Re: <nettime> Unlike Us links on social media and their alternatives

[Geoffrey Goodell <goodell@oxonia.net>]

Dear Geert and Morlock,

First of all I agree with the majority of what Morlock said, especially the
assertion that most of the example systems Geert mentioned are 'center-full'
and therefore problematic.  Morlock is right about that.  That said, I think
there are a few issues that warrant attention, which I shall describe here.

On Sun, Apr 28, 2019 at 12:46:47PM -0700, Morlock Elloi wrote:
> The center-full alternatives that do survive with limited popularity tend to
> become isolated islands, and usually end up with invitation-only memberships
> (because some dick 'knows' who to invite.) Great if you are into incest but
> suck otherwise (the islands.) There is something magic about 'public', the
> possibility of random connection and unintended consequences.

I think we need to pause a moment to understand the 'magic' to which Morlock
refers.  It would be lazy to cast the reliance upon large-scale social networks
as a simple example of people being lazy, so allow me to describe my
understanding of this phenomenon here, starting with three propositions.

Proposition 1.  People aspire.  What do I mean?  I'll leave it to these two
authors to explain:

"The pleasures of wealth and greatness, when considered in this complex view,
strike the imagination as something grand, and beautiful, and noble, of which
the attainment is well worth all the toil and anxiety which we are so apt to
bestow upon it.  And it is well that nature imposes upon us in this manner. It
is this deception which rouses and keeps in continual motion the industry of
mankind." -- Adam Smith, "The Theory of Moral Sentiments"

"Don't forget that most men with nothing would rather protect the possibility
of becoming rich than face the reality of being poor." -― Sherman Edwards,
"1776: A Musical Play"

People seek to serve institutions and systems that facilitate their
aspirations, even when such aspirations are unrealistic.

Proposition 2.  People broadcast.  Suffice it to say that for many people, the
act of developing and maintaining social connections one individual at a time,
whether through their existing friendships, work, or other activities, is
rather difficult.  It is not impossible, mind you, but it is of sufficiently
high intrinsic cost that people find value in leveraging pre-existing social
contexts managed and maintained by others as a way to broadcast their
existence, advertise whatever it is they have to offer, and find that
prospective counterparty that they would otherwise never find without the
expenditure of great time and treasure, to say nothing of psychological stress
(not everyone is well-suited to be a telemarketer, after all).  Whether it is
dissatisfaction of the inadequacy of their own limited networks or simple
wanderlust that drives them to search farther, the interest to engage at an
ever-broader scale, driven by hope and the aforementioned aspiration, seems
natural.

Proposition 3.  People blacklist.  A recurrent, intoxicating idea is that of a
free Utopia in which everyone behaves well and whose individuals contribute
only positive externalities.  Although individuals might understand that this
dream is impossible, its message nonetheless shapes the design of many human
systems and institutions.  In particular, people seek to design systems that
are 'free by default' with the assumption that misbehaviour can be deterred via
a system of punishments that are fair, unobtrusive, and most of all low-cost to
the 'good' actors.  Ostensibly because of the optimistic belief that
misbehaviour is an 'exception' that we might hope to overcome some day, such
punishments generally involve a 'blacklisting' system that systematically
singles out those who have misbehaved, in contrast to a 'whitelisting' system
that systematically approves those who have contributed.  It is plain to see
how an eagerness to bring well-behaved people aboard might lead to the adoption
of such an approach.  It might seem that the difference between the choice
between 'blacklisting' versus 'whitelisting' is mostly about the frequency of
'good' versus 'bad' behaviour, but it is not.  Whereas in a 'whitelisting'
system, the onus is on the individual to present evidence of his or her 'good'
deeds, in a 'blacklisting' system, the onus is on some institution to assert
that an individual has not done anything sufficiently 'bad'.  Such
'blacklisting' systems are manifest in the Western world, ranging from credit
bureaus and entity resolution firms, who seek to bind together every engagement
a natural person makes in the world, to ostensibly 'open' online forums (e.g.
Wikipedia), which do not allow people to contribute without providing a
credible means for the 'honchos' (to use Morlock's term) to punish them.
People know that blacklisting systems have problems, as evidenced by draconian
policies, surveillance, and even credit crises, but they keep building them
nonetheless.

Combining these three factors, we see that there is a natural tendency toward
global, centralised systems that empower a small minority to keep the false
dream of Utopia alive.  It follows that avoiding this scenario is a collective
action problem that warrants an institutional response, rather than some
technology cooked up by people at the edge.

> Technically, center-less platforms embodied exclusively on the edge are a
> solved problem.

I agree with this statement inasmuch as it implies that the main problem here
is not technical (see above).  However, I am not sure that the problem is
'solved' even technically.  Consider how difficult it is to manage a system at
the edge in a way that avoids centralisation.  For example, no cryptocurrency
network is decentralised; such networks can always be captured by those with
the means.  Organisations such as Sovrin, which ostensibly supports a
self-sovereign identity scheme, often include in their design some kind of
foundation or governing body whose interests are not necessarily well-aligned
with those of its users.  And so on.  Some networks are better than others, but
let's face it, decentralisation is hard.  The only potential solution I see is
diversity, and that is hard to cultivate.  (Witness how project funding works
within the United Nations, for example.)

> The right way is to deploy tried and tested real-world mechanisms for
> selection and throttling. People participating in traditional discourse
> today have means to come to cities, or they already live there, so they have
> money and access (hillbillies don't come to conferences.) Money is a
> functional moderator. Early Usenet was great because only those with access
> to computers and networks could participate, and that was a select elite
> from academia, industry and individual tinkerers (modems used to cost a
> fortune.) Education and club memberships are great moderators.

> Along these lines, we need an electronic system that's neither cheap nor
> simple to access. Never forget that 'user friendly' concept is a sinister
> ideological instrument to ensure impotency of the medium. Yes, that's hard
> to digest, but it's true.

Yes.  Educational (and also, dare I say, religious) institutions have served
this function in the past, although I am concerned about a rising
anti-intellectualism intrinsic to the argument for 'user friendliness'.  Rather
working to the glory of divine (in either the secular or religious sense)
goals, such architectures seek foremost to attract parishoners to the exclusion
of others who might seek to do the same.  It isn't right.  We should instead
call upon users to work with us, using concepts that are just 'friendly' enough
without excluding the 'users' from their design, governance, and management.

> I don't have a solution for the latter, but the former can be easily done by
> requiring costly PoW to participate, resulting in very material electricity
> bills, and likely a reserved piece of equipment that is used exclusively for
> the purpose of participation. Anyone willing to pay and set it up can
> participate. It would be like going to expensive night club: mostly nice
> people there, with only few scattered gangsters. The cost can be adjusted
> (via geolocating) to match the GDP of the locality.

No.  Systems designed for 'Sybil-resistance' (PoW, geolocation) necessarily
lead either to blacklisting or to plutocracy.  Think about it.  We need to
leverage our institutions, as you started to say earlier but somehow drowned in
the melancholic argument that we can never again have institutions powerful
enough to resist the current interests of a certain set of global, unregulated
corporations and the private, concentrated set of plutocrats behind them.

> Jitsi is great, BTW. 100% edge-based and end-to-end encrypted. Use the
> 'jitsi desktop', not the other stuff (which is all center-full,) and
> download the source, as they will soon end the support. It takes some effort
> to convince others to use it though, and then the idiots start to complain
> that Skype has better quality.

I'm not sure about Jitsi, and if the core maintainers 'will soon end the
support', then what option will remain to keep it from becoming yet another
rent-seeker?  Personally, I'm much more excited about Nextcloud, which provides
self-hosted chat, H.265 voice calls, filesharing, calendaring, and more.  I
only hope that its open mainfestation can remain adequately funded and
supported by a development community that is committed to developing a free and
open tool that will be audited and maintained by a broad diversity of
interests.

> Everything else mentioned is center-full.

Yes.  In particular don't waste your time with Telegram or Signal; encryption
notwithstanding, their servers collect all of the valuable metadata and social
graph data associated with the interactions of their users.  Even
Openstreetmap, sadly, is centralised; one can only hope that standardisation
and institutional support will ensure that everyone gets a say in its ongoing
development and maintenance.  For instant messaging, I would like to suggest
that one day we'll have something like Tox that is more private.  I have no
reason to believe that Briar is that something, based upon its design choices,
which in my view tend to stand in the way of user control.  And user control,
in my view, is the best form of user friendliness, and the one that matters the
most, for all of the reasons articulated by Richard Stallman and then some.  If
a user is not in control, then who is?

Best wishes --

Geoff

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