It’s easy to forget how diverse the Internet can be when just a few companies dominate the things we do online. When people talk about Internet issues in 2020, they are probably talking about a few popular social media platforms (each filled with screenshots of the others).
This room will explore the role of these big global services in the broader context of the Internet in 2020. Which services are we talking about, and why are they central to discussion of Internet issues in 2020?
There will be space to cover background questions, like why are these services so popular? How are they different from each other? Who do they serve? There will also be room for big-picture questions about the issues, like do these services have special responsibilities? If so, what are they? Are we stuck with the current services forever, or can we see alternatives?
The crowdsourced plan
Session 2: Monetization, data mining, is it true that "if you can't see the pricetag, you are the thing being sold?" And if you take yourself "off the market" what happens to the massive platforms
Session 3: Control on platforms. Hate speech, radicalization, war crimes and body policing -- platforms as law/morality
Session 4: What might a people-centred platform look like?
OTHER IDEAS we might discuss
- What should/could we expect from platforms?
- The effects of platform consolidation (FB owns the universe and Google picks up the rest)
- Are platforms too big?
- What about regulation? Should governments regulate tech platforms, and if so how? What would be the impact?
- A lot of these platforms come from one or two places -- is there space for a NuZeelund.co.nz platform?
- And whatever you want to talk about
- Many platforms report to shareholders -- are platforms public spaces and slash or corporate profit tools (public sphere anyone?)
- Rise of misinformation and shared knowledge
- What about content moderation? How should this evolve? How do we balance free speech with security?
- Platforms as a space of information (aggregations, misinfo, echo chamber, fresh perspectives) and a space of connection
- How will the COVID-19 pandemic and other global stresses change tech giants? And whatever you want to talk about
- Hey whatever happened to net neutrality?
- Big fish and big ponds - where are the guppies?
- Have they got so big they have changed social spaces forever?
- What are people to platforms? Users, fodder, consumers or what’s being sold?
- The power of people on platforms, or the power of people for platforms?
- And whatever you want to talk about
