(2006-01-21) Lanier Antigora

Jaron Lanier on Internet Culture. An example of the principle of Lock-In from the technical sphere is the idea of the computer file (File System)... As it happens, I dislike UNIX and its kin because it is based on the premise that people should interact with computers through a "CommandLine.".. The most attractive designs, from the point of view of either democratic ideals or the profit motive, would have intermediate qualities; they would leak, but only a little... Ultimately what makes a good digital voting system hard to design is exactly the same as what thwarts good content distribution system design. A little leakage is necessary to give things context and meaning, and digital systems abhor leakage... Another consequence of digital brittleness and lock-in is that more niches turn out to be natural monopolies than in previous technological eras, with Microsoft once again being a celebrated example. I call these niches "Antigoras," in contrast with the classical idea of the Agora. An Anti Gora is a privately owned digital meeting arena made rich by unpaid or marginally paid labor provided by people who crowd its periphery (Crowd Sourcing)...AmaZon and EBay are what might be called half-Antigoras, or Semigoras... If Google maintains its success in the long term, it will do so as an Antigora, but it isn't there yet. The services it offers thus far, which are essentially advertising placements, are not dependent on digital lock-in. Someone else could still come up with a way to offer Advertising in a way that trumps Google. It is only once new digital structures are built on top of Google's structures that Google can leverage the full power of the Antigora... Indeed there are reasons to like Antigoras... The Web is neither an emergent intelligence that transcends humanity, as some (like George Dyson) have claimed, nor a lifeless industrial machine. It is a conduit of expression between people... The alternative to the Finite Game (James Carse) of enhancement along a single dimension is found in the infinite process of Culture. Culture can always grow more Meaningful, subtle, and beautiful. Culture has no ceiling. It is a process without end. It is open and hopeful.

With responses by David Gelernter, John Perry Barlow, Eric Raymond...