’s a chance that none of these changes would "
"have come to pass and that the people who benefited from these changes would "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2317
msgid ""
"The corollary is that, unless you think that our society has attained social "
"perfection — that your grandchildren in 50 years will ask you to tell them "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2329
msgid "A private realm is necessary for human progress."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2332
msgid "Any data you collect and retain will eventually leak"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2334
msgid ""
"The lack of a private life can rob vulnerable people of the chance to be "
"their authentic selves and constrain our actions by depriving us of "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2340
msgid ""
"Personally identifying information is of very limited use for the purpose of "
"controlling peoples’ minds, but identity theft — really a catchall term for "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2348
msgid ""
-"Attackers are not limited to using data from one breached source, "
-"either. Multiple services have suffered breaches that exposed names, "
-"addresses, phone numbers, passwords, sexual tastes, school grades, work "
-"performance, brushes with the criminal justice system, family details, "
-"genetic information, fingerprints and other biometrics, reading habits, "
-"search histories, literary tastes, pseudonymous identities, and other "
-"sensitive information. Attackers can merge data from these different "
-"breaches to build up extremely detailed dossiers on random subjects and then "
-"use different parts of the data for different criminal purposes."
+"Attackers are not limited to using data from one breached source, either. "
+"Multiple services have suffered breaches that exposed names, addresses, "
+"phone numbers, passwords, sexual tastes, school grades, work performance, "
+"brushes with the criminal justice system, family details, genetic "
+"information, fingerprints and other biometrics, reading habits, search "
+"histories, literary tastes, pseudonymous identities, and other sensitive "
+"information. Attackers can merge data from these different breaches to build "
+"up extremely detailed dossiers on random subjects and then use different "
+"parts of the data for different criminal purposes."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2360
msgid ""
"For example, attackers can use leaked username and password combinations to "
-"hijack whole fleets of commercial vehicles that <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/zmpx4x/hacker-monitor-cars-kill-engine-gps-tracking-apps\">have "
-"been fitted with anti-theft GPS trackers and immobilizers</ulink> or to "
-"hijack baby monitors in order to <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/04/23/how-nest-designed-keep-intruders-out-peoples-homes-effectively-allowed-hackers-get/?utm_term=.15220e98c550\">terrorize "
-"toddlers with the audio tracks from pornography</ulink>. Attackers use "
-"leaked data to trick phone companies into giving them your phone number, "
-"then they intercept SMS-based two-factor authentication codes in order to "
-"take over your email, bank account, and/or cryptocurrency wallets."
+"hijack whole fleets of commercial vehicles that <ulink url=\"https://www."
+"vice.com/en_us/article/zmpx4x/hacker-monitor-cars-kill-engine-gps-tracking-"
+"apps\">have been fitted with anti-theft GPS trackers and immobilizers</"
+"ulink> or to hijack baby monitors in order to <ulink url=\"https://www."
+"washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/04/23/how-nest-designed-keep-intruders-"
+"out-peoples-homes-effectively-allowed-hackers-get/?"
+"utm_term=.15220e98c550\">terrorize toddlers with the audio tracks from "
+"pornography</ulink>. Attackers use leaked data to trick phone companies into "
+"giving them your phone number, then they intercept SMS-based two-factor "
+"authentication codes in order to take over your email, bank account, and/or "
+"cryptocurrency wallets."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2373
msgid ""
"Attackers are endlessly inventive in the pursuit of creative ways to "
"weaponize leaked data. One common use of leaked data is to penetrate "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2378
msgid ""
-"Like spies, online fraudsters are totally dependent on companies "
-"over-collecting and over-retaining our data. Spy agencies sometimes pay "
-"companies for access to their data or intimidate them into giving it up, but "
-"sometimes they work just like criminals do — by <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-24751821\">sneaking data out "
-"of companies’ databases</ulink>."
+"Like spies, online fraudsters are totally dependent on companies over-"
+"collecting and over-retaining our data. Spy agencies sometimes pay companies "
+"for access to their data or intimidate them into giving it up, but sometimes "
+"they work just like criminals do — by <ulink url=\"https://www.bbc.com/news/"
+"world-us-canada-24751821\">sneaking data out of companies’ databases</ulink>."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2386
msgid ""
"The over-collection of data has a host of terrible social consequences, from "
"the erosion of our authentic selves to the undermining of social progress, "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2394
msgid "Critical tech exceptionalism is still tech exceptionalism"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2397
msgid ""
"Big Tech has long practiced technology exceptionalism: the idea that it "
-"should not be subject to the mundane laws and norms of "
-"<quote>meatspace.</quote> Mottoes like Facebook’s <quote>move fast and break "
-"things</quote> attracted justifiable scorn of the companies’ self-serving "
-"rhetoric."
+"should not be subject to the mundane laws and norms of <quote>meatspace.</"
+"quote> Mottoes like Facebook’s <quote>move fast and break things</quote> "
+"attracted justifiable scorn of the companies’ self-serving rhetoric."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2403
msgid ""
"Tech exceptionalism got us all into a lot of trouble, so it’s ironic and "
"distressing to see Big Tech’s critics committing the same sin."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2407
msgid ""
"Big Tech is not a <quote>rogue capitalism</quote> that cannot be cured "
"through the traditional anti-monopoly remedies of trustbusting (forcing "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2417
msgid ""
"The thing is, people have been claiming to have perfected mind-control rays "
"for centuries, and every time, it turned out to be a con — though sometimes "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2423
msgid ""
"For generations, the advertising industry has been steadily improving its "
"ability to sell advertising services to businesses while only making "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2433
msgid ""
"The tech industry has made enormous improvements in the science of "
"convincing businesses that they’re good at advertising while their actual "
-"improvements to advertising — as opposed to targeting — have been pretty "
-"ho-hum. The vogue for machine learning — and the mystical invocation of "
+"improvements to advertising — as opposed to targeting — have been pretty ho-"
+"hum. The vogue for machine learning — and the mystical invocation of "
"<quote>artificial intelligence</quote> as a synonym for straightforward "
"statistical inference techniques — has greatly boosted the efficacy of Big "
"Tech’s sales pitch as marketers have exploited potential customers’ lack of "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2445
msgid ""
"It’s tempting to think that if businesses are willing to pour billions into "
"a venture that the venture must be a good one. Yet there are plenty of times "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2459
msgid ""
"The claims of Big Tech’s mind-control system are full of tells that the "
-"enterprise is a con. For example, <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.01415/full\">the "
-"reliance on the <quote>Big Five</quote> personality traits</ulink> as a "
-"primary means of influencing people even though the <quote>Big Five</quote> "
-"theory is unsupported by any large-scale, peer-reviewed studies and is "
-"<ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.wired.com/story/the-noisy-fallacies-of-psychographic-targeting/\">mostly "
-"the realm of marketing hucksters and pop psych</ulink>."
+"enterprise is a con. For example, <ulink url=\"https://www.frontiersin.org/"
+"articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.01415/full\">the reliance on the <quote>Big "
+"Five</quote> personality traits</ulink> as a primary means of influencing "
+"people even though the <quote>Big Five</quote> theory is unsupported by any "
+"large-scale, peer-reviewed studies and is <ulink url=\"https://www.wired.com/"
+"story/the-noisy-fallacies-of-psychographic-targeting/\">mostly the realm of "
+"marketing hucksters and pop psych</ulink>."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2469
msgid ""
"Big Tech’s promotional materials also claim that their algorithms can "
"accurately perform <quote>sentiment analysis</quote> or detect peoples’ "
-"moods based on their <quote>microexpressions,</quote> but <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.npr.org/2018/09/12/647040758/advertising-on-facebook-is-it-worth-it\">these "
-"are marketing claims, not scientific ones</ulink>. These methods are largely "
-"untested by independent scientific experts, and where they have been tested, "
-"they’ve been found sorely wanting. Microexpressions are particularly "
-"suspect as the companies that specialize in training people to detect them "
-"<ulink "
-"url=\"https://theintercept.com/2017/02/08/tsas-own-files-show-doubtful-science-behind-its-behavior-screening-program/\">have "
+"moods based on their <quote>microexpressions,</quote> but <ulink url="
+"\"https://www.npr.org/2018/09/12/647040758/advertising-on-facebook-is-it-"
+"worth-it\">these are marketing claims, not scientific ones</ulink>. These "
+"methods are largely untested by independent scientific experts, and where "
+"they have been tested, they’ve been found sorely wanting. Microexpressions "
+"are particularly suspect as the companies that specialize in training people "
+"to detect them <ulink url=\"https://theintercept.com/2017/02/08/tsas-own-"
+"files-show-doubtful-science-behind-its-behavior-screening-program/\">have "
"been shown</ulink> to underperform relative to random chance."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2482
msgid ""
"Big Tech has been so good at marketing its own supposed superpowers that "
"it’s easy to believe that they can market everything else with similar "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2494
msgid ""
"That skepticism should infuse all of our evaluations of Big Tech and its "
"supposed abilities, including our perusal of its patents. Zuboff vests these "
"patents with enormous significance, pointing out that Google claimed "
-"extensive new persuasion capabilities in <ulink "
-"url=\"https://patents.google.com/patent/US20050131762A1/en\">its patent "
-"filings</ulink>. These claims are doubly suspect: first, because they are so "
-"self-serving, and second, because the patent itself is so notoriously an "
-"invitation to exaggeration."
+"extensive new persuasion capabilities in <ulink url=\"https://patents.google."
+"com/patent/US20050131762A1/en\">its patent filings</ulink>. These claims are "
+"doubly suspect: first, because they are so self-serving, and second, because "
+"the patent itself is so notoriously an invitation to exaggeration."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2504
msgid ""
"Patent applications take the form of a series of claims and range from broad "
"to narrow. A typical patent starts out by claiming that its authors have "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2519
msgid ""
"What’s more, software patents are routinely granted even though the filer "
-"doesn’t have any evidence that they can do the thing claimed by the "
-"patent. That is, you can patent an <quote>invention</quote> that you haven’t "
+"doesn’t have any evidence that they can do the thing claimed by the patent. "
+"That is, you can patent an <quote>invention</quote> that you haven’t "
"actually made and that you don’t know how to make."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2525
msgid ""
"With these considerations in hand, it becomes obvious that the fact that a "
"Big Tech company has patented what it <emphasis>says</emphasis> is an "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2532
msgid ""
"Big Tech collects our data for many reasons, including the diminishing "
"returns on existing stores of data. But many tech companies also collect "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2542
msgid ""
"Data mined for predictive systems doesn’t necessarily produce these "
"dividends. Think of Netflix: The predictive value of the data mined from a "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2553
msgid ""
"Businesses pursue fads to the detriment of their profits all the time, "
"especially when the businesses and their investors are not motivated by the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2562
msgid ""
"This is another harm of tech exceptionalism: The belief that more data "
"always produces more profits in the form of more insights that can be "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2576
msgid ""
"How monopolies, not mind control, drive surveillance capitalism: The "
"Snapchat story"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2579
msgid ""
"For the first decade of its existence, Facebook competed with the social "
"media giants of the day (Myspace, Orkut, etc.) by presenting itself as the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2589
msgid ""
"Despite frequent promises that it would never collect or analyze its users’ "
"data, Facebook periodically created initiatives that did just that, like the "
"creepy, ham-fisted Beacon tool, which spied on you as you moved around the "
"web and then added your online activities to your public timeline, allowing "
-"your friends to monitor your browsing habits. Beacon sparked a user "
-"revolt. Every time, Facebook backed off from its surveillance initiative, "
-"but not all the way; inevitably, the new Facebook would be more surveilling "
-"than the old Facebook, though not quite as surveilling as the intermediate "
-"Facebook following the launch of the new product or service."
+"your friends to monitor your browsing habits. Beacon sparked a user revolt. "
+"Every time, Facebook backed off from its surveillance initiative, but not "
+"all the way; inevitably, the new Facebook would be more surveilling than the "
+"old Facebook, though not quite as surveilling as the intermediate Facebook "
+"following the launch of the new product or service."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2601
msgid ""
"The pace at which Facebook ramped up its surveillance efforts seems to have "
"been set by Facebook’s competitive landscape. The more competitors Facebook "
"had, the better it behaved. Every time a major competitor foundered, "
-"Facebook’s behavior <ulink "
-"url=\"https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3247362\">got "
-"markedly worse</ulink>."
+"Facebook’s behavior <ulink url=\"https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?"
+"abstract_id=3247362\">got markedly worse</ulink>."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2609
msgid ""
"All the while, Facebook was prodigiously acquiring companies, including a "
-"company called Onavo. Nominally, Onavo made a battery-monitoring mobile "
-"app. But the permissions that Onavo required were so expansive that the app "
-"was able to gather fine-grained telemetry on everything users did with their "
+"company called Onavo. Nominally, Onavo made a battery-monitoring mobile app. "
+"But the permissions that Onavo required were so expansive that the app was "
+"able to gather fine-grained telemetry on everything users did with their "
"phones, including which apps they used and how they were using them."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2617
msgid ""
"Through Onavo, Facebook discovered that it was losing market share to "
"Snapchat, an app that — like Facebook a decade before — billed itself as the "
"pro-privacy alternative to the status quo. Through Onavo, Facebook was able "
"to mine data from the devices of Snapchat users, including both current and "
"former Snapchat users. This spurred Facebook to acquire Instagram — some "
-"features of which competed with Snapchat — and then allowed Facebook to "
-"fine-tune Instagram’s features and sales pitch to erode Snapchat’s gains and "
+"features of which competed with Snapchat — and then allowed Facebook to fine-"
+"tune Instagram’s features and sales pitch to erode Snapchat’s gains and "
"ensure that Facebook would not have to face the kinds of competitive "
"pressures it had earlier inflicted on Myspace and Orkut."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2629
msgid ""
"The story of how Facebook crushed Snapchat reveals the relationship between "
"monopoly and surveillance capitalism. Facebook combined surveillance with "
"lax antitrust enforcement to spot the competitive threat of Snapchat on its "
"horizon and then take decisive action against it. Facebook’s surveillance "
-"capitalism let it avert competitive pressure with anti-competitive "
-"tactics. Facebook users still want privacy — Facebook hasn’t used "
-"surveillance to brainwash them out of it — but they can’t get it because "
-"Facebook’s surveillance lets it destroy any hope of a rival service emerging "
-"that competes on privacy features."
+"capitalism let it avert competitive pressure with anti-competitive tactics. "
+"Facebook users still want privacy — Facebook hasn’t used surveillance to "
+"brainwash them out of it — but they can’t get it because Facebook’s "
+"surveillance lets it destroy any hope of a rival service emerging that "
+"competes on privacy features."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2641
msgid "A monopoly over your friends"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2643
msgid ""
"A decentralization movement has tried to erode the dominance of Facebook and "
"other Big Tech companies by fielding <quote>indieweb</quote> alternatives — "
-"Mastodon as a Twitter alternative, Diaspora as a Facebook alternative, "
-"etc. — but these efforts have failed to attain any kind of liftoff."
+"Mastodon as a Twitter alternative, Diaspora as a Facebook alternative, etc. "
+"— but these efforts have failed to attain any kind of liftoff."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2650
msgid ""
"Fundamentally, each of these services is hamstrung by the same problem: "
"Every potential user for a Facebook or Twitter alternative has to convince "
"all their friends to follow them to a decentralized web alternative in order "
"to continue to realize the benefit of social media. For many of us, the only "
"reason to have a Facebook account is that our friends have Facebook "
-"accounts, and the reason they have Facebook accounts is that "
-"<emphasis>we</emphasis> have Facebook accounts."
+"accounts, and the reason they have Facebook accounts is that <emphasis>we</"
+"emphasis> have Facebook accounts."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2660
msgid ""
"All of this has conspired to make Facebook — and other dominant platforms — "
-"into <quote>kill zones</quote> that investors will not fund new entrants "
-"for."
+"into <quote>kill zones</quote> that investors will not fund new entrants for."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2665
msgid ""
"And yet, all of today’s tech giants came into existence despite the "
"entrenched advantage of the companies that came before them. To understand "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><blockquote><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2672
msgid "The hard problem of our species is coordination."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2676
msgid ""
"<quote>Interoperability</quote> is the ability of two technologies to work "
"with one another: Anyone can make an LP that will play on any record player, "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2685
msgid ""
"Interoperability is often a source of innovation and consumer benefit: Apple "
"made the first commercially successful PC, but millions of independent "
-"software vendors made interoperable programs that ran on the Apple II "
-"Plus. The simple analog antenna inputs on the back of TVs first allowed "
-"cable operators to connect directly to TVs, then they allowed game console "
+"software vendors made interoperable programs that ran on the Apple II Plus. "
+"The simple analog antenna inputs on the back of TVs first allowed cable "
+"operators to connect directly to TVs, then they allowed game console "
"companies and then personal computer companies to use standard televisions "
"as displays. Standard RJ-11 telephone jacks allowed for the production of "
"phones from a variety of vendors in a variety of forms, from the free "
-"football-shaped phone that came with a <emphasis>Sports "
-"Illustrated</emphasis> subscription to business phones with speakers, hold "
-"functions, and so on and then answering machines and finally modems, paving "
-"the way for the internet revolution."
+"football-shaped phone that came with a <emphasis>Sports Illustrated</"
+"emphasis> subscription to business phones with speakers, hold functions, and "
+"so on and then answering machines and finally modems, paving the way for the "
+"internet revolution."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2700
msgid ""
"<quote>Interoperability</quote> is often used interchangeably with "
"<quote>standardization,</quote> which is the process when manufacturers and "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2708
msgid ""
"But interoperability doesn’t require standardization — indeed, "
"standardization often proceeds from the chaos of ad hoc interoperability "
"dashboard lighter subcomponent. The automakers didn’t take any "
"countermeasures to prevent the use of these aftermarket accessories by their "
"customers, but they also didn’t do anything to make life easier for the "
-"chargers’ manufacturers. This is a kind of <quote>neutral "
-"interoperability.</quote>"
+"chargers’ manufacturers. This is a kind of <quote>neutral interoperability.</"
+"quote>"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2719
msgid ""
"Beyond neutral interoperability, there is <quote>adversarial "
"interoperability.</quote> That’s when a manufacturer makes a product that "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2727
msgid ""
-"Probably the most familiar form of adversarial interoperability is "
-"third-party printer ink. Printer manufacturers claim that they sell printers "
-"below cost and that the only way they can recoup the losses they incur is by "
+"Probably the most familiar form of adversarial interoperability is third-"
+"party printer ink. Printer manufacturers claim that they sell printers below "
+"cost and that the only way they can recoup the losses they incur is by "
"charging high markups on ink. To prevent the owners of printers from buying "
"ink elsewhere, the printer companies deploy a suite of anti-customer "
"security systems that detect and reject both refilled and third-party "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2736
msgid ""
"Owners of printers take the position that HP and Epson and Brother are not "
"charities and that customers for their wares have no obligation to help them "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2749
msgid ""
"Adversarial interoperability has played an outsized role in the history of "
"the tech industry: from the founding of the <quote>alt.*</quote> Usenet "
"peccadilloes) to Facebook (whose success was built in part by helping its "
"new users stay in touch with friends they’d left behind on Myspace because "
"Facebook supplied them with a tool that scraped waiting messages from "
-"Myspace and imported them into Facebook, effectively creating an "
-"Facebook-based Myspace reader)."
+"Myspace and imported them into Facebook, effectively creating an Facebook-"
+"based Myspace reader)."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2763
msgid ""
"Today, incumbency is seen as an unassailable advantage. Facebook is where "
"all of your friends are, so no one can start a Facebook competitor. But "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2778
msgid ""
"Adversarial interoperability was once the norm and a key contributor to the "
"dynamic, vibrant tech scene, but now it is stuck behind a thicket of laws "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2788
msgid ""
"In the absence of a competitive market, lawmakers have resorted to assigning "
"expensive, state-like duties to Big Tech firms, such as automatically "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2796
msgid ""
"These measures put a floor under how small we can make Big Tech because only "
"the very largest companies can afford the humans and automated filters "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2801
msgid ""
"But that’s not the only way in which making platforms responsible for "
"policing their users undermines competition. A platform that is expected to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2813
msgid ""
"To the extent that we are willing to let Big Tech police itself — rather "
"than making Big Tech small enough that users can leave bad platforms for "
"out of business will not destroy billions of users’ access to their "
"communities and data — we build the case that Big Tech should be able to "
"block its competitors and make it easier for Big Tech to demand legal "
-"enforcement tools to ban and punish attempts at adversarial "
-"interoperability."
+"enforcement tools to ban and punish attempts at adversarial interoperability."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2823
msgid ""
"Ultimately, we can try to fix Big Tech by making it responsible for bad acts "
"by its users, or we can try to fix the internet by cutting Big Tech down to "
"size. But we can’t do both. To replace today’s giant products with "
"pluralistic protocols, we need to clear the legal thicket that prevents "
-"adversarial interoperability so that tomorrow’s nimble, personal, "
-"small-scale products can federate themselves with giants like Facebook, "
-"allowing the users who’ve left to continue to communicate with users who "
-"haven’t left yet, reaching tendrils over Facebook’s garden wall that "
-"Facebook’s trapped users can use to scale the walls and escape to the "
-"global, open web."
+"adversarial interoperability so that tomorrow’s nimble, personal, small-"
+"scale products can federate themselves with giants like Facebook, allowing "
+"the users who’ve left to continue to communicate with users who haven’t left "
+"yet, reaching tendrils over Facebook’s garden wall that Facebook’s trapped "
+"users can use to scale the walls and escape to the global, open web."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2835
msgid "Fake news is an epistemological crisis"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2837
msgid ""
"Tech is not the only industry that has undergone massive concentration since "
"the Reagan era. Virtually every major industry — from oil to newspapers to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2844
msgid ""
"At the same time, every industry has become something of a tech industry as "
"general-purpose computers and general-purpose networks and the promise of "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2850
msgid ""
"This phenomenon of industrial concentration is part of a wider story about "
"wealth concentration overall as a smaller and smaller number of people own "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2858
msgid ""
"That means that whenever a regulator asks a question with an obvious, "
"empirical answer (<quote>Are humans causing climate change?</quote> or "
"<quote>Should we let companies conduct commercial mass surveillance?</quote> "
-"or <quote>Does society benefit from allowing network neutrality "
-"violations?</quote>), the answer that comes out is only correct if that "
-"correctness meets with the approval of rich people and the industries that "
-"made them so wealthy."
+"or <quote>Does society benefit from allowing network neutrality violations?</"
+"quote>), the answer that comes out is only correct if that correctness meets "
+"with the approval of rich people and the industries that made them so "
+"wealthy."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2867
msgid ""
"Rich people have always played an outsized role in politics and more so "
"since the Supreme Court’s <emphasis>Citizens United</emphasis> decision "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2876
msgid ""
"But the policy distortions of rich individuals pale in comparison to the "
"policy distortions that concentrated industries are capable of. The "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2885
msgid ""
"Concentrated industries also find it easier to collaborate on policy "
"objectives than competitive ones. When all the top execs from your industry "
-"can fit around a single boardroom table, they often do. And "
-"<emphasis>when</emphasis> they do, they can forge a consensus position on "
-"regulation."
+"can fit around a single boardroom table, they often do. And <emphasis>when</"
+"emphasis> they do, they can forge a consensus position on regulation."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2892
msgid ""
"Rising through the ranks in a concentrated industry generally means working "
"at two or three of the big companies. When there are only relatively few "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2904
msgid ""
"Highly concentrated industries also present a regulatory conundrum. When an "
"industry is dominated by just four or five companies, the only people who "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2915
msgid ""
"All this is to say that the tight social bonds, small number of firms, and "
"regulatory capture of concentrated industries give the companies that "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2921
msgid ""
-"This is increasingly obvious. Whether it’s payday lenders <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/02/25/how-payday-lending-industry-insider-tilted-academic-research-its-favor/\">winning "
-"the right to practice predatory lending</ulink> or Apple <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/mgxayp/source-apple-will-fight-right-to-repair-legislation\">winning "
-"the right to decide who can fix your phone</ulink> or Google and Facebook "
-"winning the right to breach your private data without suffering meaningful "
-"consequences or victories for pipeline companies or impunity for opioid "
-"manufacturers or massive tax subsidies for incredibly profitable dominant "
-"businesses, it’s increasingly apparent that many of our official, "
+"This is increasingly obvious. Whether it’s payday lenders <ulink url="
+"\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/02/25/how-payday-lending-"
+"industry-insider-tilted-academic-research-its-favor/\">winning the right to "
+"practice predatory lending</ulink> or Apple <ulink url=\"https://www.vice."
+"com/en_us/article/mgxayp/source-apple-will-fight-right-to-repair-legislation"
+"\">winning the right to decide who can fix your phone</ulink> or Google and "
+"Facebook winning the right to breach your private data without suffering "
+"meaningful consequences or victories for pipeline companies or impunity for "
+"opioid manufacturers or massive tax subsidies for incredibly profitable "
+"dominant businesses, it’s increasingly apparent that many of our official, "
"evidence-based truth-seeking processes are, in fact, auctions for sale to "
"the highest bidder."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2935
msgid ""
"It’s really impossible to overstate what a terrifying prospect this is. We "
"live in an incredibly high-tech society, and none of us could acquire the "
"expertise to evaluate every technological proposition that stands between us "
"and our untimely, horrible deaths. You might devote your life to acquiring "
-"the media literacy to distinguish good scientific journals from corrupt "
-"pay-for-play lookalikes and the statistical literacy to evaluate the quality "
-"of the analysis in the journals as well as the microbiology and epidemiology "
+"the media literacy to distinguish good scientific journals from corrupt pay-"
+"for-play lookalikes and the statistical literacy to evaluate the quality of "
+"the analysis in the journals as well as the microbiology and epidemiology "
"knowledge to determine whether you can trust claims about the safety of "
"vaccines — but that would still leave you unqualified to judge whether the "
"wiring in your home will give you a lethal shock <emphasis>and</emphasis> "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2952
msgid ""
"In a world as complex as this one, we have to defer to authorities, and we "
"keep them honest by making those authorities accountable to us and binding "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2961
msgid "Right now, it’s obviously not."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2964
msgid ""
"The past 40 years of rising inequality and industry concentration, together "
"with increasingly weak accountability and transparency for expert agencies, "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2972
msgid ""
"For example, it’s been decades since Exxon’s own scientists concluded that "
"its products would render the Earth uninhabitable by humans. And yet those "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2983
msgid ""
"The collapse of the credibility of our systems for divining and upholding "
"truths has left us in a state of epistemological chaos. Once, most of us "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:2992
msgid ""
"If you’re like me, you probably believe that vaccines are safe, but you "
"(like me) probably also can’t explain the microbiology or statistics. Few of "
"embraced by medical authorities, after all, and one is safe while the other "
"could ruin your life. You’re left with a kind of inchoate constellation of "
"rules of thumb about which experts you trust to fact-check controversial "
-"claims and then to explain how all those respectable doctors with their "
-"peer-reviewed research on opioid safety <emphasis>were</emphasis> an "
-"aberration and then how you know that the doctors writing about vaccine "
-"safety are <emphasis>not</emphasis> an aberration."
+"claims and then to explain how all those respectable doctors with their peer-"
+"reviewed research on opioid safety <emphasis>were</emphasis> an aberration "
+"and then how you know that the doctors writing about vaccine safety are "
+"<emphasis>not</emphasis> an aberration."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3009
msgid ""
"I’m 100% certain that vaccinating is safe and effective, but I’m also at "
"something of a loss to explain exactly, <emphasis>precisely,</emphasis> why "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3017
msgid ""
"Fake news — conspiracy theories, racist ideologies, scientific denialism — "
"has always been with us. What’s changed today is not the mix of ideas in the "
-"public discourse but the popularity of the worst ideas in that "
-"mix. Conspiracy and denial have skyrocketed in lockstep with the growth of "
-"Big Inequality, which has also tracked the rise of Big Tech and Big Pharma "
-"and Big Wrestling and Big Car and Big Movie Theater and Big Everything Else."
+"public discourse but the popularity of the worst ideas in that mix. "
+"Conspiracy and denial have skyrocketed in lockstep with the growth of Big "
+"Inequality, which has also tracked the rise of Big Tech and Big Pharma and "
+"Big Wrestling and Big Car and Big Movie Theater and Big Everything Else."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3026
msgid ""
"No one can say for certain why this has happened, but the two dominant camps "
"are idealism (the belief that the people who argue for these conspiracies "
-"have gotten better at explaining them, maybe with the help of "
-"machine-learning tools) or materialism (the ideas have become more "
-"attractive because of material conditions in the world)."
+"have gotten better at explaining them, maybe with the help of machine-"
+"learning tools) or materialism (the ideas have become more attractive "
+"because of material conditions in the world)."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3034
msgid ""
"I’m a materialist. I’ve been exposed to the arguments of conspiracy "
"theorists all my life, and I have not experienced any qualitative leap in "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3039
msgid ""
"The major difference is in the world, not the arguments. In a time where "
"actual conspiracies are commonplace, conspiracy theories acquire a ring of "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3044
msgid ""
"We have always had disagreements about what’s true, but today, we have a "
"disagreement over how we know whether something is true. This is an "
"epistemological crisis, not a crisis over belief. It’s a crisis over the "
"credibility of our truth-seeking exercises, from scientific journals (in an "
-"era where the biggest journal publishers have been caught producing "
-"pay-to-play journals for junk science) to regulations (in an era where "
-"regulators are routinely cycling in and out of business) to education (in an "
-"era where universities are dependent on corporate donations to keep their "
-"lights on)."
+"era where the biggest journal publishers have been caught producing pay-to-"
+"play journals for junk science) to regulations (in an era where regulators "
+"are routinely cycling in and out of business) to education (in an era where "
+"universities are dependent on corporate donations to keep their lights on)."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3055
msgid ""
"Targeting — surveillance capitalism — makes it easier to find people who are "
-"undergoing this epistemological crisis, but it doesn’t create the "
-"crisis. For that, you need to look to corruption."
+"undergoing this epistemological crisis, but it doesn’t create the crisis. "
+"For that, you need to look to corruption."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3060
msgid ""
"And, conveniently enough, it’s corruption that allows surveillance "
"capitalism to grow by dismantling monopoly protections, by permitting "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3069
msgid "Tech is different"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3071
msgid ""
"I reject both iterations of technological exceptionalism. I reject the idea "
"that tech is uniquely terrible and led by people who are greedier or worse "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3079
msgid ""
"I think tech is just another industry, albeit one that grew up in the "
"absence of real monopoly constraints. It may have been first, but it isn’t "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3084
msgid ""
"But there’s one way in which I <emphasis>am</emphasis> a tech "
"exceptionalist. I believe that online tools are the key to overcoming "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3095
msgid ""
"The hard problem of our species is coordination. Everything from climate "
"change to social change to running a business to making a family work can be "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3100
msgid ""
"The internet makes it easier than at any time before to find people who want "
"to work on a project with you — hence the success of free and open-source "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3106
msgid ""
"The internet and the computers we connect to it also possess an exceptional "
"quality: general-purposeness. The internet is designed to allow any two "
"parties to communicate any data, using any protocol, without permission from "
-"anyone else. The only production design we have for computers is the "
-"general-purpose, <quote>Turing complete</quote> computer that can run every "
-"program we can express in symbolic logic."
+"anyone else. The only production design we have for computers is the general-"
+"purpose, <quote>Turing complete</quote> computer that can run every program "
+"we can express in symbolic logic."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3115
msgid ""
"This means that every time someone with a special communications need "
"invests in infrastructure and techniques to make the internet faster, "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3124
msgid ""
"For these reasons, every type of communication is gradually absorbed into "
"the internet, and every type of device — from airplanes to pacemakers — "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3129
msgid ""
"While these considerations don’t preclude regulating networks and computers, "
"they do call for gravitas and caution when doing so because changes to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3135
msgid ""
"The upshot of this is that our best hope of solving the big coordination "
"problems — climate change, inequality, etc. — is with free, fair, and open "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3143
msgid "Ownership of facts"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3145
msgid ""
"Big Tech has a funny relationship with information. When you’re generating "
"information — anything from the location data streaming off your mobile "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3152
msgid ""
"But when you have the audacity to turn the tables — to use a tool that "
"blocks ads or slurps your waiting updates out of a social network and puts "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3159
msgid ""
"The thing is, information is a very bad fit for any kind of private property "
"regime. Property rights are useful for establishing markets that can lead to "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3166
msgid ""
"Information rarely has such a clear title. Take phone numbers: There’s "
"clearly something going wrong when Facebook slurps up millions of users’ "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3173
msgid ""
"But the phone numbers Facebook nonconsensually acquires in this transaction "
"are not the <quote>property</quote> of the users they’re taken from nor do "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3182
msgid ""
"Likewise for the facts that Facebook and other commercial surveillance "
"operators acquire about us, like that we are the children of our parents or "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3195
msgid ""
"If you go to a Black Lives Matter demonstration, do the other demonstrators "
"need your permission to post their photos from the event? The online fights "
-"over <ulink "
-"url=\"https://www.wired.com/story/how-to-take-photos-at-protests/\">when and "
-"how to post photos from demonstrations</ulink> reveal a nuanced, complex "
-"issue that cannot be easily hand-waved away by giving one party a property "
-"right that everyone else in the mix has to respect."
+"over <ulink url=\"https://www.wired.com/story/how-to-take-photos-at-protests/"
+"\">when and how to post photos from demonstrations</ulink> reveal a nuanced, "
+"complex issue that cannot be easily hand-waved away by giving one party a "
+"property right that everyone else in the mix has to respect."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3204
msgid ""
"The fact that information isn’t a good fit with property and markets doesn’t "
"mean that it’s not valuable. Babies aren’t property, but they’re inarguably "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3213
msgid ""
"It’s tempting to reach for the property hammer when Big Tech treats your "
"information like a nail — not least because Big Tech are such prolific "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3224
msgid ""
"Meanwhile, establishing property rights over information will create "
"insurmountable barriers to independent data processing. Imagine that we "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3239
msgid ""
"The same goes for things like search indexes of the web or photos of "
"peoples’ houses, which have become contentious thanks to Google’s Street "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3253
msgid ""
"The ownership of facts is antithetical to many kinds of human progress. It’s "
"hard to imagine a rule that limits Big Tech’s exploitation of our collective "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3263
msgid "Persuasion works… slowly"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3265
msgid ""
"The platforms may oversell their ability to persuade people, but obviously, "
"persuasion works sometimes. Whether it’s the private realm that LGBTQ people "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3274
msgid ""
-"The project of shifting societal attitudes is a game of inches and "
-"years. For centuries, svengalis have purported to be able to accelerate this "
+"The project of shifting societal attitudes is a game of inches and years. "
+"For centuries, svengalis have purported to be able to accelerate this "
"process, but even the most brutal forms of propaganda have struggled to make "
"permanent changes. Joseph Goebbels was able to subject Germans to daily, "
"mandatory, hourslong radio broadcasts, to round up and torture and murder "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3285
msgid ""
"Yet, after 12 years of terror, once the war ended, Nazi ideology was largely "
"discredited in both East and West Germany, and a program of national truth "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3295
msgid ""
"Racism and authoritarianism have also always been with us. Anyone who’s "
"reviewed the kind of messages and arguments that racists put forward today "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3304
msgid ""
"If racists haven’t gotten more convincing in the past decade, then how is it "
"that more people were convinced to be openly racist at that time? I believe "
"that the answer lies in the material world, not the world of ideas. The "
-"ideas haven’t gotten more convincing, but people have become more "
-"afraid. Afraid that the state can’t be trusted to act as an honest broker in "
-"life-or-death decisions, from those regarding the management of the economy "
-"to the regulation of painkillers to the rules for handling private "
-"information. Afraid that the world has become a game of musical chairs in "
-"which the chairs are being taken away at a never-before-seen rate. Afraid "
-"that justice for others will come at their expense. Monopolism isn’t the "
-"cause of these fears, but the inequality and material desperation and policy "
-"malpractice that monopolism contributes to is a significant contributor to "
-"these conditions. Inequality creates the conditions for both conspiracies "
-"and violent racist ideologies, and then surveillance capitalism lets "
+"ideas haven’t gotten more convincing, but people have become more afraid. "
+"Afraid that the state can’t be trusted to act as an honest broker in life-or-"
+"death decisions, from those regarding the management of the economy to the "
+"regulation of painkillers to the rules for handling private information. "
+"Afraid that the world has become a game of musical chairs in which the "
+"chairs are being taken away at a never-before-seen rate. Afraid that justice "
+"for others will come at their expense. Monopolism isn’t the cause of these "
+"fears, but the inequality and material desperation and policy malpractice "
+"that monopolism contributes to is a significant contributor to these "
+"conditions. Inequality creates the conditions for both conspiracies and "
+"violent racist ideologies, and then surveillance capitalism lets "
"opportunists target the fearful and the conspiracy-minded."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3323
msgid "Paying won’t help"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3325
msgid ""
"As the old saw goes, <quote>If you’re not paying for the product, you’re the "
"product.</quote>"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3329
msgid ""
"It’s a commonplace belief today that the advent of free, ad-supported media "
"was the original sin of surveillance capitalism. The reasoning is that the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3341
msgid ""
-"But the degradation of news products long precedes the advent of "
-"ad-supported online news. Long before newspapers were online, lax antitrust "
+"But the degradation of news products long precedes the advent of ad-"
+"supported online news. Long before newspapers were online, lax antitrust "
"enforcement had opened the door for unprecedented waves of consolidation and "
"roll-ups in newsrooms. Rival newspapers were merged, reporters and ad sales "
"staff were laid off, physical plants were sold and leased back, leaving the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3354
msgid ""
"Then, as news companies <emphasis>did</emphasis> come online, the ad "
"revenues they commanded dropped even as the number of internet users (and "
"thus potential online readers) increased. That shift was a function of "
"consolidation in the ad sales market, with Google and Facebook emerging as "
"duopolists who made more money every year from advertising while paying less "
-"and less of it to the publishers whose work the ads appeared "
-"alongside. Monopolism created a buyer’s market for ad inventory with "
-"Facebook and Google acting as gatekeepers."
+"and less of it to the publishers whose work the ads appeared alongside. "
+"Monopolism created a buyer’s market for ad inventory with Facebook and "
+"Google acting as gatekeepers."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3364
msgid ""
"Paid services continue to exist alongside free ones, and often it is these "
"paid services — anxious to prevent people from bypassing their paywalls or "
"their profitability, Apple has to lock its platforms so that third parties "
"can’t make compatible software without permission. These locks allow the "
"company to exercise both editorial control (enabling it to exclude <ulink "
-"url=\"https://ncac.org/news/blog/does-apples-strict-app-store-content-policy-limit-freedom-of-expression\">controversial "
-"political material</ulink>) and technological control, including control "
-"over who can repair the devices it makes. If we’re worried that ad-supported "
-"products deprive people of their right to self-determination by using "
-"persuasion techniques to nudge their purchase decisions a few degrees in one "
-"direction or the other, then the near-total control a single company holds "
-"over the decision of who gets to sell you software, parts, and service for "
-"your iPhone should have us very worried indeed."
+"url=\"https://ncac.org/news/blog/does-apples-strict-app-store-content-policy-"
+"limit-freedom-of-expression\">controversial political material</ulink>) and "
+"technological control, including control over who can repair the devices it "
+"makes. If we’re worried that ad-supported products deprive people of their "
+"right to self-determination by using persuasion techniques to nudge their "
+"purchase decisions a few degrees in one direction or the other, then the "
+"near-total control a single company holds over the decision of who gets to "
+"sell you software, parts, and service for your iPhone should have us very "
+"worried indeed."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3383
msgid ""
"We shouldn’t just be concerned about payment and control: The idea that "
"paying will improve discourse is also dangerously wrong. The poor success "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3394
msgid ""
"Perhaps paying would fix this, the reasoning goes. If platforms could be "
"economically viable even if you stopped clicking on them once your "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3401
msgid ""
"There may be something to that argument, but it still ignores the wider "
"economic and political context of the platforms and the world that allowed "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3406
msgid ""
"Platforms are world-spanning and all-encompassing because they are "
"monopolies, and they are monopolies because we have gutted our most "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3417
msgid ""
"In this wildly unequal world, paying doesn’t improve the discourse; it "
"simply prices discourse out of the range of the majority of people. Paying "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3422
msgid ""
"If you think today’s filter bubbles are a problem for our discourse, imagine "
"what they’d be like if rich people inhabited free-flowing Athenian "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3436
msgid ""
"Behind the idea of paying for access is a belief that free markets will "
"address Big Tech’s dysfunction. After all, to the extent that people have a "
"view of surveillance at all, it is generally an unfavorable one, and the "
-"longer and more thoroughly one is surveilled, the less one tends to like "
-"it. Same goes for lock-in: If HP’s ink or Apple’s App Store were really "
+"longer and more thoroughly one is surveilled, the less one tends to like it. "
+"Same goes for lock-in: If HP’s ink or Apple’s App Store were really "
"obviously fantastic, they wouldn’t need technical measures to prevent users "
"from choosing a rival’s product. The only reason these technical "
"countermeasures exist is that the companies don’t believe their customers "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3449
msgid ""
"Advocates for markets laud their ability to aggregate the diffused knowledge "
"of buyers and sellers across a whole society through demand signals, price "
"<quote>rogue capitalism</quote> is that machine-learning-driven persuasion "
"techniques distort decision-making by consumers, leading to incorrect "
"signals — consumers don’t buy what they prefer, they buy what they’re "
-"tricked into preferring. It follows that the monopolistic practices of "
-"lock-in, which do far more to constrain consumers’ free choices, are even "
-"more of a <quote>rogue capitalism.</quote>"
+"tricked into preferring. It follows that the monopolistic practices of lock-"
+"in, which do far more to constrain consumers’ free choices, are even more of "
+"a <quote>rogue capitalism.</quote>"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3461
msgid ""
"The profitability of any business is constrained by the possibility that its "
"customers will take their business elsewhere. Both surveillance and lock-in "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3471
msgid ""
"Ultimately, surveillance and lock-in are both simply business strategies "
"that monopolists can choose. Surveillance companies like Google are "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3486
msgid "An <quote>ecology</quote> moment for trustbusting"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3488
msgid ""
"If we’re going to break Big Tech’s death grip on our digital lives, we’re "
-"going to have to fight monopolies. That may sound pretty mundane and "
-"old-fashioned, something out of the New Deal era, while ending the use of "
+"going to have to fight monopolies. That may sound pretty mundane and old-"
+"fashioned, something out of the New Deal era, while ending the use of "
"automated behavioral modification feels like the plotline of a really cool "
"cyberpunk novel."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3495
msgid ""
"Meanwhile, breaking up monopolies is something we seem to have forgotten how "
"to do. There is a bipartisan, trans-Atlantic consensus that breaking up "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3503
msgid ""
"But trustbusters once strode the nation, brandishing law books, terrorizing "
"robber barons, and shattering the illusion of monopolies’ all-powerful grip "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3511
msgid "Could we find that political will again?"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3514
msgid ""
-"Copyright scholar James Boyle has described how the term "
-"<quote>ecology</quote> marked a turning point in environmental "
-"activism. Prior to the adoption of this term, people who wanted to preserve "
-"whale populations didn’t necessarily see themselves as fighting the same "
-"battle as people who wanted to protect the ozone layer or fight freshwater "
-"pollution or beat back smog or acid rain."
+"Copyright scholar James Boyle has described how the term <quote>ecology</"
+"quote> marked a turning point in environmental activism. Prior to the "
+"adoption of this term, people who wanted to preserve whale populations "
+"didn’t necessarily see themselves as fighting the same battle as people who "
+"wanted to protect the ozone layer or fight freshwater pollution or beat back "
+"smog or acid rain."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3522
msgid ""
"But the term <quote>ecology</quote> welded these disparate causes together "
"into a single movement, and the members of this movement found solidarity "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3533
msgid ""
"I believe we are on the verge of a new <quote>ecology</quote> moment "
"dedicated to combating monopolies. After all, tech isn’t the only "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3539
msgid ""
-"You can find partisans for trustbusting in every sector of the "
-"economy. Everywhere you look, you can find people who’ve been wronged by "
-"monopolists who’ve trashed their finances, their health, their privacy, "
-"their educations, and the lives of people they love. Those people have the "
-"same cause as the people who want to break up Big Tech and the same "
-"enemies. When most of the world’s wealth is in the hands of a very few, it "
-"follows that nearly every large company will have overlapping shareholders."
+"You can find partisans for trustbusting in every sector of the economy. "
+"Everywhere you look, you can find people who’ve been wronged by monopolists "
+"who’ve trashed their finances, their health, their privacy, their "
+"educations, and the lives of people they love. Those people have the same "
+"cause as the people who want to break up Big Tech and the same enemies. When "
+"most of the world’s wealth is in the hands of a very few, it follows that "
+"nearly every large company will have overlapping shareholders."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3549
msgid ""
"That’s the good news: With a little bit of work and a little bit of "
"coalition building, we have more than enough political will to break up Big "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3555
msgid ""
"But here’s the bad news: Much of what we’re doing to tame Big Tech "
"<emphasis>instead</emphasis> of breaking up the big companies also "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3560
msgid ""
"Big Tech’s concentration currently means that their inaction on harassment, "
"for example, leaves users with an impossible choice: absent themselves from "
-"public discourse by, say, quitting Twitter or endure vile, constant "
-"abuse. Big Tech’s over-collection and over-retention of data results in "
-"horrific identity theft. And their inaction on extremist recruitment means "
-"that white supremacists who livestream their shooting rampages can reach an "
-"audience of billions. The combination of tech concentration and media "
-"concentration means that artists’ incomes are falling even as the revenue "
-"generated by their creations are increasing."
+"public discourse by, say, quitting Twitter or endure vile, constant abuse. "
+"Big Tech’s over-collection and over-retention of data results in horrific "
+"identity theft. And their inaction on extremist recruitment means that white "
+"supremacists who livestream their shooting rampages can reach an audience of "
+"billions. The combination of tech concentration and media concentration "
+"means that artists’ incomes are falling even as the revenue generated by "
+"their creations are increasing."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3572
msgid ""
"Yet governments confronting all of these problems all inevitably converge on "
"the same solution: deputize the Big Tech giants to police their users and "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3581
msgid ""
"These rules — the EU’s new Directive on Copyright, Australia’s new terror "
"regulation, America’s FOSTA/SESTA sex-trafficking law and more — are not "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3590
msgid ""
"That’s because any move to break up Big Tech and cut it down to size will "
"have to cope with the hard limit of not making these companies so small that "
"outsource content moderation. It’s already going to be hard to unwind these "
"deeply concentrated, chimeric behemoths that have been welded together in "
"the pursuit of monopoly profits. Doing so while simultaneously finding some "
-"way to fill the regulatory void that will be left behind if these "
-"self-policing rulers were forced to suddenly abdicate will be much, much "
-"harder."
+"way to fill the regulatory void that will be left behind if these self-"
+"policing rulers were forced to suddenly abdicate will be much, much harder."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3602
msgid ""
"Allowing the platforms to grow to their present size has given them a "
"dominance that is nearly insurmountable — deputizing them with public duties "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3612
msgid ""
"We can work to fix the internet by breaking up Big Tech and depriving them "
"of monopoly profits, or we can work to fix Big Tech by making them spend "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3620
msgid "Make Big Tech small again"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3622
msgid ""
"Trustbusting is hard. Breaking big companies into smaller ones is expensive "
"and time-consuming. So time-consuming that by the time you’re done, the "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><blockquote><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3632
msgid ""
"A future U.S. president could simply direct their attorney general to "
"enforce the law as it was written."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3637
msgid ""
"It’s far easier to prevent concentration than to fix it, and reinstating the "
"traditional contours of U.S. antitrust enforcement will, at the very least, "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3645
msgid ""
"These powers are all in the plain language of U.S. antitrust laws, so in "
"theory, a future U.S. president could simply direct their attorney general "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3654
msgid ""
"If the courts frustrate the Justice Department and the president, the next "
"stop would be Congress, which could eliminate any doubt about how antitrust "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3668
msgid ""
"But this only prevents things from getting worse. To help them get better, "
"we will have to build coalitions with other activists in the anti-monopoly "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3677
msgid ""
"In an important sense, it doesn’t matter which industry the breakups begin "
"in. Once they start, shareholders in <emphasis>every</emphasis> industry "
"will start to eye their investments in monopolists skeptically. As "
"trustbusters ride into town and start making lives miserable for "
-"monopolists, the debate around every corporate boardroom’s table will "
-"shift. People within corporations who’ve always felt uneasy about monopolism "
-"will gain a powerful new argument to fend off their evil rivals in the "
-"corporate hierarchy: <quote>If we do it my way, we make less money; if we do "
-"it your way, a judge will fine us billions and expose us to ridicule and "
-"public disapprobation. So even though I get that it would be really cool to "
-"do that merger, lock out that competitor, or buy that little company and "
-"kill it before it can threaten it, we really shouldn’t — not if we don’t "
-"want to get tied to the DOJ’s bumper and get dragged up and down Trustbuster "
-"Road for the next 10 years.</quote>"
+"monopolists, the debate around every corporate boardroom’s table will shift. "
+"People within corporations who’ve always felt uneasy about monopolism will "
+"gain a powerful new argument to fend off their evil rivals in the corporate "
+"hierarchy: <quote>If we do it my way, we make less money; if we do it your "
+"way, a judge will fine us billions and expose us to ridicule and public "
+"disapprobation. So even though I get that it would be really cool to do that "
+"merger, lock out that competitor, or buy that little company and kill it "
+"before it can threaten it, we really shouldn’t — not if we don’t want to get "
+"tied to the DOJ’s bumper and get dragged up and down Trustbuster Road for "
+"the next 10 years.</quote>"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3694
msgid "20 GOTO 10"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3696
msgid ""
"Fixing Big Tech will require a lot of iteration. As cyber lawyer Lawrence "
-"Lessig wrote in his 1999 book, <emphasis>Code and Other Laws of "
-"Cyberspace</emphasis>, our lives are regulated by four forces: law (what’s "
-"legal), code (what’s technologically possible), norms (what’s socially "
-"acceptable), and markets (what’s profitable)."
+"Lessig wrote in his 1999 book, <emphasis>Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace</"
+"emphasis>, our lives are regulated by four forces: law (what’s legal), code "
+"(what’s technologically possible), norms (what’s socially acceptable), and "
+"markets (what’s profitable)."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3703
msgid ""
"If you could wave a wand and get Congress to pass a law that re-fanged the "
"Sherman Act tomorrow, you could use the impending breakups to convince "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3710
msgid ""
"But getting Congress to act will require a massive normative shift, a mass "
"movement of people who care about monopolies — and pulling them apart."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3715
msgid ""
"Getting people to care about monopolies will take technological "
"interventions that help them to see what a world free from Big Tech might "
-"look like. Imagine if someone could make a beloved (but unauthorized) "
-"third-party Facebook or Twitter client that dampens the anxiety-producing "
+"look like. Imagine if someone could make a beloved (but unauthorized) third-"
+"party Facebook or Twitter client that dampens the anxiety-producing "
"algorithmic drumbeat and still lets you talk to your friends without being "
-"spied upon — something that made social media more sociable and less "
-"toxic. Now imagine that it gets shut down in a brutal legal battle. It’s "
-"always easier to convince people that something must be done to save a thing "
-"they love than it is to excite them about something that doesn’t even exist "
-"yet."
+"spied upon — something that made social media more sociable and less toxic. "
+"Now imagine that it gets shut down in a brutal legal battle. It’s always "
+"easier to convince people that something must be done to save a thing they "
+"love than it is to excite them about something that doesn’t even exist yet."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3727
msgid ""
-"Neither tech nor law nor code nor markets are sufficient to reform Big "
-"Tech. But a profitable competitor to Big Tech could bankroll a legislative "
-"push; legal reform can embolden a toolsmith to make a better tool; the tool "
-"can create customers for a potential business who value the benefits of the "
+"Neither tech nor law nor code nor markets are sufficient to reform Big Tech. "
+"But a profitable competitor to Big Tech could bankroll a legislative push; "
+"legal reform can embolden a toolsmith to make a better tool; the tool can "
+"create customers for a potential business who value the benefits of the "
"internet but want them delivered without Big Tech; and that business can get "
"funded and divert some of its profits to legal reform. 20 GOTO 10 (or "
"lather, rinse, repeat). Do it again, but this time, get farther! After all, "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3741
msgid ""
"The surveillance capitalism hypothesis — that Big Tech’s products really "
"work as well as they say they do and that’s why everything is so screwed up "
"— is way too easy on surveillance and even easier on capitalism. Companies "
"spy because they believe their own BS, and companies spy because governments "
-"let them, and companies spy because any advantage from spying is so "
-"short-lived and minor that they have to do more and more of it just to stay "
-"in place."
+"let them, and companies spy because any advantage from spying is so short-"
+"lived and minor that they have to do more and more of it just to stay in "
+"place."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3750
msgid ""
"As to why things are so screwed up? Capitalism. Specifically, the monopolism "
"that creates inequality and the inequality that creates monopolism. It’s a "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3761
msgid ""
"Surveillance doesn’t make capitalism rogue. Capitalism’s unchecked rule "
"begets surveillance. Surveillance isn’t bad because it lets people "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><title>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3770
msgid "Up and through"
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3772
msgid ""
"With all the problems of Big Tech, it’s tempting to imagine solving the "
"problem by returning to a world without tech at all. Resist that temptation."
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3777
msgid ""
"The only way out of our Big Tech problem is up and through. If our future is "
"not reliant upon high tech, it will be because civilization has fallen. Big "
msgstr ""
#. type: Content of: <article><sect1><para>
-#: how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism.xml:3787
msgid ""
"I am, secretly, despite what I have said earlier, a tech exceptionalist. Not "
"in the sense of thinking that tech should be given a free pass to monopolize "
projects / text-destroy-surveillance.git / commitdiff