I Have Seen the Future and I Am Opposed - Margherita Nicotra

   In this essay/article Norman addresses some concerns he has about the future of technology, about it being driven by greed and profit, resulting in restrictions and proprietary constraints on activity by corporate empires. Norman has already been experiencing the way how the power of electronic computing and communication equipment is dictated by the service providers: radio, television, cable, satellite, telephones, cell phones and smart phones all depend on the business models of the service providers. These providers want to maximize their profit while minimizing that of their competition at the same time, so they enforce proprietary standards and lock people into their own distribution. More of our open, universal networks are becoming locked down, and they are only available from within “the walls” erected by corporate interests.

   Norman fears for the future of the Internet, an open system with open standards, that might become another one of the services contained within the bounds of subscriptions. Tablets and smartphones themselves have specific applications that can be tightly controlled with a series of imposed restrictions, already creating accessibility problems: for instance, some browsers work only on some devices and not all formats can be operated by all devices (rich textual, graphics, photo, music, video, flash..). Norman then points out how the increasing fear of damaging programs, and the ever-increasing amount of spam that is threatening the Internet nowadays, might give large corporations an excuse to exert control and exclusivity on the World Wide Web. Therefore he fears our free and continual access to information and services is doomed to be replaced by tightly controlled “gardens of exclusivity”.

   I chose this essay/article because the title was quite intriguing and it reminded me of Zittrain’s book “The future of the Internet”. As I had foreseen, Norman’s opinion and point of view on the future of technology in general and of Internet specifically, is quite similar to Zittrain’s. They both fear an increase in constraints and restrictions by providers and large corporations, which might be enabled also by the increasing fear of damaging programs and spam that is nowadays threatening the Internet. I found this trend quite disconcerting, also because I myself have been able to witness the increase in obstacles to a free and consistent accessibility to information.

Here's the link to the article:

http://www.core77.com/blog/columns/i_have_seen_the_future_and_i_am_opposed_18532.asp