You're right. And yes, we could use those laws, but we're also now at a time in history where the combined power and influence of "big tech" is greater (by far, I fear) than the will and character of Legislators (i.e. low-character politicians) to enact any such law to constrain/regulate them, at all.
"we can try to legislate against either but technology will probably overpower the legislation quickly"
Technology is here to serve us. What's with this attitude that we don't have the tools (laws) to control what our government and people are and aren't allowed to do? It's like the good ideas of small government and libertarianism have been warped mean that laws are no longer the solution to anything.
We already have the laws we want, more or less. It's just that the barriers to creation have been lowered.
If we encumber the tech with regulation, only the giants will be able to engineer the adequate protections that fit the letter of the law. You'll effectively be choosing the winners and creating a massive barrier to entry for everyone else.
I agree. Our current laws were not made in the time when these technologies were widespread. Legislation of a new law would be the better solution than trying to classify them as a monopoly.
Certain technologies are simply too abusable to be unrestricted. In fact, many technologies only exist to do things we consider wrong, so we outlaw them. Granted, many times these laws are not well enforced.
Its not even enough. Big tech is too dangerous to not regulate. When they literally decide if politicians get elected or not by controlling what the voters see, weve crossed the line.
It's past time for the US to do to big tech what it did to Standard Oil in 1911. In fact, new legislation is needed to prevent this from happening in the first place.
And of course, it is also necessary to restrict the powers of the state to end the possibility of a government that can do anything.
You say all this, but you would agree; We really can't be telling private companies or individuals what to and what not to do with their technologies, right?
1) How do we enforce that at smaller scales?
2) How would we prevent our regulation from squashing innovative solutions to problems, or enhancing safety in critical applications?
The problem is that I am feeling like I am arguing a strawman (regulations are always bad!) when my point is that calling for regulations for Big Tech will do jack-shit to actually solve any of the issues affecting society, and more likely than not it is just going to help Big Tech cement their dominance.
Sure but in my country (USA) the government is hopelessly inept at regulating technology. We still don’t have privacy regulations and now to work around this they’re trying to ban specific foreign apps instead of protecting us from all apps! I’d honestly be horrified if they tried to regulate AI. They would be in bed with Facebook and Microsoft and they’d somehow write legislation that only serves to insulate those companies from legal repercussions instead of doing anything to protect regular people. As far as I can tell it is the view of congress that big tech can to whatever they want to us as long as the government gets a piece.
I said I agree that we could use legislation. I specifically question the voracity of the messaging here. Is not even whataboutism, is literally making up concerns on the few "big tech" companies while everyone is getting fleeced by nonsense in the financial world.
Don't get me wrong, if you want to abolish facebook and/or twitter, I doubt I would really shed a tear. Most of the complaints here, though, are not really leveled at them. Heck, I wouldn't be upset to see the others get split. But we continue to make banks bigger and bigger. We have thrown healthcare to pipe dreams only. We seem to endorse that the only way to have a future is to borrow against it.
Name the biggest data leaks out there. You will find that banks make up as much of that list as "big tech." Notable that two of the main "big tech" companies aren't even on the list. Such that I feel fine standing by that claim.
Though, again, I support more legislation. I don't support pretending there are monocle wearing villains at "big tech" that is our largest problem. That doesn't mean I think we can't also still do something about real concerns there.
The tech is here now, and we’re in real trouble without solid laws around this.
People who would be interested in the misuse of this technology aren't, as a rule, interested in whatever laws you might think appropriate for regulating it.
Again, though, that's the Pandora's box of the argument- these technologies already exist and are in the wild, so we must come up with a way to co-exist with them instead of hand wringing and fretting that the world is changing and there's nothing we can do about it.
I'm absolutely on the side of wanting to come up with those as yet unknown solutions, and I abhor all of the people who say "well just don't be doing anything illegal and then it won't matter!" I'm suggesting a fundamental shift in the underlying societal zeitgeist which, I realize, is a huge stretch and a bit of a pipe dream, but I can still hope.
To clarify- I'm NOT saying it shouldn't be regulated, and I'm NOT saying we need to move to some sort of post-privacy utopia, I am saying "Gee it'd be nice if we moved past the hand wringing and started coming up with ways to use this technology in beneficial ways.)
i agree big tech needs to be held accountable more, but we also need to be careful. a lot of the freedom tech was given was to enable start ups.
big tech has basically monopolized the market, but if we enact laws of responsibility, they could be ones that make it even harder to disrupt the monopolies already in power
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