☀︎

Ethical Computing Initiative

Doctorow Insights

This is one page of a multi-part series on “ethical computing.”

Granted, at this point it might seem a bit odd to have a whole section dedicated to a single author. While Cory Doctorow has penned numerous fiction pieces to illustrate his ideas as well, we’re interested in his non-fiction works on this page.

Who is he? Intro blurb courtesy of Wikipedia:

Cory Doctorow is a Canadian-British blogger, journalist, and science fiction author who served as co-editor of the blog Boing Boing. He is an activist in favour of liberalising copyright laws and a proponent of the Creative Commons organization, using some of its licences for his books. Some common themes of his work include digital rights management, file sharing, and post-scarcity economics.

He’s been on quite a roll over the years, and certainly contributed substantially to our understanding of the issues related to the subject of the ethical computing and this site. Let’s look at a few important essays of his.

2012, The War on General-Purpose Computing

General-purpose computers are astounding.

They’re so astounding that our society still struggles to come to grips with them. What they’re for, how to accommodate them, and how to cope with them.

Yes yes, that’s exactly what we are talking about here! Is that title perhaps a little wordy and vague for regular folks? Maybe, but the idea is challenging to boil down further without the coinage of new words. What does it mean?

Well “general-purpose” here means flexible, programmable, expandable, and (later realized to be) user-controlled computers that can be adapted to any feasible application imaginable under their purview. You know, the invention at the forefront of the “Personal Computing (PC) revolution” that engulfed civilization within a few short decades?  Note that this term specifically excludes the limited computing “appliances” growing in popularity each year, such as mobile and embedded devices but also Chromebooks and Macintoshes to a growing extent as well.

A great portion of the value created from general-purpose computing includes the ability to interface with new hardware and software to solve new problems, while also creatively harnessing the work contributed by folks all over the world. To reiterate, value that is installed/created/controlled/enjoyed by the end user. Sounds amazing, doesn’t it? Well, the freedom unlocked—and not yet completely eliminated—is considered a problem by big players, one they are still trying to solve. Hence the “war.”

This is why every new device and platform on the computing market is locked down with further restrictions. Accordingly, to do what one wishes on such devices (and in conflict with corporate goals), one must “break out of jail” first!

Tactics and Strategy

Stepping back for a moment, let’s take a look at the tech industry’s long-term game plan:

Notably, these goals have already been achieved in mainstream products, AKA done. Somewhat surprisingly from a perspective of the past, because the strategy above is impractical on a technical level. Why? Because it’s a simple matter for another organization to produce unshackled hardware and software that does not comply. Or is it?

How We Are Losing:  Gravity

Truth is we can see BigTech’s strategy succeeding far more often than not these days. How come? Because the huge, growing business and consumer markets—comprised of folks who often do not think about these issues (those who have not yet realized significant ill effects)—exert a kind of gravity over all of us. Basically, the sheer size of the market for computing appliances distorts the industry in such a way as to hinder those who want or need more.

(Not to mention the billions of $$$ it takes to get a sophisticated modern product launched—a deep moat, as described by business peeps.)

So, if you’re a technically oriented person, you have likely noticed just how few computing products aimed at professionals remain. We went from the target consumer to an afterthought in decade or two. One has to really dig for these scarce products; which are often offered only by tiny, rinky-dink outfits. To the degree there are often fewer practical choices available now than there were back in los nineties. RadioShack, Fry’s, and others of their ilk no longer exist. The technology market has truly been cornered by big players peddling limited, restricted appliances.

Wait! Please, don’t give up yet and keep reading. In later pages we offer hopeful solutions to survive the war.

2022, Enshittification

Voted 2023 Word of the Year!—A.D.S. 😅

Ok, so we are coining new words!

This one describes another form of rent-seeking. Originally focused on two-sided markets but later expanding in popular usage—this outlines the process where newly launched online products and services begin in a user-friendly manner. Gradually, the screws are turned, first to commence and later to improve monetization. A process that greatly reduces user-satisfaction of the product and/or quality over time.

Here is how platforms die: first, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die.

Alternatively, the product is ruined right up to and until the line that customers will still tolerate. Yes, “enshitiffied,” if one might be so bold. Below, are a few highlights:

2022, The Shitty Technology Adoption Curve

Another important piece:

When you have a new, abusive technology, you can’t just aim it at rich, powerful people, because when they complain, they get results. To successfully deploy that abusive tech, you need to work your way up the privilege gradient, starting with people with no power, like prisoners, refugees, and mental patients. This starts the process of normalization, even as it sands down some of the technology’s rough edges against their tender bodies. Once that’s done, you can move on to people with more social power – immigrants, blue collar workers, school children. Step by step, you normalize and smooth out the abusive tech, until you can apply it to everyone – even rich and powerful people. Think of the deployment of CCTV, facial recognition, location tracking, and web surveillance.

The point… is to normalize technological oppression, one group at a time. Twenty years ago, if you were eating your dinner under the unblinking eye of a video-camera, it was because you were in a supermax prison. Now… you can get the same experience in your middle-class home with a… “smart camera.”

Great insight on a pattern we’d unconsciously noticed before. Not having experienced it directly ourselves however, kept recognition just out of reach. We have noted our school children being conditioned to surveillance. Read the stories about law enforcement tech used on prisoners and Amazon workers alike.

Mr. Doctorow once again drops the final puzzle pieces of understanding, thank you!  His own expository journey below:


Next: What are our goals?