[okfn-discuss] Web 2.0 Killed the Internet (article)

[Aaron Wolf]

I agree with Aral in almost every way. I think we can get a little too
bogged down in make overly strong enemies of folks like O'Reilly (he's a
flawed and problematic figure but certainly not as entirely malicious as
some would make him out to be).

The "Web 2.0" concept purportedly includes the Wiki and Wikipedia and Open
Street Map as much as anything else. Those things are excellent and are the
the parts of the internet that are not only intact but represent the best
of our achievements.

The problem isn't "Web 2.0", but proprietary control. Web 2.0 when it is
truly democratic and freedom-respecting (like Wikipedia) is wonderful. You
could say that the advancing technology enhances everything. It enhances
the positive impact and value of these true community projects, and it
enhances the power and anti-democratic intrusions of proprietary platforms
like Facebook.

Embracing or rejecting technology is not the answer. The question is what
sort of technology. Free/Libre/Open (FLO) internet? Yay! Proprietary
internet? Undermines our democracy and society. The tech is relatively
neutral.

--
Aaron Wolf
wolftune.com


On Fri, Jun 6, 2014 at 10:21 PM, John Baxter <john at jsbaxter.com.au> wrote:

> Interested to hear what others made of this provocative article.
>
> Maybe these ideas aren't new to you but they were to me (and yet seem
> compellingly obvious)
>
> http://aralbalkan.com/notes/how-web-2-0-killed-the-internet/
>
> tl;dr:
> Open APIs (and other 'open/free' trends) haven't really opened anything at
> all, they've been a clever ploy to build closed, privately owned silos -
> undermining openness ('killing the internet')
>
> To me the most interesting questions it raises are about governance of
> tech startups / the internet.
>
> (*Disclaimer: Sorry if a repost, I searched but couldn't find*)
>
> *John Baxter*
> jsbaxter.com.au <http://www.jsbaxter.com.au>
> 0405 447 829
> @jsbaxter_
> ᐧ
>
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