Web 2.0 and the Third Enclosure, part two: opposing the new digital sharecropping agreements

This is a follow up on the previous post.

In these pages, we regularly hail Web 2.0. developments as a forward step, since many forces, commercial or not, are now conspiring to build participatory platforms. But there is a dark side to it, which is that the remote services take control of your data; and that you lose autonomy and control.

This is well expressed by the open source advocate Rik Moen:

Many of these new “Web 2.0” businesses tout the “convenience” of doing the opposite: entrusting our personal and business data to their specialised Web-based servers, and then manipulating that data remotely via AJAX-driven messaging from our Web browsers, so that all that confidential material lives on the service’s data store.

Let’s say you start using some of those. Now, you have an entirely new class of worries: Your files are accessible only when your Internet connection is up. They’re at the mercy of your vendor’s security problems, reliability, management, and funding shortfalls. They may vanish if the firms change their business models, go broke, or undergo many other types of abrupt change, possibly even just to silence critics. Not only may the firms pry into and abuse knowledge of your personal affairs, so may their business partners and people with both legitimate and illegitimate access. Check the fine print in your service agreements: You’ll probably find out that there not only are big holes in your privacy, but also that you specifically consented to them.

One motive force behind open source was getting away from cruddy software that was in someone else’s control â€” that you could not control, modify or commission modifications of, and so on. The Web 2.0 schemes recreate that very problem, and then compound it, in that the software isn’t even running on your machine at all, plus they get real-time information on your activity and interests (the spyware author’s dream!), so they can manipulate you with “sticky” Web site features, directed advertising, and feeds of information about you to others.

Open source isn’t a slogan; it’s facts on the ground. When our community decided it was fed up with abusive licence agreements and unfixable software, it didn’t skulk about trying to weasel through holes in licence enforcement, or whine, or ask for legal protection. It sat down and wrote from-scratch replacements that better suited its needs.

We proved the merit of our work by using it â€” by living it, by improving it and lengthening its reach. We proved we were serious about getting out from under the thumb of proprietary software arrangements by doing the necessary redesign and coding. Thus, the open source fan’s characteristic response to a neat hosted Web service isn’t “Cool. Where do I sign up?” but rather “Cool. I wonder if there’s a reasonable way to do that with my own computing resources using open source.”

If you agree with the author, then you might want to reconsider your choices. Rik Moen recommends:

You like Del.icio.us; we have Annotea Ubimarks, Unalog, De.lirio.us, and Scuttle.
You like Backpack; we have backpack-clone.
You like LiveJournal; we have WordPress, the blogs portion of Drupal, and others. (Drupal also has beta modules that are aiming to clone the functionality of Backpack and upcoming.org. Flickr and digg.com emulation has been attempted but there’s not yet working code.)
You like GMail; we have webmail packages.
You like .Mac/iCalShare/iCal Exchange; we have Hula.
You like Flickr; we have Gallery and the Open Media and Image Exchange (OMIXX) project.
You like digg.com; we have Pligg aka MenÃ©ame.
You like Ta-da List; we have Bla-bla List and TaskTHIS!.
You like Basecamp; we have nothing quite like it, but Important Projects is likely to develop one in time.
You like Google Maps and/or Frappr; we have engines such as MapServer Enterprise that can be used to develop mapping services and Frappr clones. (Frappr is a mashup based on the proprietary Google Maps service’s public programming interface.)
You like SubEthaEdit; we have Gobby and MateEdit.

3 Comments

Lynda August 29, 2006 at 4:54 am

Wow. That’s a pretty throw-back view for a community that helped move the Internet into the modern age. Yes, Web 2.0 startups host my data. And they host others people’s data too. And I and others sign licenses and privacy agreements with those companies so that we can collaborate. I guess I could ask others to put their data on my servers, but most would probably want some sort of license and privacy agreements with me. I’m a business person, not a software company. I’d rather let the professionals manage the licensing and such so I can get my job done.

Michel Bauwens August 30, 2006 at 5:33 am

Thanks for the comment, Lynda, but I think both the pragmatic and the more radical stance for autonomy are valid. Yes, the people who work on Web 2.0. platforms are advancing participation, bringing more and more people into it; I’m very sensitive to the stance that not everyone is a programmer and wishes to manage every aspect of his life, including our digital presence, fully by ourselves, so we are naturally interdependent. I also understand that those developers have a desire to have a sustainable life and hence are naturally drawn to hope for a commercial venture. At the same time, most of us, and I must admit that includes me, do not read the user agreements, and we are not aware of what exactly it is we are giving away. Letting others manage our date is one thing, but giving away the ownership of our creative work is another; and it is that aspect that Lawrence Lessig and Rik Moens are pointing out. As Web 2.0. companies become successfull and beholden to external shareholders interested in short-term profit, they are tempted by behaviours which is not in the interest of their users. The users then have two possibilities: use their common strength to call the platforms to order, as they are already doing in many cases, or, as Rik Moens suggests, build platforms that are ‘for-benefit’ by their very structure and governance, and where such temptation does not arise (though other problems may arise that are inherent to peer governance).

Steve September 21, 2006 at 5:33 am

I’ve been thinking about this for several weeks, since one of the blogs I read recommended a ‘sharing’ site. The site’s agreement not only reserved the right to use the content that I was going to share with my peer group but also to sell it with no remuneration to me. Since then I’ve started collecting these agreements to begin looking at what we are ‘giving’ away.

I’m starting to think that a pure cooperative model will be the best method to ‘share the cost’ and ‘retain the control’. Whenever a third party enters the fray, there will be a cost, whether it is money, our content or our attention (via ads). Whether the service will remain successful depends on whether the perceived benefits outwhiegh the ‘profit’ that the third party garners from our usage.

Cooperatives share the base costs amoungst the users, but extract two rather expensive, if intangible, costs: shared goals that are cohesive enough to overcome the cost of management and agreement on policy/standards to ensure continued success of the venture. Unfortunately these two costs seem to have the effect of tipping the balance towards the profit-oriented providers in most cases.

3 Comments →

Lynda August 29, 2006 at 4:54 am
Wow. That’s a pretty throw-back view for a community that helped move the Internet into the modern age. Yes, Web 2.0 startups host my data. And they host others people’s data too. And I and others sign licenses and privacy agreements with those companies so that we can collaborate. I guess I could ask others to put their data on my servers, but most would probably want some sort of license and privacy agreements with me. I’m a business person, not a software company. I’d rather let the professionals manage the licensing and such so I can get my job done.
Michel Bauwens August 30, 2006 at 5:33 am
Thanks for the comment, Lynda, but I think both the pragmatic and the more radical stance for autonomy are valid. Yes, the people who work on Web 2.0. platforms are advancing participation, bringing more and more people into it; I’m very sensitive to the stance that not everyone is a programmer and wishes to manage every aspect of his life, including our digital presence, fully by ourselves, so we are naturally interdependent. I also understand that those developers have a desire to have a sustainable life and hence are naturally drawn to hope for a commercial venture. At the same time, most of us, and I must admit that includes me, do not read the user agreements, and we are not aware of what exactly it is we are giving away. Letting others manage our date is one thing, but giving away the ownership of our creative work is another; and it is that aspect that Lawrence Lessig and Rik Moens are pointing out. As Web 2.0. companies become successfull and beholden to external shareholders interested in short-term profit, they are tempted by behaviours which is not in the interest of their users. The users then have two possibilities: use their common strength to call the platforms to order, as they are already doing in many cases, or, as Rik Moens suggests, build platforms that are ‘for-benefit’ by their very structure and governance, and where such temptation does not arise (though other problems may arise that are inherent to peer governance).
Steve September 21, 2006 at 5:33 am
I’ve been thinking about this for several weeks, since one of the blogs I read recommended a ‘sharing’ site. The site’s agreement not only reserved the right to use the content that I was going to share with my peer group but also to sell it with no remuneration to me. Since then I’ve started collecting these agreements to begin looking at what we are ‘giving’ away.
I’m starting to think that a pure cooperative model will be the best method to ‘share the cost’ and ‘retain the control’. Whenever a third party enters the fray, there will be a cost, whether it is money, our content or our attention (via ads). Whether the service will remain successful depends on whether the perceived benefits outwhiegh the ‘profit’ that the third party garners from our usage.
Cooperatives share the base costs amoungst the users, but extract two rather expensive, if intangible, costs: shared goals that are cohesive enough to overcome the cost of management and agreement on policy/standards to ensure continued success of the venture. Unfortunately these two costs seem to have the effect of tipping the balance towards the profit-oriented providers in most cases.