2018-07-30 Alternatives to Surveillance Capitalism

@aral writes a response (Out of the frying pan and into the fire) to Mariana Mazzucato’s has an article in the *MIT Technology Review* (which I didn’t read). Aral makes a number of excellent points in his blog post that are independent of any particular article he is replying too.

@aral

Out of the frying pan and into the fire

1. **we must not normalise violation of privacy** – let’s not concede defeat and become the willing sheep on the way to the slaughterhouse

2. **there is a world of difference between data about a rock and data about a human being** – we must be careful when talking about data because humans are different

3. **this toxic way of building modern technology is not the only way to design and build modern technology** – ethical alternatives do exist!

4. we must **stop financing** start-ups that want to join surveillance capitalism

5. we must **fine** and **break up** the companies that constitute surveillance capitalism

ethical alternatives do exist

And finally, do not make the mistake of nationalizing surveillance capitalism. I used to think that this was a good solution to the problem. It is not. We don’t want to replace the corporate overlords with government lording it over us.

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