Risto Linturi, the Initiator of Helsinki Arena 2000, Chairman of R. Linturi Plc.
Panel Discussion
Jules Verne started writing science fiction in 1860’s. He wrote about Paris one hundred years in the future. He saw that streets would be full of cars. But he also saw that industrialization would make us faceless. Verne saw that faceless ownership through shareholding system and corporate production systems would rob us of many basic values that hold the society together. This same concept was repeated by many philosophers some one hundred years ago. Charles Chaplin demonstrated it very well also in his movie The Modern Times.
Francis Fukuyama shows statistics in his book “The Great Disruption”. He shows how in the years of information technology – crime has increased fifty fold in United States and twenty fold in many European countries. Societal norms are breaking.
There is something in this industrialized information technology that is not good for us. Alvin Toffler analysed in early eighties what Verne predicted. Hierarchical information structures make individuals lose much of their significance. People become anonymous and their actions are invisible to others but their boss.
Fukuyama saw statistical signs of things turning better lately. He did not offer any good explanations. But New York Times foreign columnist Thomas Friedman explained in his book about globalisation “The Lexus and the Olive Tree” many recent phenomena connecting them to the advances of the Internet and transparent society. He saw that hierarchies are breaking, mostly to a positive end result.
But let us think about wider issues. One major aspect of the network is decreasing transaction cost. Internet is often referred to as a global village. It is easy to find new business acquaintances and start co-operating. This fast paced networked business model seems to be extremely efficient but it requires a similar model of non-hierarchical trust that existed before the industrial revolution. If you are a bully I will easily find it out from others in Internet. If you are a good guy I can trust you and do business with you without long contractual negotiations. It seems that a good mechanism for rumours helps businesses to network, but wrongly understood concept of privacy decreases feeling of trust needed for societal productivity.
It seems that there was not enough positive feedback for trust and honour in our western industrial society. For that reason we shifted towards hedonistic values and selfish behaviour patterns. All ill deeds were handled according to the hierarchical organisational routes and absolute privacy was considered everyman’s right. This suited the industrial society and mass marketing but it does not match the needs of our networked era. It is questionable whether honour has any meaning if you cannot lose it in the eyes of your fellow beings. Government is not our mother.
As information technology decreases transaction cost, decreases cost of distribution and copying there is a major shift in organisational productivity. Well-informed, creative individuals with empathy towards other people become more valuable in this new, networked economy compared to people who obediently follow their bosses’ instructions. These empowered citizens and employees are also more satisfied with their lives. But naturally this is a risk for those in power. And there are other risks as well which we had to think about as we tried to give powerful new tools to ordinary users outside existing corporate and governmental power structures.
You know that there is a serial number in each bank note. Also the cars and guns have identification numbers. Power over others and accountability must go hand in hand. There is however a complex issue with privacy. Many people are afraid of big corporations and their own government who might misuse their personal information.
In Finland organizations are not allowed to collect private information – very much opposite to what has been the case in USA. Perhaps due to this, people in Finland are not commonly afraid and do not wish for a complete anonymity. They understand that anonymity for everybody would include criminals. I have been promoting a solution where the net would save tracing information in such a way that it could only be used if several organizations co-operate. And simultaneously corporations and the government were to be restricted so that they could not abuse the information. This would help to catch whoever broadcast copyrighted material illegally or sent nasty viruses or a blackmail letter to me. There would be balance and trust without a need for web spy agencies who work in secrecy, only for themselves and those in power.
Trust seems to require openness and efficient methods for people to communicate with each other across hierarchies. With transparency we gain more from honourable conduct. Many disruptions of the society and abuse of power hopefully disappear.
It seems that we are drifting towards a world state. In the meantime bit realm will resemble a strange mixture of Wild West and feudal age structures with virtual Disney-worlds in every corner. In this Wild West criminals enjoy great freedom because the “big brother” metaphor requires Internet to support complete anonymity for everybody. Similar requirements in the real world would mean “no licence plates”, “no numbers in money” and “no finger prints”. This non-tractability leads to spy agencies requiring authority to listen in to everything. It seems that we get a big brother because we are so much afraid of one. This trend is especially strong again in US because the corporations abuse users information in such a way, which is illegal in EU. But we may also get one because operators are reluctant to search solutions.
Internet task force has informed that forthcoming versions of Ipv6 would include mechanisms for tracing messages to individual machines. This might mean licence plates and this should mean full support for strong encryption and a worldwide legislation to ban corporations and governments from collecting extensive user information into their databases without users approval. This would create a balance where networks would be safe and everybody would equally get information on others - no big brother but small brothers peeking from every possible hole. Just as in small villages, where doors could be kept unlocked.
This would give me the right to know if it was the American NSA who just supplied me with their spy-virus or mafia who sent me a blackmail letter. This would also help to solve the copyright issues to operators' best interest by allowing finding out, who is responsible for spreading unauthorised material? There would be trust. Without letting go of our privacy we cannot cope with the future – and we need again to be responsible to our fellow beings – not only to our government.