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Visions of a Post-Apocalyptic Internet: The Future of Democratized Information
(open.substack.com)
this post was submitted on 24 Jun 2024
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The Arab Spring was not about "actual digital freedom". It was a state-sponsored attack on non-aligned regimes, facilitated by Facebook, Twitter and a few other American companies, that ultimately failed to improve the lives of people living in the affected countries.
And thank you for bringing that up as it helps me illustrate my central point: the importance of a free internet isn't online life in and of itself, but rather what the open flow of information and communication enable us to do in order to make the world a better place. Thanks for allowing me to clarify.
I absolutely agree, but I don't think it's too much to say that digital freedom and more important access to the internet and the various tools it offers played a starring roll in the Arab Spring.
Internet access on third world countries (at least in mine... I live in Brazil) is mostly Whatsapp/Facebook and sometimes other sponsored stuff, not the actual open Internet. Mobile telecoms usually offer packages with free access to that corporate-driven sh*t and a few GBs of traffic to other stuff. I'd hazard that this is true elsewhere on poor countries.
It's a real challenge in large portions of the world. So many national governments are perfectly happy with a corporatized, compartmentalized internet--and willing to pass legislation to keep it that way.
Indeed. And it's kinda hard imagining things getting better, since most politicians are corrupt fucks under the payroll of either national or foreign big money. The only hope I have is people's revolution, Marxist style... but I don't see it happening anytime soon. Maybe things will turn this way when our climate catastrophe starts to really rear its ugly head, but who knows? It might even go in the opposite direction, with the fascism blight we're suffering reaching critical mass.