Centralization Strikes Again - February 2021 Edition
“Even when technology enables us to transcend locality, the instrument of our deliverance is given a nickname describing it as a route from place to place (e.g. information superhighway). Like salmon marked by their homing instinct, our consciousness is still deeply etched by notions of locality.” — The Sovereign Individual
Where have centralized technologies, including those who limit our access to it, failed us this month? Let’s take a look at our February month in review:
Timeline
Feb 1 - The ongoing Myanmar military coup, amidst the defeat of military-affiliated USDP party in the 2020 general elections, is reported to have seen an increase of violence on civilians, detention of civilian leadership, imposed curfews, and bans on gathering of crowds. In the early hours of the coup, real time network data from NetBlocks Internet Observatory reported a 50% drop in national connectivity, with many on the ground unable to get online or make phone calls. Source
Feb 4 - YouTube and Google was accused of censorship after removing two videos of an opening statement from Dr. Pierre Kory on a COVID-19 treatment using ivermectin during a US Senate hearing. YouTube cited their COVID-19 misinformation policy as the reason for removal. Source
Feb 4 - In the ongoing Myanmar military coup, the military has ordered social media platforms like Facebook, Messenger, WhatsApp, and Instagram to be blocked. They are citing doing so as an attempt to stop the "spreading of fake news and misinformation". Source
Feb 5 - In its fourth month of the ongoing farmer's protests in India, thousands are calling on the Indian government to lift its blackouts on phone and internet services. Source
Feb 12 - Notion cited a DNS issue at the registry operator level for the loss of service between 0830 EST and 1100 EST, which left countless users in the dark. Source
Feb 17 - Facebook bans publishers and people in Australia from sharing or viewing Australian and international news content on their platform. This is in response to a new law requiring tech platforms to reimburse local news publishers. Attention from governments around the globe are heightened, as this is seen as a potentially important precedent which forces tech giants to pay news publishers for their content. Source Source 2
Feb 19 - An issue with AWS caused issues with Binance users unable to view their wallet balance. Source
Feb 22 - Binance (once again) suspends withdrawals of Ethereum and ERC-20 tokens due to "high network congestion." Source
Feb 23 - Facebook strikes a last minute deal with Australian lawmakers, agreeing to pay local news publishers for sharing content on their platform. This comes after Facebook sharing traffic for Australian content was rug-pulled after the ban on Feb 17. This deal likely sets an important precedence for governments around the world. Source
Feb 24 - Twitter removes hundreds of accounts it says are linked to Iran, Russia, Armenia, citing their platform manipulation policies. Source Source 2
Feb 25 - Facebook bans all accounts associated with the Myanmar military, including ads from military-controlled companies. Source
Op-Ed
As we embark on the journey to accelerate decentralization further, we are faced with numerous cultural shifts and challenges. In fact, as is common with most major cultural shifts in human history, we do not expect decentralization to happen overnight - i.e. the industrial revolution took place over many centuries, with its seeds sown late in the feudal ages. In a similar fashion, decentralization will slowly take over, overcoming obstacles and resistances as adoption steadily increases. However, the conversation must necessarily begin now, with the beginnings of the internet and Satoshi’s whitepaper setting the stage as some of the early seeds of a decentralized future.
At Liberate Data Week, we discussed the concept of decentralization in more detail with our friends from Swarm. In particular, we focused on the topic of coordination. With decentralization, there is not one central party coordinating efforts and distributing outcomes. Instead, intentionally designed infrastructure allows for many nodes to collaborate and coordinate across space and time, aligning all participants towards a common goal.
To solve for this challenge, there are several systems and solutions in place: mainly DAOs, and consensus algorithms. Yet, there’s no one-size fits all solution, and coordination can still be painful. However, this is nothing new. Every organization has to find a way to coordinate amongst participants to set a common goal and a way to reach it. This is especially true when it comes to open-source projects and the software maintenance involved. If you’re interested, we suggest you listen to this podcast from Nadia Eghbal, on the making and maintenance of our open source infrastructure.
Thank you to Golem Network for their contribution to this month’s edition of our newsletter
If you would like to contribute to the Op-Ed in next month's edition of Centralization Strikes Again, then please email tim.ho@chainsafe.io. We would love to hear your thoughts on how we can leverage decentralized technologies as a solution to the many problems centralized systems present for humanity!
Like all great things, our newsletter starts humble and, well... unpolished. If you have any feedback, please don't hesitate to send them my way.
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