Digital sustainability or solving the dilemma of benign versus catastrophic vision facing the growth of digital juggernauts

We are facing a situation in which we may have to begin to recognize that in order to empower humans again, we have to accept that their behavior has already been modified. That the power of the technology giants can dismantle democracies and that perhaps the size of the risk to be mitigated will lead us to interventional drifts globally or to redefine a new account of progress.

[Reading time: 10 mins. 17 secs.]

[Read original post in Spanish: "Sostenibilidad digital o la dicotomía entre utopía y distopía digital."]

Denial is the first sign of addiction, psychologists claim. I have been fortunate to feel addiction to Twitter and Facebook before feeling it when using LinkedIn. The behavior that I usually see on LinkedIn users reminds me of past years and my obsession with growing followers and improving engagement. In each of the publications I have made on Twitter, Facebook or Linkedin I have felt first-hand what Jaron Lanier 3 calls “empires of behavior modification” in action.

One of the founders of Facebook (Sean Parker 4) recognized two years ago that the mechanism on which they devised Facebook - the same as on any other social network - was a social validation feedback loop in order to improve engagement and enhance growth. We must recognize that when we combine aggressive emotions (outrage or fear), acknowledgement and status, the mix is explosive. It is not possible to disconnect with those who hold the same opinions and/or feel admiration towards your ideas. Moreover, when all happens in a social network catalyzed through constant push notifications through a device that has become for the last twelve years an appendix of your own body.

1. KEYS TO A NEW CONTEXT

The truth is that the trigger for this context is a globally interconnected device, fueled by growing interactions and optimized by algorithms with a purpose. I think that the dilemma and the conversation about this new digital context is based on these four pillars:

• Ubiquitous technology,
• Constant connectivity,
• Traceability and access to information, as well as,
• Optimization powered by algorithms.

And for the purpose of what? Growth? Revenues? Power? A better world?

I do not intend to dismantle the world we have created, simply what I want is to decompose the context, to analyze and reflect on the best of the possible worlds given what we have created. I believe that this desire is not far from the will of the majority.

In the last two years, big technology companies are at the same time the most valuable companies in the world. Regardless of whether their revenue generation is on advertising (Google, Facebook), on first-party or third-party product sales (Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Alibaba, Tencent) or in facilitating our daily tasks and routine (Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Alibaba, Tencent), all these companies have managed to swing from one industry to another without the need to emulate the most important players in each of these industries. Should we call these companies DaaS -Disruption as a Service? Or maybe their secret weapon is about offering value, comfort, security, speed, ease, entertainment to users? We may be able to bring it together in one concept: Trust.

Their business models are various and their ability to transform user’s data into individual insights based on interactions on their platforms to later launch new products and services is an unstoppable force. Thanks to individual and collective data and using technology as a catalyst for that knowledge, any industry could be disrupted at a speed never seen before. And once any sector has been disrupted, the next step of these large digital companies is to generate collaboration between all their business models and continue to grow user interactions. It is a success story that feeds on more and more successes. There is no sector or regional regulator that can stop them.

Big Tech companies have managed to gain our attention and have transformed our interest through more value in every interactions and by solving friction issues that other traditional players did not know how to transform (eg knowing the price of your taxi ride in advance, exempting fees from card payments using QR codes). They have managed to convert the increasing time we dedicate daily to entertainment, interact with acquaintances, find recipes or seek help in tutorials, in the desire to devote our behavior exclusively to their platform. And also, they have managed to translate all these hours to new revenue streams (proliferation of freemium models). In short, trust and value at scales never imagined.

This virtuous circle of attraction, attention, interaction and value creation has led them to break any historical series in terms of revenue growth and value generation. We can decode that success is in its platform vision and we can also judge that its value lies in having managed to transform data with technology into daily value to our lives. And the truth is that they have managed to gain our trust because our life is now more comfortable, our use of more effective time and our access to knowledge grows without incurring great financial efforts. Another conversation is whether we talk about knowledge or learning, either we are more effective or perhaps we are more distracted. Or we are more flexible or perhaps more conditioned in our behavior. Whether we are happier or have we forgotten how to be happy. Does our always-on connectivity require some other kind of thought?

And now we are afraid of the power this digital juggernauts have accumulated. My fear is that populist politicians smell that fear better than anyone. Trust translated into fear. This story rings a bell.

It is time to reflect on a new model in which this ubiquitous technology, this constant connectivity, traceability and access to our information, as well as this ability to optimize their platforms based on machine learning, can draw a more equitable, fair and humanistic present.

2. TOTALITARISM OR REGULATION OF THE NEW DIGITAL CONTEXT

Whether or not we change the architecture on which the Internet was initially built, whether or not we modify the regulation on which we have allowed access to our information and the traceability of our behavior, whether or not we define ethical norms that regulate the use of artificial intelligence and machine learning, the challenge is that there are aspects of our day to day that have already been altered. Altering behavior and transforming clicks and taps into elected presidents of powerful countries is already a reality. And this drift lead us to risk the freedom of humanity.

There are advanced models and indicators of how to face this new context that we live in and everything seems to lead us to two political-economic scenarios: Digital totalitarianism, or digital regulation. As examples of digital totalitarianism I take Russia and Putin's desire to close the doors to the Internet and create a closed digital economy [5]. Additionally, China's exercise of embracing the new global digital context and translating it into a country advantage through exercising state data ownership under the pretext of cybersecurity [6].

The other scenario comes from voices that claim a global digital tax and OCDE initiative facing the issue of BESP (base erosion and profit shift) seeking to find a consensus on taxation before the challenges posed by the digitalization of the economy [7]. Another example to illustrate digital regulation is the creation of a global standard on data privacy protection and data consent [8]. It seems as if after the latest data breaches and Facebook’s initiative to launch a global cryptocurrency, a new regulation flame had been ignited in latitudes where deregulation were the norm.

Perhaps the only way to start controlling the latency of regulators and thus mitigate the risk of Big Tech companies’ omnipresence, overpower and entrepreneurial speed, is to opt for one model or another: Chinese approach or American approach? A new digital cold war emerges.. It is funny that we are only able to agree on a global scale only when we fear a global threat.

China has based its digital success as a country through active public participation in the growth of new digital giants. China’s commitment to mass entrepreneurship and mass innovation has created a new power that relies in controlling the new space by measuring user behavior and data ownership. US has based its growth on deregulation and its commitment to support research development and the proliferation of successful startups and a powerful venture capital industry. Honestly and with data in hand, China is winning the battle [2]. Isn't it a symptom that the balance is tilting towards the side of public intervention?

“...Chinese mobile payment spending outnumbered that in the United States by a ratio of fifty to one. For 2017, total transactions on China’s mobile payment platforms reportedly surpassed $ 17 trillion—greater than China’s GDP” - Kai-Fu Lee. “AI Superpowers” [2]

3. UTOPIA OR DIGITAL DYSTOPIA

Whether we accept an utopian or dystopian drift, my personal vision is that all forces will end up balancing and we will create a better world in which new professions will emerge. Poverty will be reduced and we will look for alternative ways to deal with seemingly unsolvable problems such as resource sustainability or energy supply. Floating cities if the poles melt (eg Oceanix), clone animal tissues to end meat supply problems and their carbon footprint (eg Memphis Meats), mindfulness in schools to neutralize the growing lack of focused attention (eg Mindfulnessinschools.org), reinventing nuclear energy to guarantee energy supply (eg Terra Power) or digital taxes to sustain a longer-lived humanity (eg Digital Tax).

The founding of the Internet advocated a libertarian approach in which the exchange of knowledge and a decentralized model of information were the fairest way to re-found a new economy and granting universal access to information. I think we were not wrong and we are better-off than we were 30 years ago when Tim Berner-Lee gave birth to the world wide web. And it also is time to roll up to re-found a new exchange model that guarantees the progress and sustainability of humanity.

Although a feasible vision for the future is somehow sustainable, I don't want to be naive and I have to admit that I fear transition management. Human being does not feel comfortable managing change. And this is an era of changes. I firmly believe that "Digital" and "Sustainability" are two concepts that are inherently linked in this particular moment of time.

It is not possible to conceive actual context without forgetting how the most valuable companies on the planet have raised doubts about the stability of democracies. Nor is it possible to ignore that the proliferation of O2O (Online to Offline) business models is generating comparative grievances and a new class of professionals marked by social insecurity and economic instability.

Nor can we deny that although our productivity is not being well measured by statistical bureaus, in many cases we have never enjoyed more offer at a lower price (eg Spotify), with the consequent impact on private consumption and disposable income. And we must admit that the evolution of biotechnology leads us to a scenario in which the hope of decoding the genetic secret of cell degeneration seems closer than distant. However, do we really want immortality if we don't know how to control the data to ensure that democratic systems are not affected?

We have overcome the stage of digital change and now it is time to face a new stage of sustainability of an economy that is already digital. And that means that thoughts on technology with purpose, responsibility in the use of data and algorithms transparency, humanism over technological drift and well-being over growth may be the next axioms to be debated when we talk about digital transformation.

“God gave us the gift of life; it is up to us to give ourselves the gift of living well.” - Voltaire

"Old men should have more care to end life well than to live long." - Captain J. Brown

________________________________________________

Dedicado a la VII edición #iePDTD7 del Programa de Dirección en Transformación Digital en IE Business School:

Luis Aribayos, Eduardo Becerra, José María Celemín, Mihaela Ioana Fechete, David Gilaberte, Alfonso González, Nana Morón, Blanca Moscoso Del Prado, Kike Nieto, Enrique Pérez, Santiago Sanz.

#iePDTDers

Special thanks to Susana Rodríguez Urgel co-academic director and also special thanks to to my friend Gam Dias for being a constant source of inspiration with recommended readings, many of which are sources that has inspired this publication.

________________________________________________

SOURCES:

1. https://time-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/time.com/5505441/mark-zuckerberg-mentor-facebook-downfall/ Last visit on Oct 29, 2019.
2. Kai-Fu Lee. “AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order” (English Edition). 2018. Pages 74-75) Kindle Edition. ISBN-13: 978-1328546395 / ISBN-10: 132854639X
3. TED. 2018. Jaron Lanier “How we need to remake the Internet” https://www.ted.com/talks/jaron_lanier_how_we_need_to_remake_the_internet Last visit on Oct 29, 2019.
4. AXIOS. Sean Parker’s interview by Mike Allen. “On social validation feedback loop” Nov 9, 2019. https://www.axios.com/sean-parker-facebook-was-designed-to-exploit-human-vulnerability-1513306782-6d18fa32-5438-4e60-af71-13d126b58e41.html Last visit on Oct 29, 2019.
5. Forbes. May 2019. “Putin Signs 'Russian Internet Law' To Disconnect Russia From The World Wide Web” https://www.forbes.com/sites/zakdoffman/2019/05/01/putin-signs-russian-internet-law-to-disconnect-the-country-from-the-world-wide-web/#5e8cb0ea1bf1 Last visit on Oct 29, 2019.
6. China Law Blog. Sep 2019. “China’s New Cybersecurity Program: NO Place to Hide” https://www.chinalawblog.com/2019/09/chinas-new-cybersecurity-program-no-place-to-hide.html Last visit on Oct 29, 2019.
7. OECD. May 2019 “Program of Work to develop a Consensus Solution to the Tax Challenges arising from the Digitalisation of the Economy” https://www.oecd.org/tax/beps/programme-of-work-to-develop-a-consensus-solution-to-the-tax-challenges-arising-from-the-digitalisation-of-the-economy.pdf Last visit on Oct 29, 2019
8. The Verge. Apr 2018 “Zuckerberg says Facebook will extend European data protections worldwide” Last visit on Oct 29, 2019 https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/11/17224492/zuckerberg-facebook-congress-gdpr-data-protection