If you think about the supply chain needed to distribute an application or platform like Parler, it's things like programming languages, database software, programmers, compute (physical machines or virtual cloud hosting), networking (i.e. public IP address), domain name, app store distribution, payment infrastructure. When companies AWS…
If you think about the supply chain needed to distribute an application or platform like Parler, it's things like programming languages, database software, programmers, compute (physical machines or virtual cloud hosting), networking (i.e. public IP address), domain name, app store distribution, payment infrastructure. When companies AWS, Apple, Cloudflare, PayPal all get together to deny service to companies like Parler, if Internet companies like Comcast join the mix and prevent such companies from getting an IP address on the Internet, there really is no "go build your own" alternative.
The modern Internet, with apps distributed through Apple and Android app stores, are the modern public square. Neither the physical public square, nor potentially re-building your own Internet from the ground up, have a critical mass of people - the network effect of the current Internet is too strong. If that's where people are, where their ears and eyes are, then that's where someone who wants to be part of the public conversation has to be.
So we either need to (a) somehow make that not be where public conversation is, (b) ensure people have well-protected rights to participate there, or (c) admit that we'd prefer to devalue protected free speech.
(b) is essentially government going after "Big Tech", which feels illiberal in its own way.
There are lots of places in the world you can go to if you like (c), it's not what the American Experiment is about though.
Maybe (a) is possible if enough people and organizations can operate in a principled way, and enough people vote with our attention and dollars in that direction. I think Bari and Substack seem principled in this way, I just hope some big controversy later on doesn't cause Substack to lose its way in the future. And hopefully Substack and things like it become big and successful enough that the supply chain it relies on (IP, DNS, compute/hosting) can't get away with just pulling the plug on it, and avoids getting too ugly like Parler that it's hard for anyone to go to bat for it.
If you think about the supply chain needed to distribute an application or platform like Parler, it's things like programming languages, database software, programmers, compute (physical machines or virtual cloud hosting), networking (i.e. public IP address), domain name, app store distribution, payment infrastructure. When companies AWS, Apple, Cloudflare, PayPal all get together to deny service to companies like Parler, if Internet companies like Comcast join the mix and prevent such companies from getting an IP address on the Internet, there really is no "go build your own" alternative.
The modern Internet, with apps distributed through Apple and Android app stores, are the modern public square. Neither the physical public square, nor potentially re-building your own Internet from the ground up, have a critical mass of people - the network effect of the current Internet is too strong. If that's where people are, where their ears and eyes are, then that's where someone who wants to be part of the public conversation has to be.
So we either need to (a) somehow make that not be where public conversation is, (b) ensure people have well-protected rights to participate there, or (c) admit that we'd prefer to devalue protected free speech.
(b) is essentially government going after "Big Tech", which feels illiberal in its own way.
There are lots of places in the world you can go to if you like (c), it's not what the American Experiment is about though.
Maybe (a) is possible if enough people and organizations can operate in a principled way, and enough people vote with our attention and dollars in that direction. I think Bari and Substack seem principled in this way, I just hope some big controversy later on doesn't cause Substack to lose its way in the future. And hopefully Substack and things like it become big and successful enough that the supply chain it relies on (IP, DNS, compute/hosting) can't get away with just pulling the plug on it, and avoids getting too ugly like Parler that it's hard for anyone to go to bat for it.