However, I cannot help but wonder whether those whose livelihoods depend on the internet staying the way it is, not to mention those with strategic interests in this status quo, will allow this to happen. And here I am talking about non other than the corporations in the west that have made and continue to reap billions off the internet. I am talking about intelligence agencies that are benefiting off of the capacity of the internet to enable mass surveillance of civilians on a scale and scope unknown and unheard of before.
The west is currently the main beneficiary of the current manner user data is handled on the internet. This means that it will be the entire western establishment that loses out if Tim's idea is allowed to take shape.
This situation is comparable to the motivation for western resistance to advancements that threaten to end this same modus operandi, such as 5G led by the Chinese. 5G and Huawei have met with unified western (NATO) sanctions for fear of losing the benefits of the internet being run the fixed way that it is run, with western companies in control.
It's because of the increasing capacity of the Chinese to lead in strategic inventions that the west has for some time now been waging perpetual and covert bioterrorist attacks on China designed to hamper the capacity of the country to muscle in on their economic territory.
Let's face facts here ... Leaders of the west wouldn't allow a single individual to win if they are prepared to destroy the most productive and creative country to grace humankind since the Pharaohs, a phenomenon sensible people would readily embrace and emulate, rather than destroy.
We are experiencing a repeat of something familiar in human history and it is not for nothing that this is happening.
It's the way of the culture called capitalism, actually, that people are given no choices in a situation where they should have aptions. For example, a tenth (1/10) or 10% of Germany's huge economy depends on its auto industry. If you devise a new mode of transportation that doesn't require a car to have the technology current vehicles utilize to perform as well (that would be beneficial to Germans too) you will be frustrated in your efforts to make your product sell or outright eliminated by the Germans themselves because the loss of their industry would mean starvation for them.
So, rather than have their plate moved and starve because they cannot shift in their seat, they will be forced to do the simpler thing of eliminating a threat before it is too late, to forego the possibility of their own demise, even if this is at the expense of an actual advancement for the species. The Germans are not going to wonder whether they are better off having choices, whether this is more beneficial to them. It is cultural for the Germans to behave this way. This is how things have always been done in their culture.
This example focusing on the German automobile industry may give the impression that I am biased against Germans, while in fact I am not. I am trying to outline a situation here, and just happened to have this example of the German automobile industry handy. I could just as easily have used an example of British Petroleum to make the same point.
The fact of the matter remains that recent history is in fact replete with examples of inventions that were better than what existed but were frustrated in their efforts to go mainstream because of the threat they posed to the survival of existent ones. It cannot be disputed therefore that the technological advancement at which humankind currently finds itself is inferior to what the species would have attained if this system didn't exist.
The problem is the system. And It's not individual aspects of the system going or gone awry, such as the internet falling into the wrong hands, that need changing because they are but effects of a cause. The system is the main cause of all that goes wrong and needs changing, otherwise we will remain stuck in this twilight zone situation forever, a situation where better technologies, including ways of dealing with socio-economic situations that may arise, stand no chance of being established by those benefiting off of existent ways and technologies.
The internet data security Tim envisions can get up and become a reality, but what's to stop it from being hijacked by those whose businesses are threatened by the idea in the long run.
And we will quickly be back to square one, if we had moved away from the first square in the first place.
Haven't we seen enough examples of this to know better? The new social networking site Parler, for example, was considered a haven of free speech until push came to shove and it was unceremoniously taken down. This bizarre episode transpired a week ago after mobs broke into the seat of government, the Washington DC Capitol in the United States of America. Only then did it became apparent that the system already had the platform owned.
Parler wasn't given a chance to correct an error. It wasn't called to appear before congress to explain how they had let a wrong situation continue. They weren't given the chance to shape up or shape out, like Facebook and other tech giants were. Parler was simply banished from the internet, and democracy died in the dark.
What, should we surmise, is the difference between Parler and Facebook? Well, Parler is competition, while Facebook isn't. The western powers that be have vested interests in Facebook maintaining a monopoly on social networking media. They are benefiting from this and don't want this arrangement disturbed. It was therefore their chance to eliminate Parler when opportunity gave. Parler''s deletion from the internet had absolutely nothing to do with Trump supporters using the platform to coordinate their activities, if you read between the lines like I did above.
What needs to happen to correct matters and prevent the situation we are in from perpetuating isn't reform, which is what Tim wants to happen with the permission of big tech. We are well past the stage when reform can sort issues out and usher in the age when we can grow and advance virtually unhindered. What we need is a revolution, or at least the corrupt, incorrigible corporations that have established themselves in the dominant culture have to be tackled where it will cause their inevitable ruin, which can only happen by the rise of a new, superior competitor that isn't in the least affiliated to the old guard.
This is why I support the rise of China. This is actually the reason the west is fighting against their rise. China is in this sense our only hope where revolution and revolutionary movements are found too wanting in Western countries themselves where knowledge of the imperative to ditch the system is abundant.
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Click on the link below for the article on Tim's "pods" idea
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