The broad consensus in the US and Europe in general is that there’s absolutely no threat in unaccountable, unelected entities being allowed to accumulate vast amounts of wealth(and thusly power) so long as they’re not called ‘governments’ due to our worship at the altar of markets. Welcome to the world of 2018, the world we’ve wrought.
This I would agree with. Though, really, it’s not a new thing, but something that has been around in one form or another since at least Adam Smith. And while I may disagree with some about how we use certain concepts or terms, and about legal specifics, I wholeheartedly agree that regardless of what we call it, we have a situation that is far from healthy.
I agree as well. The big tech companies are today’s vesrsion of the 19th Century’s Railroads. And we now have a strange confluence; @Panzeh, @TheWombat, @Strollen, @tomchick and myself agree politically about a big tech duopoly (maybe more than that, including Amazon and other media providers, if you broaden it beyond games to audio and video content). That is a strange day on the Qt3 forums!
Sounds like someone should start a P & R thread.
Our own political party, as the existing ones sure don’t seem to get the job done! Maybe it’s time for a parliamentary system!
Oh, and, um, wargames!
I don’t think so. I used the word effective deliberately because while you are right, I’m free to create Leisure Suit Larry Uncensored in VR, for IOS, since I know that Apple will never distribute the game, I’ll never create it in the first place.
I don’t mean to keep harping on you, because I understand what you’re trying to say and I mostly agree, but it’s striking to me that you can’t say it without undercutting the point that it’s a form of censorship.
You’re not free to create content for a proprietary platformed owned by another company. Apple should be allowed to control content on their platform, even if they make dumb choices. This is in no way, shape, or form censorship. It’s a fact of content delivery, whether it’s software for a closed platform, a theater chain, an ebook reader, or a cable channel. They get to make their own rules and you don’t get to claim it’s limiting your freedom of speech.
-Tom
At what point does a private platform(s) become so ubiquitous it becomes a public platform so the government must step in and regulate it or even take it over?
I mean in the USA this happened with railways in the 20th century.
I’m not even sure what we are disagreeing about.
I’m not claiming it is censorship. But you don’t need to censor something to have a chilling effect on free speech. There is a scene in 1984 where Winston Smith talks about the government doesn’t even need to censor things, people censor themselves in order to avoid committing a thought-crime. Apple doesn’t need to censor my game, that will undoubtedly offend many people because no developer is going to make it in the first place.
In a truly competitive marketplace, I’d agree. But just like there was fairness doctrine that required the networks to air both sides of an argument and carry political ads, the right of Apple to control content on their platform is not absolute because of their duopoly position. Now hopefully, just like the explosion of TV channels and the internet made the fairness doctrine unnecessary, we will see competitive platforms arrive that will make government regulation of iTunes and the Playstore unnecessary.
In the case of games, I certainly don’t think any government action is needed today. For other types of media, perhaps we’ve already reached the point.
I append my above post to include you too, Rod.
Cheers. I am coming around to the view that the next big infrastructure project in my countries (UK/EU/USA) should be related to digital commerce and privacy.
I dont have any particular policy advocacy but it feels like most people of all political viewpoints think tech companies have gone too far and something needs to be done for citizens rights.
Even a “simple” move like striking down the legal ability of Apple & others to stop developers selling iOS apps on other stores might be on the table.
Afghanistan 11 is an interesting case because Apple literally changed the business terms on a whim. That feels very off.
Agree. If we are rapidly reachingthe point where a few companies can defacto control speech or expression in what has evolved into the public square, as the railroads once dominated commerce, then we need to find a unique regulatory solution to that unique problem. I agree with @Strollen that we aren’t quite there with games yet. We may be there with A/V communication/expression. What if Amazon bought Steam? Then there’d be a “Big Three” controlling all games with DRM and downloads/online sales.
We may get there soon. There are rumours again of Unity being shopped around. I cant think of any place they would land that wouldn’t reduce competition in gaming to a large degree. Insert ones own “means of production” aphorisms here.
I really hope they decide to go public instead. I would also suggest now is a good time to do it.
Unless you’re using it in a generic sense, free speech is a Constitutional right in the United States. It has nothing to do with Apple not carrying certain games. You keep using language about people “not being allowed to create”, and that would constitute actual censorship. But that is not at all what’s happening here.
That’s what we’re disagreeing about.
I’ll take Extreme Analogies for $100, Alex. :)
-Tom
On the topic of unspoken rules, i’ve heard podcasts about moderators on large subreddits explain that actually delineating rules causes people to break the rules, because they can then plausibly deny their trolling is not in violation since they custom tailored it to get around the rules. And if you revise the rules to account for their behavior, they turn around and tailor their follow up content to get around those new revisions, ad infinitum.
For some reason a lot of Silicon Valley types have decided that to defend the spirit of the law requires hiding the letter of the law, since bad actors will use the that definition of the law to get around it and violate the spirit of it.
Which, in turn, makes said rules seem arbitrary and capricious when unevenly applied.
There’s not really a ‘winning’ play here from the establishment of a framework. The reality is that this can only be fixed by hiring enough competent people to do the required hard work.
But companies like Apple find this anathema to them, so instead take the expedient course and simply dump stuff that causes a fuss. Easier and cheaper to be capricious than consistent. It’s all risk aversion.
Which makes it entirely exploitable by bad actors, and also allows far worse examples to exist below the radar.
This is one of the most Orwellian things I’ve read this year (no fear, Enidgm, I don’t think you are Big Brother) or maybe the most Kafka-esque thing I’ve read all year (however, we are all Joseph K).
“No,” said the man at the window, who threw his book down on a coffee table and stood up. “You can’t go away when you’re under arrest.” “That’s how it seems,” said K. “And why am I under arrest?” he then asked. "That’s something we’re not allowed to tell you. Go into your room and wait there. Proceedings are underway and you’ll learn about everything all in good time.
I really ought to work that into one of the books i’m writing ;). The monopolistic indifference to the injustice of wasting developer’s time, money and creative energy in a digital age where they can be “deplatformed” with the flip of a switch is infuriating, with little to no recourse offered.
IMO, it comes from the divide that Silicon Valley types divide the world between “developers” and “users” and in the case of Apple, “users” include people posting random games on their App store, the same way users post pictures on Tumblr or memes on Facebook. For it is users, not the content users make, that is really the product.
Yes, I’m using free speech in a generic sense. This isn’t a question of constitutional rights.
I would suggest not falling into the “Silicon Valley types” label for Apple’s current idiocy. Sometimes bucketing people here can be useful. Politically for example we are fairly uniform, as you would expect from a majority immigrant workforce who all share similar values.
But on this subject ie: the role of tech and platforms & openness vs closed, I would say attitudes around this issue within bay area tech are wildly divergent.
Unfortunately, I don’t think it’s this easy–I mean, I don’t think that even hiring enough competent people will solve the problem. It is genuinely hard to do consistent moderation at these large scales. If you have set rules, people will skirt them (as mentioned above), and if you don’t, then even competent, well-meaning people will enforce things differently (aka arbitrarily and capriciously).