Cory Doctorow on The Age of Surveillance Capitalism
Cory Doctorow has writtten an extended rebuttal of The Age of Surveillance Capitalism by Shoshana Zuboff. He summarized the argument on Twitter.
Shorter summary: it’s not the surveillance part, it’s the fact that these companies are monopolies.
I think it’s both. Surveillance capitalism has some unique properties that make it particularly unethical and incompatible with a free society, and Zuboff makes them clear in her book. But the current acceptance of monopolies in our society is also extremely damaging—which Doctorow makes clear.
Lord • August 27, 2020 6:57 AM
Monopolies
Nothing stops anyone from setting up an alternative email system to Google. Same for search.
Nothing stops Wallmart from setting up a website and competing with Amazon.
Nothing has stopped Google, Microsoft from competing for cloud services with Amazon.
The only one that is different is Ebay. The problem with auction sites is you have to look at what the buyers and the sellers want.
The sellers want lots of buyers because they want competition for the item. They can only list the item on one site.
The end result is that its a winner takes all. In any given area, one auction site will win. Ebay, UK and USA for example. Ricardo in Switzerland
But the rest aren’t monopolies, its just the competition isn’t good.