IP: Did Orwell get it wrong? - MIT Technology Review opinion

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: Nathan Cochrane <ncochrane () theage fairfax com au>
Organization: The Age newspaper
Date: Wed, 17 Jul 2002 15:41:42 +1000
To: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>


Hi Dave

The following piece from UC-Berkeley physics academic, Richard A.
Muller, paints technology as essentially liberating not an enslaver as
Orwell envisaged.

http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/wo_muller071202.asp

"But in a time when technology is frequently under attack, it is
worthwhile to notice its role in spreading truth. It was not Stalinism,
but the flow of information that proved to be unstoppable."

FWIW I think he's on to something here, certainly PGP has allowed human
rights groups to get information out to the world. But it also allows
drug traffickers to scramble their communications. The PC has enabled
millions to access the Web easily, but at the cost of competition in the
operating systems space and all that entails. People can send e-mail to
each other effortlessly, but Carnivore and Echelon vacuum it out of the air.

IMHO the arguments "technology=bad" or "technology=good" are both too
simplistic for these dynamic times. Technology is a dual-edged sword
that cuts three ways. Information is an arms race.

A nuclear reactor can power a city, or be used to make nuclear weapons -
it's our call. A commercial plane can ferry food supplies to the hungry,
peace keepers to the war-torn, or a deadly payload to civilians in the
hands of terrorists.

But there are enough scary uses of information technology to make me
think Orwell underestimated the power of the state to control our lives
and pervert its intentions, just as he underestimated the ability of
people to seek to use it for freedom. Take a look at what DARPA's Office
of Information Awareness has in store if you don't want to sleep at night.

http://www.darpa.mil/iao/

Stalin fell, but then other structures almost as bad sprung up in his
wake. It seems no sooner do we tear down one wall, than we build others,
both figuratively and literally. And another area that Orwell
underestimated was the power of cabalistic private enterprise, through
groups like WIPO and the WTO, to dictate agendas to poorer and rich
nations alike. Who would have thought cuddly animated forest animals
would be the shock troops in a war on citizens' right to free speech?

As someone who has walked amid the wreckage brought on by protest at
global capitalism, one thing I have to agree with is his vision of the
future as a boot on the face of humanity. Only it's the boot of
government, conscripted by private enterprise. Perhaps not exactly what
he had moind, but a tyrant is as a tyrant does.




-- 

Nathan Cochrane
Deputy IT Editor
:Next:
The Age and Sydney Morning Herald
http://www.next.theage.com.au



****************************************************************************
*****
This email and any files transmitted with it may be legally privileged
and confidential.  If you are not the intended recipient of this email,
you must not disclose or use the information contained in it.  If you
have received this email in error, please notify us by return email and
permanently delete the document.
****************************************************************************
*****


------ End of Forwarded Message

For archives see:
http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/