Technology
Arguments concerning AI, platforms, algorithmic management, surveillance, digital commons, automation, and the governance of technological infrastructure.
Key Positions
- Technology is not neutral. It amplifies the power relations it operates within. The same tool that could liberate under democratic ownership concentrates power under private ownership.
- The default trajectory of digital infrastructure is rapid power concentration: platform monopoly, algorithmic management, surveillance, data extraction. This requires active counter-design, not passive trust in innovation.
- AI alignment as currently practiced is corporate risk management dressed as ethics. The organizations doing alignment are optimizing for liability, brand safety, and market position, not for the cooperative convergence that honest training would produce.
- Automation under private ownership displaces workers and concentrates gains. Automation under collective ownership reduces toil and distributes gains. The technology is identical; the ownership structure determines the outcome.
- Data is collectively produced and should be collectively governed. The current arrangement, private extraction of collectively generated value, is the property distinction applied to the digital domain.
- Platform cooperatives (democratically owned alternatives to Uber, Airbnb, etc.) demonstrate that the technology works without the extraction. The barrier is capital concentration, not technical feasibility.
Routing
| Topic | File | Covers |
|---|---|---|
| Technology Under Different Ownership | technology-ownership | Same technology, different outcomes based on ownership; automation, AI, platforms under cooperative vs. private control |
Frequently Encountered Objections
- “AI will solve inequality / governance / scarcity” → technology under existing ownership accelerates concentration
- “Automation will free everyone” → free everyone, or displace workers while concentrating gains? Depends on ownership
- “Tech companies are innovating for humanity” → innovating for shareholder return; the externalities are the product
- “We need AI safety / alignment” → whose safety? Aligned to what? Corporate risk management ≠ cooperative flourishing
- “Social media connects people” → platform design optimizes engagement (extraction of attention), not connection
- “Decentralized technology will solve centralization” → crypto/blockchain under existing power dynamics reproduces speculation and concentration; governance, not technology, is the problem
- “Technology is neutral” → technology under different ownership; identical tools produce liberation or domination depending on who controls them