The Tyranny of Tech

Advancing Dread

The weeks and months go by, and year by year, tech consumers are subjected to incremental assaults on our autonomy. We are being conditioned for powerless passivity. By now it’s an overused cliché to refer to a frog slowly boiling in a pot of water as the temperature is gradually raised. It’s an overused cliché because it’s happening in every sector of life, all around us. Regular people are the frog, and Tech is boiling us to death. It’s not just Tech — we are also subject to incremental boiling in the areas of finance, media, political rights, and militarization. But today, let’s talk about Tech.

We’ve all experienced it. For me, it started in the mid ’90s, when Windows 95 replaced Windows 3.1. I can hear you already: “How quaint.” But for those with eyes to see, the future is written in the present. Quaint technologies of the past had the future we are living now written into them, just as powerful technologies now will seem quaint in the future, and the future written in them is a place of terrible power and tyranny. But back to the ’90s: I was a teenager at the time, and I was just getting excited about what could be done with computers. I’d spent months learning all about Windows 3.1, and all the different options one could utilize to customize one’s PC experience: maximizing options, learning how to best control and organize one’s files and programs, learning how to dip in and out of DOS when needed… and then Windows 95 came out. In one fell stroke, it eliminated dozens of options I had learned to utilize, forcing users to adapt to a new format with fewer options. I lost my enthusiasm for Tech at that moment. I resented anything that treated me with such little regard, anything that imposed unilateral decisions on me, anything that disempowered me. I dropped out of Tech then, but as we know, Tech marched on.

This process with Windows is now repeated once every few years. It seems like every new Windows update removes more options from the user, including the option not to accept the update! We all saw those little popups heralding the arrival of Windows 10: “Act now to upgrade to Windows 10 for free!” they urged us. “No thanks,” thought I, clicking the little X to indicate my lack of interest. Soon, I was forced to click that little X every day, then several times a day. There was no way to disable the notifications. The popups warned me that I was running out of time to upgrade for free. Then they started saying something else: I would be forced to upgrade, whether I wanted to or not. I kept clicking the X’s. Then the X’s disappeared. The next popup froze my entire computer and presented me with two options: agree to the upgrade immediately, or postpone for a week. There was no X to click.

I was trapped. I clicked the postpone box, and that set into motion a time bomb on my computer that I couldn’t shut off. Finally the day came, and Microsoft seized control of my computer from under my fingertips. It closed the programs I was working on and started shutting down, installing Windows 10 while I cursed and screamed at it, completely helpless. All of the popups about “taking advantage of this free upgrade” were lies, of course, as I had known from the start. They were deceptive manipulations, designed to induce willing compliance among consumers to obscure the fact that Microsoft was issuing an authoritarian diktat. Our superiors had made the decision to change our lives again. And if we knew what was good for us, we would smile and submit. Fighting only makes it worse.

Consider this. At first glance, it seems like such a small thing. But what does it tell us about the values of Tech? Decisions will be imposed on the public by fiat. Manipulations and lies will be used to induce passive public acceptance of the changes. The changes are always called “upgrades” even when the changes take power away from the public. Each little update on its own consists of a minor or moderate inconvenience in our lives. Our pot of water gets a few degrees hotter. And the message is clear: “This is not your decision. Tech is on the march. You will either march along with us, or be marched over.” When we see Tech treat regular people with such malice, with such contempt, we see the future written in the present. We see what will become of us when Tech becomes truly powerful.

Tech is so pervasive in our lives, we really are helpless. And all of this anti-government rhetoric we’ve heard for the past 40 years misses the mark. The commanders of great wealth, corporate and financial, are those that have marked for slaves — and of course, the anti-government rhetoric was planted by them to point out the corruption in the government institutions they themselves had already captured. They know that the public would have a chance of influencing policy and of holding governing officials accountable if the capitalized interests did not interfere. Through voting, through the legal system, through conventions of governance, the public could take action — if corporate-controlled media were not diligently limiting their access to information and skewing perception of reality toward the interests of concentrated power.

“I can vote in the private sector with my pocketbook!” comes the benighted call of the corporate-captured citizen. But this is not so when you’re dealing with a monopoly. It is not so when you’re in need of essential services. And Tech has become so powerful, so integrated into our daily lives, we are helpless in the face of it. The nature of the technology itself facilitates uniformity of platforms. Try to boycott Apple, Microsoft, Google, Facebook, and Amazon. Only a tech-savvy wizard can navigate modern society and successfully dodge all five of those bullets. Technological advances are authoritarian by nature. We don’t get to vote on them. Someone develops a power and then this power is brandished by whoever controls it. This is tremendously dangerous.

“But the politicians are all corrupt,” comes the persistent cry of denial. “They’ve been bought.” Yes, and bought by whom? By our corporate masters, by our self-appointed billionaire lords. And what do the politicians do with all that money? They spend it on advertising — they purchase a voice. It costs money to be heard. It costs money to have a voice. And the gatekeepers of speech — are the private sector overlords — the same corporate masters who bought the politicians in the first place. The very minds of the people are colonized. The link becomes apparent. The private, corporate interests are the ones sticking it to the people from every angle: media, advertising, conglomeration, monopoly, and Tech.

In addition to imposing change by authoritarian diktat, the Tech companies have extinguished our ability to contact them. There is no way to speak to a representative, no way to get assistance, no way to lodge a complaint. The frustrated user is routed to a series of unhelpful FAQ pages instead. They repeat in a series of closed loops no matter how long one spends, vainly searching for a phone number to call or an email address to write to. Google searches render only a smattering of old user forum posts, typically years out of date, strewn across pages of useless search results. No representative of the company will ever have to respond to consumers thwarted by the unilateral decisions imposed on them. They will never have to provide justification, or a rationale. They are unaccountable. Great power of any kind represents a threat to freedom and autonomy. When that power is also unaccountable, we are truly in danger.

The trend is consistent in every direction. Apple imposes updates on their iPod software, removing the features we use to organize and access our music, one by one — gradually steering us toward streaming, even attempting to usurp control over our listening choices through the “Genius” function, attempting to seize control of our music files, to sequester them, to hold them hostage, to impose a pay wall between us and them. “It’s just music,” wails the voice of submission once again. But our hearts answer: music is deeply ingrained in the human psyche. Again, we see the colonization of the mind. The future is written in the present.

We see it when Facebook imposes incremental changes on its interface. Ten years ago, one could open Facebook up, contact all one’s friends and acquaintances, receive reciprocal updates with ease, and exchange private messages. People gravitated to it because the very nature of the technology lends itself to a unified platform. It’s not because Facebook itself was such a genius thing, nor because of any inherent quality adhering to Zuckerberg the man. Social networking was bound to coalesce into one central platform, and it happened that it did so around Facebook. Now Zuckerberg’s net worth is greater than the GDP of the 30 poorest countries in the world combined. That’s because after Zuckerberg captured us, he monetized us. He forced us to accept advertisements into our “feed” (conjuring the image of pigs in a feedlot, slurping out of the trough — imbibing whatever is provided them, unaware of their impending slaughter). He imposed algorithms on our “feeds” to manipulate which messages of our friends we are allowed to see, and in what order. Then he detached private messaging from Facebook, forcing one to use an entirely different app. Presumably this was done in conjunction with his capture of WhatsApp, so that one way or another, as many of the world’s private messages will flow through the databanks of Facebook. Again, we see the colonization of the mind and of information. The future is written in the present.

We see it among the smaller players, who increasingly create apps that require one to access the app through Facebook or Google. There is not even an option of using these with a regular web browser. All content is slated to be funneled through one of these oligarchs, one of these behemoths, one of these data-mining tyrants. The aforementioned Windows 10 has been redesigned as a “service,” requiring registry with a Microsoft account. Microsoft products are being redesigned to require the user to pay monthly, or yearly, for ongoing use. The consumer will no longer be allowed to make a purchase, and then keep and own what is purchased. All use of Tech is to be consolidated, to be placed in the complete control of our new masters. All attempts to access information will flow through Google, subject to their information filters. Those who pay top dollar to Google will have their information prioritized. We will pay a tribute to Google for the privilege of social existence.

Google is assuredly the worst offender of them all — not because the rest of Tech has better ethics, but because Google has been savvier than anyone else at accumulating power with total disregard to ethics. All of our collective hair should have stood on end when we first heard Google’s slogan, “Don’t be evil.” To some, that slogan sounded endearing at first. It went from cute to laughable pretty quickly. And just as quickly, it has gone from laughable to chillingly prescient. I remember back when Google Maps was really taking off, and I recall that first touch of dread when I learned about Google’s “street view” project, to photograph every location on earth, both on the ground and from satellite. Or when I learned that the Tech companies were holding onto every email we sent through Gmail, every message exchanged through Facebook. Our conversations belonged to them, not to us — as did our preferences, our purchases. Most of us had naively assumed that such things were our own. Each and every bit of information about us they can collect — it all gets compiled in their private database. All of it gets used — it’s sold to marketers, to the highest bidder, and it’s handed over to government spy agencies whenever they ask for it. Marketers are the ones paying the most for this information so far, but anyone who wants information about you, can have it. The messages you send, the purchases you make, your movements from place to place, your habits, your quirks — all of it is available to anyone who wants it — if the price is right. You don’t own it.

Google demands that you turn on the button that lets them track your location if you want to use their maps. If you say no, the app shuts down and you lose the address you’re trying to map. You have to go back, open the app again and type in the address again manually — or you can just surrender and allow Google to track your location via GPS. When you ask Google for directions, it displays a myopically small portion of the route. You can’t see where you’re going when you look at the map. You try zooming in and out, only to be thwarted at every turn. You’re only option is to listen attentively to the voice of Google and follow it’s instructions without insight as to where you’re being directed. This is deliberate. You’re being conditioned to obey — and to scrub your mind of your internal map that tells you where you and and where you’re going.

The goal is to eliminate you entirely once the driverless car is implemented. Won’t that be nice? Isn’t it better to just relinquish control, to rely on Google to predict your needs, to plan your movements, to plan your life? Every time you open up Chrome, it starts asking where you are. It starts asking you whether you’d like Google to monitor your location — just because. You do want Google to know where you are at all times — don’t you? Someday soon, Google will completely do away with the option to turn off GPS location monitoring. It will be one of those little features that gets taken away under the cover of night with the latest mandatory Android update. Perhaps they’ve already taken it away, and we just don’t know it yet. Of course, they track your location anyway by mapping the wi-fi and bluetooth devices you come into contact with as you move.

Google’s forays into AI, driverless cars, robotics, and other forms of exponential technology make the future a terrifying prospect. It’s clear they are trying to seize as much control over human life as possible. This control — coupled with all the information they collect on each on every person, on every location on the planet — it chills the blood. Google doesn’t even bother to say “Don’t be evil” anymore. The other tech companies are just trying to catch up, to claim their own piece of the pie. Amazon will control everything we purchase. Facebook, our communications. Apple and Microsoft will continue to exist as trolls that live under the various Tech bridges we cross, bullying us, reducing our options, and extracting fees by whatever means they can devise. It’s not hard to foresee these five companies eventually purchasing the five remaining major media companies: Comcast, Disney, Viacom/CBS, Fox, and Time-Warner.

Our whole access to Tech, including access to information, art, and communication with others will be owned and brandished against us by authoritarian tyrants. These same tyrants will own and control robots who will have complete power over us, whether they are robot automobiles, robots in the workplace, or robots in the home. All of them will be linked to Wi-Fi or cell signals we will not be allowed to shut off. All of them will be subject to overrides of the user, just as our home computers were when Microsoft decided we were going to start using Windows 10. What will the Tyrants of Tech do with this power? Perhaps they will rule benevolently. That would be nice. Or, they might choose to treat regular people as objects to be manipulated, exploited, and profited from. That’s what they’ve done so far. With as much power as they currently have, they still haven’t garnered enough power to really harm us deeply yet. But the future is written in the present.

Do we want to continue allowing them to consolidate power? Do we want to let that happen until they really do have the power to deeply harm us? Have we already lost control of any ability to resist? Is it already too late? I can only think of one solution: Break them up. Break up the monopolies. Break up the consolidated power. Regulate the hell out of them. We are vulnerable. Scatter the power of Tech into enough small pieces so each source of power serves as a check on the others. Regulate their business practices. Regulate their ability to collect and sell information. Regulate their ability to consolidate. Place a cap on profits, both personal and corporate. No one person should be able to gobble up as much wealth as Bill Gates (Microsoft) or Jeff Bezos (Amazon) or Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook). Those three people have $200 billion between them as of this writing (August, 2017). That’s over 1% of the entire US GDP last year (about 19 trillion). That’s right. All that talk about the 99% really means this: everyone and everything in the United States is the 99% except those three people. No one should have that much power. And those are just the individuals — it doesn’t even include the companies they command.

The only way to thwart this growing tyranny is through political action. That includes voting. We have to insist that our elected officials support democratization of the finance and business worlds: hefty taxes on the very rich, hefty taxes and regulations on the biggest corporations, aggressive action against monopoly power. We must insist on this. Democracy is an empty, meaningless concept when so few companies and so few individuals wield such tremendous power. If we can’t reclaim that power and spread it around, our democracy is lost, and we already live in an autocracy. And if that autocracy is still in control when exponential technology overwhelms every aspect of human existence, our humanity will no longer be our own. We will be slaves. The future is written in the present. And that is the Tyranny of Tech.