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Machine Usefulness – A Compass for Navigating the AI Revolution

Tuesday, May 13th, 2025

Book Review of Power and Progress: Our Thousand-Year Struggle Over Technology and Prosperity by Daron Acemoglu and Simon Johnson

Innovation lays the groundwork for the redistribution of power and wealth. In the Middle Ages, elites used water and windmills to extract wealth from the people to build cathedrals. Today, with AI, we are on the same path – unless we get up for “machine usefulness”.

Innovation lays the groundwork for the redistribution of power and wealth.

Innovation. Nothing can be wrong with that. Can it? Innovation brings us better products, leaner processes, and greener technology. We all benefit. We have better lives. This has always been the case for humanity throughout history, whenever innovation has entered the scene. Innovation is what we need to solve our problems. This applies even more to the latest and most significant innovation of our time, which is now taking off: artificial intelligence.

But what if this common narrative is simply wrong? That’s the argument made by economists Daron Acemoglu, Nobel Prize laureate in 2024, and Simon Johnson in their recent book Power and Progress: Our Thousand-Year Struggle Over Technology and Prosperity (2024).

Technology often redistributes prosperity away from ordinary people.

In an unusual move for economists, Acemoglu and Johnson take a deep dive into economic history to support their argument. As a result, their book is full of stories rather than models and statistics, making it an engaging read. The historical examples they provide vividly illustrate what happens when technology “redistributes power and prosperity away from ordinary people”. This is exactly what happened when water and windmills were introduced in the Middle Ages. Instead of enabling a better life for all those involved in production and consumption, the surplus created by the new technology was largely absorbed by the religious hierarchy. Cathedrals, monasteries, churches—that’s where much of the profit ended up.

Mills are just one of many cases Acemoglu and Johnson cite to make their point. Looms and coal mining are other examples. Looking at the broader picture, hardly any progress for ordinary people is discernible. “The quality of life of a European peasant circa 1700 was not much different from that of an Egyptian peasant two thousand or even seven thousand years earlier,” they write. “According to the best available estimates, GDP per capita (in real, price-adjusted terms) was almost the same in 1000 CE as it had been a thousand years earlier.”

But there are exceptions. And this brings us to the brighter outlook that Power and Progress points to. Whether innovation and technological change benefit the general population or just those in power is a matter of choice—both political and technological. These choices are ours to make or enforce. “Machine usefulness” is the term Acemoglu and Johnson propose for a kind of innovation that benefits society and ordinary people.

Machine usefulness means innovation that benefits society, not just elites.

Again, history provides useful examples. Electricity, for instance, embodies the kind of “usefulness” they advocate, as it allowed for diverse applications and development paths. Another example is how the American automobile industry handled automation in the postwar period. Instead of merely cutting costs, technology was used to create new tasks and jobs for workers of all skill levels.

“Managers and engineers could have chosen to double down on automation as a method to cut costs in existing industries. Instead, they […] pushed to build new systems and machinery […], augmenting the capabilities of both skilled and unskilled labour.” This led to an increase in demand for workers in the industry, “which more than made up for declining labour intensity in agriculture and some manufacturing tasks.” All of this is well-documented in recent research on economic history.

Some digital technologies also exhibit traits of “machine usefulness”. Acemoglu and Johnson highlight famous single innovations like the computer mouse, as well as broader advancements such as virtual reality and digital tools that support work in education and healthcare. Steve Jobs referred to such tools as a “bicycle for the mind”. Other examples mentioned in the book include new platforms that connect people with different skills and needs or tools that improve classroom instruction by enabling personalised learning.

AI continues this trend: disrupting labour markets, shifting power to those who control

Overall, however, the introduction of digital technologies marks a turning point—one that contrasts with the shared prosperity model associated with the automobile industry. “Wage growth slowed down, the labour share of national income declined sharply, and wage inequality surged starting around 1980.” AI continues this trend: disrupting labour markets, shifting power to those who control data and make key corporate decisions, impoverishing billions in the global south, reinforcing existing biases (such as those based on skin colour), and even undermining institutions. That’s the dark picture Power and Progress paints.

AI, Acemoglu and Johnson point out, enables “so-so automation”. AI replaces humans, but often without creating new opportunities—just leading to lower service quality. “So-so automation” occurs when stores install self-checkout kiosks that don’t improve customer service or when AI takes over customer support:

“Humans are then brought in as troubleshooters after a long series of menus. By this point, the customer is often frustrated, early opportunities for building a social bond have been lost, and the customer service representative lacks the same depth of communication, limiting their ability to learn from and adapt to specific circumstances. This makes the representative less effective and may encourage managers and technologists to find further ways to reduce their tasks.”

That’s a perfect vicious cycle.

So, what’s our task? The direction that innovation in general—and AI in particular—is taking must be brought under democratic control:

“When a company decides to develop facial recognition technology or track faces in a crowd… their engineers are best placed to decide how to design the software. But society at large should have a voice in whether such software should be developed and deployed.”

Another example: rules for social media platforms that go far beyond the relatively weak measures discussed recently:

“Even with much better monitoring, it would be unrealistic to expect that Facebook can eliminate all posts containing misinformation or hate speech. Yet it is not too much to expect that their algorithms should not amplify such material by boosting it and actively recommending it to other users.”

Will innovation automate work or create new tasks? Will it be used for surveillance or to empower workers? Will it influence political discourse and social outcomes for better or worse? These are the key questions that determine whether a technology exhibits “machine usefulness”. What we need is the right institutional framework and government policies to steer the private sector away from excessive automation and surveillance and toward technologies that serve the broader public interest.

Whether innovation serves the public is a political and technological choice.

Here’s one idea for such a framework: let’s make the direction of technological development a key criterion for investors when evaluating companies. Large investors could demand transparency on whether new technologies align with societal needs.

Last but not least: narratives matter. It is persuasion—not mere physical force—that has historically paved the way for innovation. And the ability to persuade is deeply tied to social status and political power. The tech elite, today’s global oligarchy, have successfully convinced us of their narrative about AI’s exponentially increasing capabilities. Power and Progress offers a counter-narrative. Let’s spread the word!

 

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I Have Not Been Manipulated by Algorithms, but You Have

Monday, April 21st, 2025

Giuliano da Empoli is a Swiss-Italian novelist, political essayist, and professor at Paris’s Sciences Po. He writes about how political forces rise to power and how manipulation of public discourse happens. And he has a message for you: you are being manipulated by algorithms. We are being manipulated by algorithms.

Read the headline of this post again: I Have Not Been Manipulated by Algorithms, but You Have.

Doesn’t sound right, does it? Those being manipulated are always somebody else. They. You. Never we or I. So the first step is to accept that I, too, am being manipulated. When we accept that, we can start thinking about what to do about it.

I am being manipulated by algorithms. My taste in music. My knowledge about the world. My understanding of how the world works. This is not a conspiracy theory—I am not being singled out and fed something specific to move in some certain direction. It’s just that the way the online world works—the algorithms it runs on—will bring me some sorts of information and not other sorts of information.

What do I do with this insight? First, I will stop pointing fingers and doing algo-shaming on others. Next, I will make more efforts to seek information outside of online sources. I’ll tell you when I find something—watch this space.

You don’t have to do anything, because surely you see through the algorithms. Or do you?

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The Key to European Competitiveness?

Wednesday, April 16th, 2025

When Mario Draghi defined the future of European competitiveness, no one expected the results to be treated like sacred scripture—open to interpretation, debated in hushed conference rooms, and occasionally quoted as if it came with divine footnotes. And yet, here we are!

The Draghi Report has landed, and while some see it as a roadmap to economic revival, others seem to be using it to justify investments in… Formula 1? As our cartoonist cheekily puts it, interpreting Draghi’s recommendations is now a spiritual journey—complete with misunderstandings, contradictions, and the occasional ban on crustaceans.

Welcome to the holy grail of European economic discourse.

The Key to European Competitiveness?

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The Trilemma of European Big Tech Regulation

Wednesday, April 9th, 2025

Book review: Werner Stengg, Digital Policy in the EU. Towards a Human-Centred Digital Transformation

It is unusual to read an EU Commission insider’s writing on recent and current topics of legislation. Werner Stengg’s book Digital Policy in the EU is one of those unusual comments. Netopia invited a former Commission insider – Detlef Eckert – to review it.

Werner Stengg’s book Digital Policy in the EU. Towards a Human-Centred Digital Transformation (Edward Elgar Publishing 2024) addresses the EU’s response to the challenges posed by digital transformation. While it focuses predominantly on regulation, it also explores broader policy aspects.

Technology should serve people, not just businesses — a human-centred digital transformation

The subtitle reflects the EU’s perspective on technological disruption, emphasising the wish for technology to serve people rather than solely businesses. This aligns with the EU’s characteristic approach of pursuing three simultaneous objectives: social (human-centric), sustainability (climate), and competitiveness. Balancing these ambitions has always been challenging.

The increasing societal impact of social media, coupled with Meta’s recent scale-back of content moderation following similar actions by Twitter/X, makes Werner Stengg’s book particularly timely. While the book delves into various aspects of digital regulation, its analysis of Big Tech and social media regulation is especially compelling.

As an active EU official and a key figure within the Commission’s digital policy teams, Werner Stengg offers an insider’s perspective. Readers can expect a well-researched and meticulously drafted account of policy developments, providing valuable insight into how the Commission perceives digital technologies and the rationale behind its regulatory interventions.

The book’s stated aim is “to capture the digital transformation, as well as Europe’s policy response to it, in the most holistic way possible.”

SETTING THE SCENE

The author begins his book by examining the digital policy approach of the first von der Leyen Commission, which focused on the dual green-digital transformation. Its slogan, “Europe fit for the digital age,” encapsulated this vision. The text provides an overview of the evolution of the digital space, incorporating historical references and its connections to earlier scientific revolutions. The author briefly traces the development of the Internet, the World Wide Web (Sir Tim Berners-Lee, CERN), search engines, and mobile ecosystems.

Europe invents, the U.S. commercialises — a recurring pattern in tech history.

The chapter places significant emphasis on the platform economy, setting the stage for subsequent chapters by exploring the power of platforms and the regulations aimed at curbing this power. It identifies network effects, lack of transparency, disruption, and negative externalities as the most pressing challenges that require policy responses.

A Note on the Internet’s Evolution

I would like to take this opportunity to add a few comments regarding the evolution of the Internet. First, the Belgian software engineer Robert Cailliau, a colleague of Berners-Lee at CERN, should be recognised as a critical contributor to the project that became the World Wide Web. Second, it is a recurring pattern that technologies developed in Europe are commercialised in the United States.

Robert Cailliau deserves recognition as co-creator of the World Wide Web

For instance, the first commercially successful WWW browser was Netscape’s Navigator, which was pivotal in making eCommerce a reality. Third, the Internet was introduced to Europe on 17 November 1988, when the Dutch Computer Centrum CWI connected to the NSF. Interestingly, the European Commission, for a long time, did not embrace the TCP/IP suite but instead promoted ISO standards. Finally, the role of RIPE, the European IP registrar, in fostering internet adoption across Europe deserves greater recognition and appreciation.

REGULATING INTERNET-BASED SERVICES

In its third chapter, the book examines the first significant regulations aimed at internet services, or, as they are referred to, ‘information society services.’ This somewhat unusual term dates back to the 1990s when the EU’s digital strategy was built around the concept of the Information Society, introduced by Commissioner Martin Bangemann.

The eCommerce Directive stands out as a landmark regulation, establishing the principle of the country of origin for digital services combined with minimal regulatory requirements. Adopted in 2000, the Directive governed digital services for two decades and was considered an enabling framework that unleashed the potential of eCommerce. Its importance lies in its liability provisions for hosting, mere conduit, and caching services. While praised for fostering innovation, the Directive also attracted criticism.

Initially, hosting services were primarily databases and websites, but over time, they evolved into powerful platforms. The Directive aimed to limit “excessive litigation.” However, as the author recalls, critics argued that intermediaries could cause harm to others without being held accountable. Copyright holders were among those raising concerns, alongside those worried about harmful content that was inadequately moderated.

The author revisits these issues later in the book when discussing contemporary challenges and the Digital Services Act (DSA).

PRIVACY CONCERNS

The 1995 Data Protection Directive (which, by the way, took five years of negotiation) served as the cornerstone of privacy regulation in the EU. It formed the basis of the “Safe Harbour” arrangement with the US, later deemed legally insufficient by the European Court of Justice (ECJ).

However, the Directive had several shortcomings, which Werner Stengg explains in detail and which the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) addressed. For example, the GDPR clarified the definition of private data, outlined what constitutes valid consent, and provided a more comprehensive legal framework for data processing.

“Data processing must be lawful, fair, and transparent,” Stengg writes, highlighting the GDPR’s foundational principles. He elaborates on the principles of purpose limitation and data minimisation, raising essential questions about how these principles can be upheld in big data and artificial intelligence.

CONSUMER PROTECTION

In the context of eCommerce and digital services, the Commission has consistently regarded consumers as the weaker party needing protection. As the narrative explains, the Commission also recognised the importance of ensuring consumer trust in these new services to enable their adoption and growth.

Thus, consumer protection—much like privacy protection—has always been viewed as a means of safeguarding consumers and facilitating the development of digital services. This sub-chapter introduces various Directives and initiatives, providing detailed explanations of their provisions.

ALGORITHMS

Up to this point, the book has focused primarily on the consumer side. However, as the platform players’ market power increased, the focus shifted to competition policy. This shift began with several landmark competition cases and extended to the Platform-to-Business (B2B) Regulation, which aimed to address unfair competition. An informed reader will recognise that this development ultimately led to the Digital Markets Act (DMA), with a preparatory analysis presented in Chapter 4.

“The paradigm shift in European policymaking was the recognition that continued reliance on market forces alone would not solve any of the problems identified.” (p. 109)

Continued reliance on market forces alone won’t solve digital economy challenges.

In exploring these issues, the narrative revisits the earlier discussion of the platform economy, delving into market power, misaligned interests (negative externalities), information asymmetries, and unhealthy global dependencies. The author conducts a market failure analysis by examining the impact of the platform economy’s characteristics on markets. This offers valuable insight into how regulators perceive markets and rationalise regulation and market intervention.

Algorithm opacity is one of the Commission’s key concerns.

That said, the book could also have considered policy failure. Issues such as a lack of foresight, tendencies toward over-bureaucratisation, and slow responses to align regulation with dynamic market changes.

At this stage, the book clarifies that algorithm opacity is one of the Commission’s key concerns. These algorithms effectively govern how platforms operate, and their lack of transparency poses significant challenges for regulators.

TARGETS OF REGULATION

This section of the book helps the reader understand various regulatory approaches by distinguishing three partly overlapping characteristics.

First, specific regulations can be identified by their target services, such as video-sharing platforms or online marketplaces. Readers might be surprised to learn that several regulations were already in place even before the DSA and DMA were enacted.

Second, not every market player is subject to the same level of regulation. Typically, smaller companies benefit from exemptions or are regulated less. The book notes, “Therefore, it seems justified – and more proportionate – to request higher levels of due diligence from such large operators.” This distinction is evident in the DSA’s focus on “very large online platforms” and the DMA’s regulation of “gatekeepers” and “core platform services.”

Third, regulation can target specific technologies. While the EU traditionally follows a principle of technology neutrality, this approach appears to be shifting in certain policy areas, such as the Green Deal. The author refers to ‘data technology’ as an example of this focus. Another key example is artificial intelligence, which the AI Act addresses.

REGULATING DIGITAL MARKETS

After outlining various policy concepts related to the digital decade in Chapter 6, the narrative moves to the core of the book, focusing on the most recent legislative initiatives, starting with the Digital Markets Act (DMA).

 “…the new digital monopolies (or oligopolies) were the result of the free play of market forces: …”.

The central issue addressed is the weak contestability of specific digital markets. One earlier attempt to address this was the Platform-to-Business Regulation, which aimed to enhance transparency but ultimately fell short of making digital markets fair and contestable.

The author identifies five factors that contribute to market contestability: ease of market entry, access to market information, absence of self-preferencing, avoidance of lock-in situations, and limiting the leveraging of market power into adjacent markets. The DMA directly addresses these concerns, which the author analyses before moving on to the Digital Services Act (DSA).

For some, the DSA is too weak; for others, it goes too far, curtailing free speech. The book offers a balanced perspective, helping to rationalise the debate by clarifying what the DSA

The author turns to the DSA to explain how it distinguishes between social media platforms and eCommerce marketplaces. While the liability regime remains unchanged, the DSA introduces day-to-day responsibilities and due diligence requirements. It defines the processes that intermediaries or platforms must follow to mitigate risks.

Chapter 8 takes on a more political topic: democracy and social media. The chapter reveals how Elon Musk’s decision to reduce or even remove content moderation on X has struck a nerve with EU policymakers. The book illustrates their unease about these developments, which is evident in recent European statements regarding Musk’s actions. For some, the DSA is too weak; for others, it goes too far, curtailing free speech. The book offers a balanced perspective, helping to rationalise the debate by clarifying what the DSA does and does not address. Beneficial are the two summarised sections outlining the key aspects of the DSA.

THE BROADER REGULATORY LANDSCAPE

In Chapter 9, Werner Stengg introduces the reader to several initiatives, including those related to data governance, cybersecurity, the Chips Act, and, most notably, artificial intelligence (AI). This provides an overview of the broad range of regulations and initiatives impacting various aspects of the digital economy. AI has become a politically charged topic, and the book explains the rationale behind the AI Act. It also covers the various political discussions and formats, such as the G7, that have taken place.

Given the rapid advancements in generative AI (foundation models), the onset of the Trump administration, and the substantial investments announced in the US and China, the European response appears cautious (despite strong political statements and recent announcements). It will be fascinating to revisit this topic in a few years to see how market realities have unfolded compared to the current discussions.

CONCLUSIONS

Is Europe fit for the digital age?

Werner Stengg’s book comprehensively explores the EU’s digital policy, shedding light on the motivations and challenges underlying its regulatory framework. The author ultimately leaves readers with the question: Is Europe fit for the digital age? This question is accompanied by ten key takeaways encapsulating the book’s insights. I conclude this review by inviting readers to delve into these takeaways for themselves and explore Stengg’s analysis.

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Postcard from Geneva (or: Keeping up with the Americans)

Sunday, March 23rd, 2025

Earlier this year, I visited Geneva. More importantly, I visited CERN; the particle physics laboratory. It is a very impressive and welcoming place; go if you can. On the French border, there is a 27 km long tunnel in the form of a circle, a particle accelerator named the Large Hadron Collider (hadrons are components of atoms: protons and neutrons, but not electrons). Full of fun facts, the temperature is -271.3°C, which is colder than outer space. This is because the electromagnets powering the accelerator are superconductors at this temperature. The particles reach 0.999999991 times the speed of light. And so on… you get the picture (don’t tell me you’re not fascinated!).

I said welcoming: there is an exhibition covering five expo halls, where scientists working on real experiments hang about, keen to explain and answer questions. There is a guided tour that takes visitors into some of the labs and control rooms. And everything is free, a short tram ride from Geneva Central Station (the trams are free too, with a voucher from your hotel). In fact, this is the spirit of the whole lab: it is paid for by the participating states. Only they can conduct experiments, but the results are freely available to all of humanity.

I was interested in the history of the facility, and it turns out it started in the 1950s when Europe was lamenting the loss of all those prominent physicists that moved to America during WWII. How should Europe keep up with America? The answer was to build the biggest particle accelerator in the world.

Has anything useful come from this particle physics laboratory? you ask. Well, the anti-matter factory has only produced enough anti-matter to heat a cup of tea since its inception in 2000. But the crystals used to capture the particles from the hadron collisions are used in medicine to diagnose cancer. So that saves lives. But the most famous invention from CERN came from the document management system: the World Wide Web, invented by Sir Tim Berners-Lee at CERN in 1989.* Now… who has made the most money from the World Wide Web?

You decide what the moral of this story ought to be. All I know is that particle physics are cool. Superconducting cool.

So cool that the computer that ran the first www-server is on display at the CERN expo, and it is a NeXT – that’s the computer that Steve Jobs designed in order to get his job back at Apple.

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Netopia Spotlight: Detlef Eckert – Escaping Digital Policy Déja Vu

Wednesday, January 29th, 2025

It is a rare occasion that a policy insider writes a book about what really happened. Most of the time, we have only the official communication and the odd little glimpse into the inside of the European policy mechanics. But now one retired EU civil servant has written a book, and on Netopia’s topics no less. Digital policies over four decades. Is making policy for the digital space possible? Author Detlef Eckert’s answer is yes, if done right. Watch the interview video and transcript below.

Transcript of video interview

Welcome to Netopia Spotlight with Detlef Eckert. My name is Per Strömbäck, and I’m here today with the newly published author, Detlef Eckert, for an exclusive interview with Netopia. Hello, Detlef, welcome to Netopia Spotlight.

Detlef: Hello.

Per: And you have just this autumn published a book. It’s called The 40 Years of European Digital Policies: Lessons Forgotten. Is that correct?

Detlef: Yeah, that’s correct.

Per: There it is. Excellent… The Pulitzer Prize winner, maybe?

Detlef: Well, we’ll see.

Per: Congratulations on the book! I have some questions about it, but maybe first—you have a long background in European digital policy. Can you tell us a little about your work life?

Detlef: Well, I started in the European Commission early in the 1990s, predominantly in the digital field. Back then, we didn’t call it “digital”—we called it ICT: Information Communication Technologies, Telecommunications, and Media. Those were the buzzwords at the time.

I worked in the digital field until 2002, when I took leave and worked at Microsoft for four years, mainly in cybersecurity. Afterward, I returned to the Commission and continued my digital journey. Later, I shifted focus slightly, but I always stayed connected to the digital realm. Toward the end of my career, I spent almost three years in China to experience another country and culture. That’s when the idea of the book emerged.

 

Per: So what was the idea? What was the spark behind the book, and what do you hope to achieve with it?

Detlef: When I retired, I reflected on the current state of digital policies—particularly under the Von der Leyen Commission—and realised many narratives and aspirations were repeating. It was a sort of déjà vu. I thought it would be worthwhile to write about what has been learnt in the past.

Having been deeply involved in these policies over the years, I felt I had a comprehensive perspective. Whenever I shared my experiences with colleagues or friends, they often said, “You should write this down.” So I did.

The book is a historical account written as a story. It doesn’t include tables, graphs, or exhaustive details about directives and regulations. Instead, it provides a holistic overview of how digital policies evolved in Europe and offers lessons that could inform today’s policymaking. It’s a summary and a story, and as such, it doesn’t exist anywhere else.

After four decades of digital policies, why is Europe more dependent on external technology—particularly American and Asian—than ever before

Per: That’s a valuable contribution to understanding the digital policy landscape. But the subtitle, Lessons Forgotten, has a hint of sarcasm. What do you mean by that?

Detlef: That subtitle reflects one of the main reasons I wrote the book. Over the years, I’ve seen narratives and initiatives repeated without pro-reflection on past experiences. We don’t seem to ask, “What did we learn before?” There’s another path of dependence—policies continuing on autopilot.

Two key questions come to mind:

1. After four decades of digital policies, why is Europe more dependent on external technology—particularly American and Asian—than ever before?

2. Why does digital technology not appear in productivity statistics as a transformative force?

Despite significant investments and efforts, Europe’s market share and contribution to digital innovation have declined. Understanding the forces behind this trend is crucial.

 

Per: Solow’s paradox—that technology is everywhere except in productivity statistics—still holds true?

Detlef: Yes, it does. There was a measurable impact of ICT on productivity in the 1990s and early 2000s in the U.S., but not in Europe. Various explanations exist: measurement issues, time lags as society adapts to new technologies, or inadequate complementary investments like infrastructure and skills. Institutions, education systems, and infrastructure need to adjust for digital technology to reach its potential.

While necessary, regulation alone won’t drive competitiveness or innovation. For that, we need complementary investments and structural reforms

Per: So, is it even possible to regulate the digital world effectively?

Detlef: Yes, but it depends on the type of regulation. Over time, European digital regulation has evolved in three layers:

1. Enabling regulation: Policies that created internal markets for e-commerce, liberalised telecommunications, and fostered market competition.

2. Accommodating regulation: adapting existing rules (e.g., copyright, consumer protection) to the digital age.

3. Protective regulation: Focusing on risk management, as seen with AI regulations.

While necessary, regulation alone won’t drive competitiveness or innovation. For that, we need complementary investments and structural reforms.

Europe must embrace innovation and entrepreneurial risk-taking more wholeheartedly.

Per: What about competition? How does it factor into your analysis?

Detlef: Competition is critical, especially in digital markets dominated by network effects that favour monopolies. The Digital Markets Act (DMA) seeks to address this by targeting gatekeepers—platforms with dominant positions. It builds on telecom liberalisation principles, aiming to create fairer marketplaces. But implementing these rules effectively remains challenging.

 

Per: What are your thoughts on improving Europe’s productivity?

Detlef: Focus on complementary investments—education, skills, infrastructure—and foster a culture of entrepreneurship. Structural reform is crucial. Europe must embrace innovation and entrepreneurial risk-taking more wholeheartedly. Programs alone won’t suffice; we need a mindset shift.

 

Per: Thank you for sharing your insights, Detlef, and for contributing to the discussion on Europe’s digital future. To our viewers, thank you for watching this Netopia Spotlight interview with Detlef Eckert

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Facts – Who Needs Them?

Wednesday, January 8th, 2025

Is this the end of social media we witness? I hate to say “late capitalism,” but does anyone have a better label? Having observed how Musk effectively killed Twitter/X by killing content moderation and moving to “community notes,” Zuckerberg thought it would be great to try the same recipe for his platforms. What is that definition of madness again? “Repeating the same action and expecting a different outcome” …something like that? Can somebody please explain how Facebook, Threads, Instagram, et al will not drown in the cesspool of AI, trolls, spam, and slop the same way that X did?

Ah, well, who uses Facebook these days anyway? It was already swimming in irrelevant content, and only your grandmother posts there anymore. Time to start looking for Facebook’s Bluesky?

It is ironic in a way, those who used to advocate for no regulation of platforms liked to say that competition will take care of it. Looks like they had a point, except it was not some new competitor that brought them down. They did it to themselves (sort of like constitutional democracy in some countries, some might add).

It does not end with a bang nor a whimper, but a slow, painful, ugly decline into desperation. AI propaganda, alt-right nonsense, Russian disinformation, fake news, hate speech… good luck monetizing that, mr Zuckerberg. I hope you have a profitable car company to cross-subsidize your losses…

I have often pondered why Silicon Valley has failed to develop standards and self-regulation to benefit its users, owners, advertisers, workers, etc, as most industries like to do, instead rather inviting policymakers to regulate them. At one point I had the opportunity to ask an insider just this, and they told me there had been attempts, but there was so much backstabbing between the companies that it never materialised. I guess we’ll see about the backstabbing now.

Oh, by the way, this change is only US for now. EU citizens: relax. Your online platform experience is completely safe…

Do users want stupid political discussions on their social media anyway? In the early days, somebody described Facebook as a cocktail party. You can pop in to all kinds of interesting conversations, but nobody talks about politics. Ah, the good old days… Turns out cocktail parties work best when there is a host that… you know… asks misbehavers to leave.

“The reality is this is a tradeoff,” Zuckerberg says in the video. “It means that we’re going to catch less bad stuff, but we’ll also reduce the number of innocent people’s posts and accounts that we accidentally take down.”

Happy New Year, trolls!

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All Hail Our Robot Overlords

Monday, October 21st, 2024

Ray Kurzweil’s new book The Singularity Is Nearer brings back some familiar topics; review here by Ralf Grötker. One is the dualism of mind and body—in Christianity, our soul leaves the body and we can live forever in heaven (unless, of course, we have sinned; in that case, we have another thing coming). For Kurzweil, we can upload our minds to the cloud and live forever (regardless of our sins!). But… your body interacts with your mind, no? And you might want to interact with the outside world? Don’t worry, all those things can be simulated.

When prophecies fail, some prophets re-write them and delay the rapture, apocalypse or singularity. Kurzweil does the opposite—he brings it closer. It used to be 2045, but in the (appropriately named!) new book, the new delivery date is 2040. This is the year when you can start backing up your mind to the cloud. Subject to change, one would suppose, but mark your calendar just in case.

Will this opportunity be equally available. Certainly not, but don’t worry—even if your income has not increased in the last two decades, you are still much richer today. At least measured in computing cycles, which in Kutzweil’s world is the only really important currency. You get much more computing power today for the same money! It makes sense if your demand is computing. And all the rest can be simulated anyway, so put your money where your… eh, computer cycles are.

This phenomenon is known as Moore’s law—you know those lines about how a doorbell has more computing power these days than the Apollo rocket? That is Moore’s law: the observation that the amount of transistors on an integrated circuit chip doubles on average every two years. Or double computing power at same price every two years. Or half price for same computing power. You get it. Silicon Valley may treat this as a law of nature, but Wikipedia puts it as an observation, a projection, and an “experience”curve”—continued improvement based on growing experience. (Or “Wright’s law”, for those who like laws).

Will it last forever? Maybe, but there are some question marks. The economies of scale in chip production require increasingly large production facilities. There are limits to energy access. Microchips cannot be infinitely small; the electronic circuits require some nanometers to let the electrons pass; as those circuits become smaller, they become increasingly difficult to produce (waste increases). And so on. This is the logic of diminishing returns. Sure, with fusion energy and quantum computing, those things will be fixed. But those technologies are far beyond 2040. An old Greek philosopher has said that better than I could ever hope to. (If you click that blogpost, it will take you back to 2013 but the thinking has not evolved!)

But maybe more importantly: you have more computer cycles, but can you do more with them? The word processing software I use for writing this blog has not changed fundamentally since those I first came across 30+ years ago. Sure it looks better, has more fonts and (very annoying) spell-check. But all these are incremental developments. They don’t add up to a revolution. They don’t bring us closer to eternity (unless, of course, you write an immortal masterpiece).

Now you must choose your path, padawan. You can trust Kurzweil and prepare for bliss and immortality in the cloud, where lions and lambs live peacefully together. Or you can choose the bold path and challenge the concept. But before you move that way, let me warn you of Roko’s Basilisk. If you try to delay the arrival of the almighty artificial intelligence, it might punish you for it. And if you should depart meatspace before the singularity comes, the AI may still bring back a simulation of you. And torture it. In eternity.

All hail our robot overlords!

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Want to become a brain in the cloud?

Thursday, October 17th, 2024

Kurzweil’s “Singularity” is a future where Google will infiltrate our brain matter and veins

Companies like Google literally infiltrate our brains and veins, merging human intelligence with the cloud

We should take this seriously. The Singularity is Nearer is a book that offers a glimpse into how human life, according to popular future predictions, could become something that can be stored in the cloud. And of course, technology does not exist without commercial service providers. While it doesn’t say so explicitly, Kurzweil’s new book envisions a future where companies like Google literally infiltrate our brains and veins. Disclosure: Ray Kurzweil is not just a respected futurist and engineer but also holds a leadership position at Google.

The Singularity is Nearer The Singularity is Nearer – Ray Kurzweil serves as an update to Kurzweil’s previous book, The Singularity is Near, published nearly twenty years ago. As the author proudly notes, it’s not a revision of his earlier predictions but a confirmation. (For a list of his forecasts across different works, see Wikipedia.) The central theme is the merging of machine intelligence with humans, culminating in a point (the “singularity”) where machine intelligence surpasses the combined power of all human brains. The timing of this new book is well chosen, given the public release of ChatGPT and its competitors over the last two years, which have likely surprised many of us with the capabilities of artificial intelligence.

Nanobots: A Path to Enhanced Intelligence and Immortality

The concept, in a nutshell: computing power continues to get cheaper and cheaper. “One dollar today buys about 11,200 times as much computing power, adjusted for inflation, as it did in 2005.” And this trend will continue. Soon, it will be feasible for computers to surpass the human brain in sheer computational capacity. This will allow them to function as extensions of our own brains. The extension will take the form of a direct connection between our neocortex and the cloud. (Note: this assumes that human intellectual activity can be reduced to the processes occurring in the neocortex.) The connection will be established almost non-invasively, through microscopic devices called nanobots, which will be introduced into the brain via the capillaries. Once inside, they will communicate directly with simulated neurons hosted in the cloud. This, according to Kurzweil, will mark a new step in evolution. “In the past, we added roughly one cubic inch of brain matter every 100,000 years, but with digital computation, we are doubling price-performance every sixteen months.”

Digital Replication and Ending Ageing

By 2040, Kurzweil believes, we will be ‘able to back up our mind files digitally

Becoming smarter—much smarter—is just one step in Kurzweil’s vision. The other, even more astounding achievement he predicts is immortality. Immortality will come in two forms. The first is the “replicant”: a digital version of a person who has died, re-enacted by machines. This concept goes far beyond the AI-generated avatars we see today. By 2040, Kurzweil believes, we will be “able to back up our mind files digitally.” The brain’s information will be preserved digitally, and Kurzweil claims this information is not just a collection of data but the essence of a person’s identity. As replicants, people will continue to exist even after death in the biological sense.

The second form focuses on ending ageing. Kurzweil predicts that by 2030, medical nanobots will be able to “conduct cellular-level maintenance and repair throughout the body.” Cancer will be eradicated, as these nanobots will “examine each individual cell and determine whether it is cancerous or not, and then destroy all the malignant ones.” DNA transcription errors, a major cause of ageing, will be prevented and even reversed. While this may seem far off, Kurzweil claims that by 2030, “the most diligent and informed people will reach ‘longevity escape velocity’—a tipping point at which we can add more than a year to our remaining life expectance for each calendar year that passes.”. (To anyone who wonders what “diligent and informed” stands for: Kurzweil himself is said to take 100 pills a day in an effort to “reprogram” his biochemistry.) What Supplements does Ray Kurzweil take and why? — TRANSCEND

Philosophical and Ethical Questions: Unanswered in the Singularity

All of this sounds fantastic, and it raises many technological and philosophical questions. Kurzweil does address some of these in his book, such as the debate over artificial consciousness. However, he leaves other issues, like the role of emotions or relationships in human identity, untouched. What also goes unexamined are the questions of corporate power and control. If our minds and bodies fuse with information technology, they will fuse with technology providers such as Google. That this might be perceived as scary, does not seem to be worth a line throughout the book.

Does Rising Technology Lift All Boats?

Kurzweil also deals with the macro-economic outlook at great length. Climate change and ecological problems are solved as minor issues on the way.  One obvious point of criticism might be that only the wealthy will profit from superbrain-power and longevity. Kurzweil doesn’t think so. Almost half of the book is devoted to show how “exponentially improving information technology is a rising tide that lifts all the boats of the human condition”. Kurzweil and his at least sixteen co-authors (who are listed as members of the “Kurzweil team” in the acknowledgement pages) have spared no effort to pile up statistical evidence of how, globally, technological progress has made possible a better life, especially for the least well-off.

While stagnant wages in developed countries are a real issue, Kurzweil points out that “even if your normal wages stayed flat over the past two decades, you can now buy many thousands of times more computing power with them”. Therefore, he concludes, you are richer in a sense.

Thus, a horizon of expectation is set. Against that horizon, other things are getting ever more expensive: those things and services which cannot be produced ever more efficiently. Labour-intensive services like health care, teaching and the like become less and less affordable for individual consumers and to society. Economists describe this phenomenon as “cost disease”. Kurzweil’s age of the singularity will be a future where old-style teaching and health care will be a luxury accessible only for very wealthy people.

A Reality Check: Technology vs. Infrastructure in 2024

One last observation: when I started reading the book, I was on a train from Berlin to Munich. The train—or rather, the journey, since I had to change trains unexpectedly—was several hours late due to a series of technical and managerial problems. This is the usual state of long-distance travel with German Railways these days. Decades of underinvestment in infrastructure, combined with staffing shortages, have led to frequent system breakdowns. This is the reality in 2024. From this perspective, technological progress seems like something that happens only in books.

Kurzweil offers an answer to this too. “Wars and other political problems make large infrastructure projects impractical.” As a result, centralized technological fixes aren’t always the solution. The alternative is technologies that empower individuals to solve problems themselves (his example: water purification). The private solution for long-distance travel, by this logic, is cars or airplanes. But what we have today is congestion, pollution, and urban spaces dominated by cars. It’s not a solution, and many cities are trying to change this. The “singularity” doesn’t appear to have an answer for these kinds of problems.

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TESCREAL or How to Tell if Your Broligarch Is after Your Soul (or just Your Data)

Monday, September 2nd, 2024

What has gone wrong with the minds of Silicon Valley? In the 1970s the place was full of hippies who saw computers as a counter-culture. In the 1990s information wanted to be free. In the 2010s the internet was claimed to topple dictators. And now? Now Silicon Valley is run by broligarchs – tech bros who want to control elections, control the media, control the markets. (And in some cases puppets for bigger forces.) Much has been said about Big Tech’s ideological U-turn, but Netopia wants to offer three observations: early signs, religion and… sand. Bear with me:

Early signs. Let’s take a look at the arch-broligarch, tech investor Peter Thiel. He laid out the plan almost forty years ago as the co-founder and editor-in-chief of student newspaper Stanford Review when he articulated the manifesto for Silicon Valley’s dominance: 1. No regulation 2. No taxes. 3. No copyright. 4. No competition. It is fair to say that the plan worked. The same Thiel suggested datacenters be set up on abandoned oil rigs on international water in order to escape government intervention (Barbara Broccoli, if you read this put this in the next 007 flick!). In his 2014 book From Zero to One, Thiel advocates niche monopolies as business strategy (no competition!). And perhaps those oil rigs aren’t necessary after all, if you pull the strings of policy-makers like puppets. None of this should come as a surprise though, the signs were there all along.

Religion. Worship higher powers, separate soul from body and be blessed with eternal life. Sound familiar? They simply replaced the word God with AI and look what happened. If you want to know if a broligarch is after your soul or just your money, look for the word TESCREAL for example on their Twitter/X-profile. (Or check if they are a member of a community such as this!) Tescr… what? Let’s decipher it:

T – Transhumanism. Transcend the limits of the physical body and live forever through technology. Stop infection with microbots in your bloodstream. Replace worn-out organs with synthetic ones. Add new sensory functions like night vision. None of these technologies exist yet? Fear naught, there is a company that offers to cryo-freeze your corpse until the tools and methods have been properly developed.

E – Extropianism. An earlier label for the transhumanism idea. A scoop on Truthdig revealed that this also included ideas of superior intelligence in the white race (by Oxford AI professor Nick Bostrom no less).

S – Singularitarianism. The idea that the accelerating pace of innovation will come to a point – The Singularity – when all innovation happens at the same time. Moore’s law which predicts increases in computing power is one ingredient. The speed of dissemination of new technologies (soundbites like “television took four decades, smartphones four years and Chat-GPT four days” are par for the course) is another. Expotential growth is another key word. When the singularity comes, technology will liberate us, we will live forever and shall not want. Google chief technologist Ray Kurzweil expects the singularity in the year 2045, though his more recent forecasts suggest it may have been delayed slightly. Oh, there is also the Singularity University in Santa Clara, CA, (right next to Google’s Mountain View) where students can study this concept.

C – Cosmism. Humans will merge with technology and become a new race, for example by uploading our minds online and live forever without bodies. Same Kurzweil has a new book out about this (review coming soon on this website). And of course William Gibson described this idea long ago in Neuromancer (Ace, 1984) where “cyber-cowboy” McCoy Pauley’s consciousness uploaded to ROM-drive plays a central part. (Re-read the book!)

R is for Rationalism. For all this good stuff to happen, we need really smart people working on the execution. The TESCREAL-flavour of rationalism is about finding ways to make people smarter so the fantasy can become reality. An obsession with IQ-tests is part of the package.

EA is for Effective Altruism. Don’t waste your time saving the world at some not-for-profit, instead make heaps of money on something evil and donate to something good. How about crypto currency scams and donations to one of those NGOs (or Singularity University!)?

L – last but not least: Longtermism. A moral compass that says if human kind can live forever uploaded to the cloud or on new planets, maximising happiness and minimizing suffering the really long view means we should care more about the happiness and suffering of those who will live forever in the future than those who live today. Can’t make an omelet… (or as if talibans interpreted utilitarianism.)

So there it is. TESCREAL is a litmus-test, use it to see if a broligarch is a creepy cultist or just a harmless hyper-capitalist megalomaniac. TESCREAL’s baby cousin is e/acc or “effective accelerationism” which means we should accelerate the development of AGI so it can fix our problems. (It makes for good sci-fi, in the very least) The word “problems” is key to understanding the TESCREAL world-view. If the world is full of problems that stand in the way of our development as a species/civilization/culture/insert-your-favourite-big-word, it would be great to solve them, no?

But you said something about sand? Ah, yes. That too. I’m thinking of course of the Burning Man-festival, the Nevada Desert glamping fiesta where some pay 2 500 US dollars to expand their minds, share their ideas about the inevitable path of technology and partake in sexual experimentation (maybe I’m just envious of the “sex plane”?). Elon Musk himself said “if you haven’t been, you just don’t get it”. Burning Man has come a long way from its anti-capitalist roots, just like the Silicon Valley – once a haven for hippies. Perhaps this is why higher powers released their wrath on last year’s “burners”. Or maybe that was an AGI taking control of the weather?

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