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Why They Spy: IT-Powered Feudalism Is Cheaper Than Playing Fair

Tyler Durden's picture




 

Submitted by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

The amount a state needs to expend on guard labour is a function of how much legitimacy the state holds in its population’s reckoning. A state whose population mainly views the system as fair needs to do less coercion to attain stability. People who believe that they are well-served by the status quo will not work to upset it. States whose populations view the system as illegitimate need to spend more on guard labour.

 

Why spy? Because it’s cheaper than playing fair. Our networks have given the edge to the elites, and unless we seize the means of information, we are headed for a long age of IT-powered feudalism, where property is the exclusive domain of the super-rich, where your surveillance-supercharged Internet of Things treats you as a tenant-farmer of your life, subject to a licence agreement instead of a constitution.

 

From Cory Doctorow’s Guardian article: Technology Should Be Used to Create Social Mobility – Not to Spy on Citizens

At this point, only the most clueless and gullible amongst us thinks that government surveillance has anything to do with stopping terrorism. Nevertheless, it remains as important as ever to explain to people the true reason behind the elimination of the 4th Amendment. Namely, protecting the oligarchy from restless plebs.

Cory Doctorow just wrote an excellent piece on the subject for the Guardian, in which he introduced a new term (at least to me): IT-Powered Feudalism. Here are some excerpts from the piece:

Why spy? That’s the several-million pound question, in the wake of the Snowden revelations. Why would the US continue to wiretap its entire population, given that the only “terrorism” they caught with it was a single attempt to send a small amount of money to Al Shabab?

 

Spying, especially domestic spying, is an aspect of what the Santa Fe Institute economist Samuel Bowles calls guard labour: work that is done to stabilise property relationships, especially the property belonging to the rich.

 

The amount a state needs to expend on guard labour is a function of how much legitimacy the state holds in its population’s reckoning. A state whose population mainly views the system as fair needs to do less coercion to attain stability. People who believe that they are well-served by the status quo will not work to upset it. States whose populations view the system as illegitimate need to spend more on guard labour.

 

It’s easy to see this at work: Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, China and North Korea spend disproportionate sums on guard labour. Highly redistributive Nordic states with strong labour laws, steeply progressive taxation and tenant protection spend less on guard labour. They attain social stability through the carrot of social programmes, not the stick of guard labour.

 

This implies that productivity gains in guard labour will make wider wealth gaps sustainable. When coercion gets cheaper, the point at which it makes “economic sense” to allow social mobility moves further along the curve. The evidence for this is in the thing mass surveillance does best, which is not catching terrorists, but disrupting legitimate political opposition, from Occupy to the RCMP’s classification of “anti-petroleum” activists as a threat to national security.

 

Even if you think that hereditary dynasties and extreme wealth for the few and hereditary, extreme poverty for the many is morally fine, the reality is that extreme wealth concentration distorts policy. We want policy to reflect the best available evidence, but when legislators are drawn from, and beholden to, a tiny ruling elite, they can only make evidence-based policy to the extent that the evidence doesn’t inconvenience rich people.

 

And so on. A state that is beholden to a small number of people is also beholden to that elite’s sacred cows. It is incompatible with evidence-based policy.

 

Why spy? Because it’s cheaper than playing fair. Our networks have given the edge to the elites, and unless we seize the means of information, we are headed for a long age of IT-powered feudalism, where property is the exclusive domain of the super-rich, where your surveillance-supercharged Internet of Things treats you as a tenant-farmer of your life, subject to a licence agreement instead of a constitution.

One of the most important observations made above is that: “We want policy to reflect the best available evidence, but when legislators are drawn from, and beholden to, a tiny ruling elite, they can only make evidence-based policy to the extent that the evidence doesn’t inconvenience rich people.”

A perfect example of this was recently inadvertently displayed on NBC’s Sunday morning establishment circus Meet the Press. Here we learned that Lindsay Graham, a member of the Senate Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law, has never sent an email in his life. Won’t stop him from crafting technology policy though will it?

You have to see it to believe it:

 

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Wed, 03/11/2015 - 22:40 | 5880254 NoDebt
NoDebt's picture

Believe me, IT ain't the only reason we're heading towards feudalism.

And let's not forget that the Internet was not invented by Al Gore, contrary to popular belief.  It was invented by a GOVERNMENT AGENCY.  The DOD.  How did you expect this to turn out?

 

Wed, 03/11/2015 - 23:00 | 5880289 knukles
knukles's picture

Listen.  If every kid growing up was as good a person, showing real morals and ethics as these kids, then none of this creepiness and spying would be necessary, tolerated or contemplated.
An example of young men doing the next right thing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbVifPkbYsk

Wed, 03/11/2015 - 23:04 | 5880298 TruxtonSpangler
TruxtonSpangler's picture

As my silicon valley software company would say: THE SOLUTION IS SCALABLE!

Wed, 03/11/2015 - 23:08 | 5880308 Greenskeeper_Carl
Greenskeeper_Carl's picture

Why they spy?
Simple, because they can, and because hardly anyone in this country cares.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 01:57 | 5880531 disabledvet
disabledvet's picture

Americans value FREEDOM too.

 

When we came from Europe...and yes we all came from Europe when this "experiment" got started...well, first we had to pay for it IN BLOOD, but second...we created a CODE to enshrine this view.

 

These people peddling "God's Law" need to take a good hard look at the psychos we are NOT going to fight.

 

I have no problem with folks who believe in this stuff acting out their End of the World Theology....just do it

 

OVER THERE.

 

So should the people who take their money I might add...and seek to divide along SECTARIAN lines.

 

You believe in weirdo-ism?

 

Guess what....

 

GOD IS ON YOUR SIDE AND SO IS AMERICA!

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 03:27 | 5880605 Ying-Yang
Ying-Yang's picture

IT spying is cheaper, it really is!

When GM calculated how many deaths in auto accidents are cheaper than a GM recall

 

IT spying is cheaper like, drone warfare, versus "boots on the ground" costs per data point.

 

The Utah Data Center was built very large to process very fast your data points.

Where or where should this lead? This shift is the breakpoint for sheeple, who get it or not.

 

Just in news...... Are lawyers being Ubered?

New website service http://www.avvo.com/

AVVO. I have used legal zoom and was impressed. This legal service may shake the standards. I have been amused by the disruption of Uber.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 08:24 | 5880628 NidStyles
NidStyles's picture

How interesting some of this is compared to the Protocols, if you accept that the protocols are real, they are a quite accurate playbook. If they are not, they were a rather amazining forecast of what was to come.

Wed, 03/11/2015 - 23:09 | 5880310 stant
stant's picture

Dam you

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 02:05 | 5880538 disabledvet
disabledvet's picture

EXACTLY!

 

We can do that in America.  We can build dams!  And Bridges, and Skyscrapers, maybe even "Space Invaders" too!

 

We have a God given right to be totally CRAZY.

 

You want to fight "climate change".... I say...LET'S ROLL!  SIGN ME UP!

 

I WANT AMERICA TO HAVE WEATHER JUST LIKE FRANCE!

 

I mean let's face it...the weather is just God awful in America.  Just existing here REALLY SUCKS.

 

I blame " The Puritans" myself.  They landed in New England in November and thanked God.

 

Thanked God for what?  Not for landing in Massachusetts that's fer sure.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 03:19 | 5880592 Aussiekiwi
Aussiekiwi's picture

disabledvet, awesome day here today as per usual, you can't expect to be 'exceptional' AND have great weather.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 07:04 | 5880769 SmedleyButlersGhost
SmedleyButlersGhost's picture

That was terrific - would love to see the merit badge

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 01:00 | 5880464 YHC-FTSE
YHC-FTSE's picture

The internet would be nothing more than another quaint, antiquated text communications link between military/education  installations, perhaps at best a few bulletin boards if it weren't for the inventor of the world wide web (HTML): Tim Berners-Lee.

The open nature of the code behind browsers gave rise to everything from websites & social networks to video chats (Skype) & movies on demand. Openness, sharing and cooperation are the keys to rapid development and dissemination of information on the www. This is something the hoarders of other people's intellectual capital will never understand in their quest to make feudal fiefdoms on the net, where their sites are "protected" by paywalls, patents (That other people developed) and growing dominance to kill off or buy out any competition.

As for another type of feudal fiefdom, old fashioned spying, the numerical & logistical problems of watching and storing everyone have always limited governments from blanket surveillance. That no longer is true as smarter automated programs and investments in data storage infrastructures mean that these self-proclaimed over-seers beyond the rule of law can program the automated intelligent programs to monitor their serfs for deviations from their sets of narratives for being a "good citizen" and retain all the meta (& actual) data for all eternity to retroactively criminalize and blackmail anyone. It is always about control. Made by control freaks, for control freaks, a system for dominance of one set of people over another to feed their hunger for megalomania.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 01:45 | 5880517 wolfnipplechips
wolfnipplechips's picture

YHC-Very well put, although it makes me sick knowing what you say there is a truth few understand, or even want to understand. Sort of hopeless.

However, there is one thing these megalomaniacs miscalculated: Their ability to control the economy. They got "too" greedy and f'd it up big time. Oh, they'll put up a good fight for a while with their War Machine and police-state/ hired thugs. Sadly, I fear, they are just getting started.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 02:19 | 5880549 disabledvet
disabledvet's picture

Radio created megalomania.

 

The internet I think is the end of all life forms on earth.  "The killer ape Automated.". Not even the insects are going to survive.

 

It's possible trees will be saved.  " the tin man might need some sap to oil his gears" on occasion.  Plus all the gears of his fellow self replicating automotons.

 

I fear for some alien life form that arrives here expecting a nice reception.  God help them if they have technology of some sort.

 

From "automatic updates" to "automatic up grades."

 

No doubt the first thing they'll go after are cell phones.

 

The good news is that should be the end of the telephone company.  Good luck getting a robot to pay for the "cadillac data plan."

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 01:14 | 5880479 Equality 7-25-1
Equality 7-25-1's picture

My grandmother warned me about this back then.

Wed, 03/11/2015 - 23:03 | 5880263 battlestargalactica
battlestargalactica's picture

The thing about application development is that initial build may make some decent money, but the big bucks come in contractual service agreements and ever increasing enhancements.

Gotta keep making moar enemies to keep expanding the data cubes to keep rationalizing those fees and guarantee both vendor and gov contractor job security. Those 3,000 square foot townhouses in Fairfax and Woodbridge ain't gonna pay for themselves, after all.

Wed, 03/11/2015 - 22:52 | 5880268 MrButtoMcFarty
MrButtoMcFarty's picture

That bobble head on the right would look magnificent on a 12' pike....

Wed, 03/11/2015 - 23:01 | 5880293 knukles
knukles's picture

Now that is homophobic.  Keep up the good work.
This message was approved by the ZH Community

Wed, 03/11/2015 - 22:58 | 5880284 Usurious
Usurious's picture

Lindsay Graham.......whata piece shit

 

''A sputtering movement to force labels on GMO foodstuffs is a 'back door way to put you out of business,' he warned farmers.''

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2984410/Lindsey-Graham-notches-breakout-performance-upends-Republican-presidential-field.html#ixzz3U8WbvWXM
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Wed, 03/11/2015 - 23:00 | 5880291 SgtShaftoe
SgtShaftoe's picture

Sorry, love you Mike, but it's already over. They have already lost. The tech community are finding solutions faster than the .gov can find ways to spy. Compounding that, they're running out of money! They're not going to have these vast, endless resources forever.

As Seneca wrote in De Clementia, “Repeated punishment, while it crushes the hatred of a few, stirs the hatred of all... just as trees that have been trimmed throw out again countless branches.”

Wed, 03/11/2015 - 23:09 | 5880304 knukles
knukles's picture

Plants that cannot bloom by day must flower in the night.
                           - sung by G Slick

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pXRrprAo8Uc

   (Some of the guitar BTW, is J. Garcia)

 

Paine and Pierce and Robespierre, Juarez and Danton,
Luther, King and Lumumba dead but far from gone
Lenin, Cleaver, Jesus too, outlaws in their nations,
Revolutionaries all, dreamed of liberation

God is up in heaven his agents here on earth
The church has said that this man rules, he's best because of birth.
But what's that noise down in the street, who dares to shout and sing?
With all his courtiers at his side, who dares to touch the king?

Old man get some soldiers, keep them close at hand
There's a fire in the country, there's a flame come to the land
Seven thousand loyal troops, in ranks they stretch so far
With seven thousand well armed men, no one can touch the czar.

Louis watch the prisons, send the goons around
Is that Paris burning, is the Bastille falling down?
And where are all the mercenaries - paid for by the king?
Have they joined the mob you say, doesn't money mean anything?

Old men get some soldiers, keep them close at hand,
The seeds that were sown yesterday now flower in the land
And guard yourself most carefully with military might.
For plants that cannot bloom by day must flower in the night.

 

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 00:18 | 5880418 The Fourth
The Fourth's picture

.. "unless we seize the means of information"..  Indeed.

 

Did anyone see the little story on how Apple has been targeted?

https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/03/10/ispy-cia-campaign-steal-ap...

Quote: ".. Researchers also claimed they had successfully modified the OS X updater, a program used to deliver updates to laptop and desktop computers, to install a “keylogger.” .."

 

It really is a "war" of control.  It is also what inspires a few to provide solutions.

One of the very few assets that one can currently control and have true liberty over is: your brain.  Your thoughts, reasonings, acquired knowledge, etc.  Every time we share our thoughts digitally and do not cloak them in transit, there is a digital sucking sound of our intellectual property being stored on a vast server to be stored and mined by the powerful.

Plug: update coming within 3 weeks.  "No back doors. No hashing. No prime numbers."

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 07:13 | 5880775 mvsjcl
mvsjcl's picture

Who owns Apple? The very same people who own the intelligence services. This is a story created for mass consumption, to promote the illusion that corporations are separate from the surveillance apparatus. They are not.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 00:02 | 5880395 VWAndy
VWAndy's picture

Ever see a tool that you really want to barrow just for a day or two?

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 00:21 | 5880424 RyeWhiskey
RyeWhiskey's picture

tech IS enslavement dummiez////

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 00:33 | 5880437 williambanzai7
williambanzai7's picture

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 08:49 | 5880989 post turtle saver
post turtle saver's picture

actually, where the cameras would really be deployed are:

- the dial hubs of the clock faces

- the nose of the doll on the shelf

- one of the eyes for each of the pictures on the wall

- at least one room mic embedded in the phone, possible one under the lamp shade

- the mouse is actually a robot drone for close-ups

- comb and brush are used for DNA collection, with health analysis reported back to the insurance actuaries for adjustment in policy

etc.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 09:48 | 5881211 optimator
optimator's picture

Cameras will be mandated in the bedroom next, followed by a tax on, shall we say, intimacy.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 01:47 | 5880512 OldPhart
OldPhart's picture

Um, hey, you bastards, I  just sent $70 million to Obama's slush fund, please redirect to the approrant nazi fund.

Lotsov love, OldPhart.

 

One reservation...That $70 million is to be used to hang you and everyone of your supporters,  Get your ass-lickng puppet to argue that wtith me in court.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 05:56 | 5880705 css1971
css1971's picture

It's just maths.

Originally the networks were very peer to peer. It'd have looked something like this:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/fa/Unstructured_peer-to-peer_...

It's highly redundant with multiple paths for data and no central control, it also tends to be more expensive, adding capacity is also difficult to do because you have no control over intermediate hops so things like video streaming are going to be... difficult.

Today networks look more like this:

http://www.orgnet.com/hierarchy.gif

Centralised control, big fast hubs and far less redundancy.  It's much cheaper, easier to control and not nearly so redundant.

If you want to remove the central control then you can get involved on an amateur basis and set up wifi peers. But you see, it takes knowledge, time, effort and expense. Alternatively, if you are a mobile device developer you could create a peer to peer, delay tolerant networking system.

It's easier to be a slave.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 08:51 | 5880994 post turtle saver
post turtle saver's picture

this is what happens when peer-to-peer protocols are laid over circuit-switched network architectures... the outcome was never in question, especially when commercialization entered the picture...

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 06:34 | 5880735 saltoafronteira
saltoafronteira's picture

Feudalism, being an extreme form of oligarchy, is part of human nature. Feudalism, as oligarchies in general, emerges when family and group ties are reinforced to the extreme, in reaction to many possible causes (historically it emerged as a human response  in face, and as consequece, to extreme collapses, but there may me a gret number of other reasons) . The only way to avoid it, is by tempering that extreme reinforcment of ties, providing to factors that make them useless or socially unacceptable.

Neo-Feudalism is born, I believe, out of privilege and the animal fgear of loosing it, created by the terrible jungle rules the anglo-american upper class imposed over the world, but also unpon themseleves. The way to defuse it, I believe, is by smoothly change that set of rules, and the fear it creates.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 10:35 | 5881409 2handband
2handband's picture

Not human nature... you don't see it amongst tribal societies. Ever. Studied this stuff pretty extensively as an anthropology student back in the day. The problem is bigness; true freedom is only found in very small, completely autonomous societies. Which of course are completely incapable of resisting invasion, so that horse was out of the barn the moment the agricultural revolution really got rolling. We're fucked. I see no other answer than thousands of more years of pain until humans get smarter.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 06:37 | 5880737 22winmag
22winmag's picture

Everybody has a plan [for global subjugation] until they get punched in the face.

Thu, 03/12/2015 - 10:48 | 5881454 GRDguy
GRDguy's picture

If you really want to avoid feudalism, here's a few simple steps to take the sociopaths out of the House of Representatives and the 99% will be represented once again at the table.

(1) Never vote for an incumbent.  (2) Vote only for someone who's words have matched their actions, and are the least financed of the group.  (3) Make no political contributions. Haven't they stolen enough?

Repeat these three steps every state and national election.  You'll soon eliminate the sociopaths. There's lots of good folks who would represent you well, but want no part of any political machine. And two years is enough for any good person to suffer the slime and stench of the D.C. pit, and be able to come back to their neightborhood intact.

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