There used to be a time when the internet was meant to bring democracy to the oppressed. Swedish foreign aid authority SIDA co-funded anonymization technology. The Arab spring was called a “social media revolution”. Tech companies played the democracy card when facing criticism.

Much has changed since those days. Secret police figured out how to track down dissenters using digital technology. Facebook spawned a genocide in Myanmar. The spread of conspiracy theories led to the Capitol Hill riots in Washington DC.

And in the recent elections to the Russian duma, the opposition’s “Smart Voting”-app was removed by Apple and Google. The idea behind smart voting was to focus opposition votes on the non-Kremlin candidates most likely to make the five-percent threshold. Apparently Big Tech found it more important to make friends with the people in power than to support dissenters. Is this the end of the myth that internet brings democracy?

How fun to watch deep fakes of old favorite movies! Here is one with the classic 80’s action flick muscle stars Sylvester Stallone’s and Arnold Schwarzenegger’s faces projected on main characters Dale and Brennan in Step Brothers. It’s cute, Sly and Arnold used to be competitors in the box office back in the day, but in later years worked together in movies like The Expendables and Escape Plan. Much like John C Reilly’s and Will Ferrell’s characters in Step Brothers went from adversaries to best friends.

Deep fakes raise many questions, what can we trust in the online world? What if your face appeared in a video, saying something you would never? Who do you push back on something like that? The Step Brothers deep fake probably won’t fool anyone – the movie is familiar, the actors well-known and in any case there is something weird about the faces. Or is there?

Robot designers and video game makers struggle with a problem called the “Uncanny Valley” – it is possible to make a robot or a game character that looks perfectly realistic like a human being. But when it starts moving and talking, it feels weird. The facial expressions are off, or the timing, or something else – could be difficult to put one’s finger on it. It is possible to fool the eye but not the brain. The effect, the gap between expectation and behaviour, is unpleasant, or uncanny. The design is right on the edge of the uncanny valley. The jump to the other side, where the impression matches the visuals in harmony, is not a gradual improvement but a single big leap that no one has made (yet).

Robot designers tend to avoid the uncanny valley by making robots that look nothing like humans. Video game artists often aim for photo-realistic visuals but avoid going to close to the valley’s edge. Conceptual art, however, might seek out the effect, making a point of the uncanny (such as this video by Swedish artist Tove Kjellmark [sensitive viewers are warned!]).

Will deep fakes be able to make the leap to the other side of the uncanny valley? Is it only a question of better technology? Or is there is something more profound in us, that will always sense there is something wrong? It may be a philosophical question, or even religious. But if deep fakes (or some other technology) one day will make it to the other side… where does that leave us? A place where there is no knowing what is real and what is not. Perhaps that is the real meaning of uncanny.

Most of the headaches of the digital world seem to have one common denominator: there is someone in the middle who could do something but doesn’t. Whether it’s fake news, terrorism content, revenge porn, abuse of workers’ rights, copyright infringement, cyber-attacks… you name it—the list goes on (and ought to be familiar by now).

The answer is often to address such issues by adding more: privacy regulation via authorities, educating the users to do better, via the police and courts—but rarely by demanding action from the middleman. (That would “break the internet.”.)

Does it have to be like that? That is a rhetorical question; the answer is “no, it doesn’t have to be like that.”. Take my favourite example: video games. Some games may be controversial and rely on freedom of expression, but instead of saying “any restriction would break the internet,” games have age recommendations and parental controls in answer to the concerned. This kind of self-regulation (with independent oversight boards) is common in advertising, the press, and many other places. I have written more about that here.

Earlier this month, Tobias Schmidt, chair of ERGA (the European audiovisual media regulators), said to Politico that the EU’s suggested content moderation rules are “toothless” and sanctions are needed (rather than sending letters). One might add that if sanctions are fines, they may be just as toothless, as some of the platforms see fines more like the cost of doing business. So much for “we comply with local regulation.”. (Really? You want a medal for not breaking the law?

The idea that the intermediary should take action, not because it does anything wrong but because it can, is everywhere: hotels must act against trafficking, banks have strict rules on money laundering, printshops are not allowed to make copyright-infringing prints, transport companies must act on suspicion of illegal goods, etc. Even car makers try to stop their vehicles from ending up in the hands of terrorists.

In the digital world, exemption from liability for what users do with a service is the norm. That has benefits for sure: easy access to distribution for all users. However, it appears that the European policymakers are looking at the middlemen to help fix the internet. In the Digital Services Act, “due diligence” procedures such as an official point of contact, transparency reporting, codes of conduct, reporting criminal offences, and so on (more due diligence for bigger players—with great powers…). Sounds great, but also begs a question: why not connect those due diligence obligations to the exemption from liability? That way, the EU Commission could fix the internet without breaking it. Have the cake AND eat it! Get all the juicy stuff—innovation, growth, digital champions—without the headaches and nosebleeds of fake news and revenge porn.

Surely the COMM has thought of that? If not, happy to send a link to this post. If yes, why not connect the dots?

“But… if we don’t do it, somebody else will” – ever heard that? It’s the worst excuse ever, but it can be used to justify anything – pushing drugs at the schoolyard, selling “dual use” surveillance tech to dictators and now, apparently, hosting child pornography. If we don’t do it, somebody else will. And it’s like 20% of our revenue … As famously sung by the Manic Stresources to NRCet Preachers: “If you tolerate this your children will be next” (citing Aneurin Bevan, founder of the British National Health Service). Except in this case, that bridge has already been crossed: sacrificing children for 20% of revenue.

The case in point is Dutch internet hosting provider NForce which hosts 93% of child abuse material in the Netherlands, according to sources to NRC. Operations director Dave Bakvis commented that it is difficult to monitor everything, most content is legal, there is sometimes over-blocking… and if we don’t do it, somebody else will. If this sounds like you’ve heard it all before, it’s because you have. This is a throwback to the debates around ISP liability last decade.

Illegal content has always been an unwelcome topic for digital infrastructure companies but child abuse material has been the exception, so controversial even some of the most hard-headed internet freedom fighters have accepted action is necessary (you could say other things than the consciences of broadband carriers board members should decide such things, but whaddayknow). So ISPs block access to such material based on lists provided from the police or NGOs. Keep in mind, this is about providing access, hosting is a different story: actually renting the server space, sending invoices to those who provide the abuse material. Difficult to pretend you know nothing if it shows up on your bank statement.

Internet companies love to compare themselves with things like road-keepers and post offices, to suggest they have nothing to do with the content or traffic (so does mr Bakvis). Those are horrible comparisons! While the road-keeper may have no idea who uses the road, there is no need for the police to get their support in order to uphold the law on the road. They just drive their police cars and set up a checkpoint and do whatever police do. Also, last time I looked cars have license plates which identify the owner. The post service has strict rules on what can be sent in the mail and a duty to act on suspicion. If the mail crosses a border, custom rules apply. If internet companies would act as road-keepers or the post, these problems would be solved.

Dear mr Bakvis. You can do better than this.

The Bank Holiday weekend in May is a big occasion in English football, but this year is different. Protesting against social media’s inaction toward racist abuse online, in a rare move the major football organisations in England come together in a four-day boycott. Contrary to many actions, this has a real price, the social media attention around football this weekend is worth mucho dinero, but English football decides it’s more important to take a unified stand against racism and demand action from those who own the platforms where it is distributed. The demands are straight-forward:

filtering, blocking and swift takedowns of offensivemajor football organisations posts, an improved verification process and re-registration prevention, plus active assistance for law enforcement agencies to identify and prosecute originators of illegal content.

If this sounds familiar, it is not the first time anyone has brought demands that social media companies take responsibility for the negative impacts of the services they provide. The question is: who can make Big Tech step up? There are many candidates, but so far with limited success. Staff walk-outs have been tried, different flavours of government intervention, advertiser boycotts, share-holder protests, users departing… so far none of this has put more than a small dent in the stock price graphs of social media companies.

If users, owners, government, media, advertisers, or staff couldn’t influence Big Tech, perhaps footballers will?

Transparency: Premier League is one of Netopia’s supporters

Fungible – raise your hand if you had heard this word before the hype around NFTs – non-fungible tokens. I sure had not (I first thought it had something to do with mushrooms). It means exchangeable, as in it can be traded for something. Money is fungible. So non-fungible then means it is not exchangeable, but fixed. Which brings us to cryptoart, but first some de-tours.

I used to be rather enthusiastic about the opportunities brought by blockchain technology to enable “transfer not copy”. The internet is often described as a great copy machine, the drawback is that the scarcities that can make economic value are difficult to uphold. (See also the late David Bowie’s 2002-prediction of music as a utility.) However, Bitcoin and blockchain hasn’t really saved copyright yet, instead new challenges have arrived.

The biggest criticism is around energy use. Blockchains require massive amounts of electricity, Bitcoin alone on the same scale as The Netherlands. This is because of something called “proof-of-work”. Simplified: the number of blocks (or coins) on the chain are limited, new blocks are released every five or ten minutes and distributed in a sort of lottery. “Tickets” for this “lottery” are awarded based on proof-of-work; “mining” – the computer solving difficult math puzzles. As more miners mine, more electricity is needed to win the lottery. The value of the block can be thought of as the total price of the electricity put in by all miners. The electricity consumption is built into the proof-of-work system, and it keeps growing. (Longer read on the topic here.)

Never mind the climate, can crypto save art? The non-fungible token is – as the name suggests – a token: what is sold and bought is a token, not the artwork itself. A connection is needed between the token and the artwork. That connection relies on things other than technology: social contract, companies keeping records, the legal system. Rather than replacing copyright or creating a new market for art, the token is at best a piece of evidence that could be useful in claiming the right of ownership. It does not limit copying or re-distribution, thefts have happened, even re-distribution with the artist’s name (more here).

Other markets for digital items, such as assets in video games, have existed for a long time and are operated by for example games companies, without taking the detour around the blockchain. A convincing case why this is a better model has been made by Gamesindustry.biz.

It appears to this writer as non-fungible tokens are yet another example of the pipedream that technology will bring simple answers to difficult problems. If people want to trade NFTs, fine – trade away! The hype is there. Surely some will make some money. The business around crypto-currencies is booming, as represented for example by the IPO of crypto-trading-platform Coinbase this month. The impression is still however that more transaction is being done in Bitcoin than with Bitcoin.

So keep your crypto-powder dry, the old saying is still true: in a gold rush, you want to be selling shovels.

Many years ago at the Gothenburg book show, I was on stage with a representative from Wikipedia (technically the Wikimedia Foundation, which owns Wikipedia). Oh, and before I write anything else, let me first say that I like Wikipedia. I use it. Lots of link to it on Netopia. Anyway, I asked the Wikipedia-lady what she thought about the legacy encyclopediae – don’t they bring some value that Wikipedia does not? Would it not be great with pluralism? (If you follow Netopia, you know this is the kind of questions I like to ask.)

“They must become much better”, she replied. The outdated business models of the print encyclopediae can’t compete with the free, crowd-sourced online alternative. The hierarchy model with academics scrutinizing entries in their fields of expertise has no place in the digital world. That is how I understood her. I wanted to say something like “wouldn’t it be better with both crowd-sourced and expert edited encyclopediae?” but I didn’t. My mind was busy unpacking her statement: it makes an assumption that the legacy encyclopediae could survive if only the tried a little harder. (And perhaps she was right, at least the classic Britannica lives on with subscriptions but many others are gone.)

Wikipedia continually asks users to make donations. It doesn’t say it uses some of those donations to pick fights in intellectual property law, on things like a monkey selfie and artist’s copyright. Of course it is fair for the Wikimedia foundation to bring whatever court cases it wants, but an organization committed to spreading unbiased knowledge could do better in being transparent about how it uses donations.

Did the donation economy win in the long run? Celebrating Wikipedia’s 20^th birthday earlier this year, Jonas F Ludvigsson – famous Swedish doctor – called for government intervention to secure Wikipedia’s long term survival. Funny, can it not just “become much better”?

It is a tad ironic that Wikipedia repeats the familiar patterns of disruption->monopoly, anti-establishment rhetoric and tax money bail-out. Similar to basic income, after all of the economy has been disrupted, let the government pay.

Happy belated birthday Wikipedia. Netopia wishes you many more years of crowd-sourced wisdom and promises to continue to link to your entries. Netopia also wishes you some competition. Pluralism wins in the long run.

EDIT: Looks like Wikimedia is not in dire straits after all. Rather it is swimming in $$$! Wikipedia Endowment: The Site Is Rich. Why Is It Fundraising? (dailydot.com)

Social media platforms are under fire on freedom of speech after they banned President Trump: Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, etc. in fact, an impressive number of internet services have followed suit Every Social Media Platform Donald Trump Is Banned From Using (So Far) | Glamour.

Social media are not just any business; they often function as the town square. Blocking users has wide consequences, which is part of the reason why the companies have hesitated. Is it censorship? No, censorship is when the government limits the freedom of expression of a citizen. Freedom of expression is not a duty for private companies to broadcast every expression. They are free to make the choices they like. However, the rest of us are also free to criticise the choices they make.

It is, for example, easy to criticise the tech companies double standards: Internet platforms are happy to monetise user content but not to take any form of responsibility for it that falls strictly with the uploading user. Many cases exist since long before President Trump, where internet platforms have interfered with content.

How can social media companies escape this trap? On the one hand, editing content would concede to taking some editorial responsibility. On the other hand, it is clear that bad actors can abuse the platforms if they don’t.

So far, the companies have decided themselves, often pointing to user agreement or opaque policy, perhaps dozens of pages with no indication of which specific part was violated. Or responding to demands for more action by saying it would “break the internet,” but sometimes promising to hire a few thousand more moderators.

That has not worked so well. The result is arbitrary decisions, a lack of transparency, and legal certainty. It looks more like the consciences of the top management or board members guide those decisions than anything legally solid.

Here’s the answer—and I have brought this idea before (read Netopia more closely, Big Tech executives!)—take a page from the media. Or advertising. Or cinema age ratings. Or games, for that matter. Set up an independent oversight board. No, not the Facebook oversight board; that is not independent. It should be separate from any company. Make the rules transparent and easily accessible. Appoint media, tech, and legal experts as decision-makers. Make all decisions public; that educates the entire sector as well as the outside world and creates a corpus that can be referenced in future cases. Appoint an appeals board, which can hear complaints from either side of the ruling. Fund the whole thing with fees from the participating companies. As an added advantage, this system can deal with different situations in different parts of the world (ask games how). The downside is that, as any standard, this will put some limit on competition. It would be more difficult to paint oneself as “the ethical platform.”. But that hasn’t really been the focus before, so why start now?

It’s not difficult. It’s called self-regulation. Happens all the time. Do it right.