The Problem With Big Tech (II),

*doom*

I was wrong in my previous post. I was foolish to think big tech would bend to the will of the richest, most powerful benefactors. But I forgot that the tech "leaders" are some of the richest themselves. And would like to be powerful too.

I could not stop laughing at Facebook trying to blackmail Australia into changing its proposed news content laws. Just as I could not stop laughing at Twitter trying to "explore other options" because it didn't want to function in India under Indian laws.

It's like they're all run by petulant children.

This will be a short post, because I still can't stop laughing. These little power-hungry, pasty-faced twats think they can subvert the way sovereign nations function? Coerce local businesses or try to destroy them? What is this, the newest regime-change toolkit? *snigger*

It's thoroughly unsurprising that businesses run by people from, and often established in, countries that have been throughout recent history singularly incapable of understanding the concept of sovereignty of any nations other than their own, end up being just as imperialistic in their functioning.

But ultimately, they're just businesses. It's still about the $$$. What none of these "big tech" corporations seem to realise is that they're mere platforms. If they leave, they'll simply be replaced by competitors in due time. Sure, it won't happen quickly, but it will. They're hardly indispensable. And if at all any country believes otherwise, well, they better start building up alternatives.

If anything, this year has shown that just as public sector monopolies are bad, so are private ones. Especially if the players are extensions of countries that, to this day, think they can arm-twist governments globally into being subservient to their interests through "spreading democracy" and "human rights" and sometimes "free trade".

The fact that the biggest thieves, colonisers, murderers from the recent past think their standards are the most "civilised" is both funny and alarmingly stupid. And also a reminder that geopolitical realities are always shaped by the (economically or militarily) powerful. The same lot who hold UN backed meetings to throw elected governments out of power, to sanction blowing up countries under false pretenses, who are now fighting like clowns over vaccines they're already hoarding - even taking from the COVAX scheme meant in principle for the countries that cannot afford to strike private deals, who fund wars and terrorists and terror sponsors for reasons of their own interests. Well. That's for another post.

At this point I can't say if these tech companies and developed nations have any convergence in the areas they like to bully other nations on, but whether corporate monopolies choose to act on their own or to the benefit of their patrons, they're still just businesses. They need their markets/data sources.

Do I think Facebook's going to try anything further? No, because they still need the revenue. They might even renege on their latest step. But what I do know is that India's data privacy and protection legislations are long overdue, and rules regarding such digital platforms and intermediaries are not up to speed with this new-fangled medium of blatant resource cartelisation.

The sky is nowhere near the limit for human greed, looks like.