Anti-interoperability, vendor lock-in, and high switching costs (with Cory Doctorow)
Spencer Greenberg and Cory Doctorow discuss the growing influence of large tech companies, the critical role of interoperability for user control, and the legal battles around software modification. They explore how to prevent tech catastrophes and address issues like high switching costs and corporate power.
Deep Dive Analysis
12 Topic Outline
Introduction to Big Tech's Role and Interoperability
Defining Interoperability: Types and Significance
Case Study: Facebook's Suppression of User Modifications
Legal Tools Used to Prevent Interoperability and User Control
Ethical Implications of Corporate Control vs. User Freedom
The Need for Democratically Accountable Lawmakers in Tech Governance
Analyzing Google's Business Model and R&D Strategy
How High Switching Costs Maintain Tech Giant Dominance
Critique of Blockchain as a Solution for Social Media Lock-in
Strategies for Achieving Widespread Interoperability
The Argument for Breaking Up Large Tech Companies
Historical Impact of Antitrust Actions on Tech Sector Conduct
6 Key Concepts
Interoperability
Interoperability refers to the ability of different products or services to work together, encompassing deliberate standards, inadvertent compatibility, and 'adversarial' or 'competitive' compatibility. It is crucial for user freedom, allowing customization of technology, and for fostering competition by enabling new products to integrate with existing ones.
Adversarial Interoperability
Also called competitive compatibility, this occurs when a new product or service plugs into an existing one without the original creator's permission, often through reverse engineering. Historically, this has driven innovation and competition, allowing users to choose how their technology functions, but it is now actively suppressed by dominant tech companies.
Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA)
A 1986 US cybersecurity law that criminalized 'exceeding your authorization' on a computer. Tech companies have broadly interpreted this to mean violating terms of service to sue users or developers, though the Supreme Court's Van Buren ruling substantially narrowed its scope to unauthorized access, not merely breaching terms of use on an authorized system.
Tortious Interference with Contract
A legal theory used by companies like Facebook to threaten developers. It alleges that a third party's actions (e.g., creating a tool that modifies a service) interfere with the contract (terms of service) between the company and its users, allowing the company to pursue legal action against the third party.
High Switching Costs
The barriers or difficulties users face when trying to move from one service or platform to another, such as losing connections or data. For large tech companies, high switching costs are a primary mechanism for retaining users and maintaining market dominance, even more so than network effects, as they lock users into their ecosystems.
Federal Privacy Law with Private Right of Action
A proposed legal framework where a national law would define and protect individual privacy rights, allowing individuals to directly sue any entity that violates them. This is advocated as a superior alternative to corporate self-regulation, as it would create a level playing field and bind all parties to clear privacy standards.
10 Questions Answered
Interoperability is the ability for different products or services to work together, either by design or through user modification. It matters because it allows users to customize technology to their needs, fosters competition, and prevents vendor lock-in, driving innovation and user freedom.
Facebook actively prevents modifications (like the 'Unfollow Everything' tool) because it prioritizes shareholder interests (e.g., maximizing ad views and engagement) over user satisfaction, especially when those interests conflict.
Companies primarily use the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), tortious interference with contract claims, and sometimes copyright law (claiming modified web pages are derivative works) to threaten and sue developers who create tools that alter their services.
Cory Doctorow argues that users have historically modified software, and companies should not expect courts to intervene in the 'guerrilla warfare' between a company's design choices and a user's desire to customize.
Rather than allowing conflicted corporations to decide, democratically accountable lawmakers should create comprehensive privacy laws that bind all parties, including both platforms and interoperators, establishing clear rules for user data and system modifications.
Cory Doctorow argues that Google is a highly effective profit-maximizing company that monopolizes the ad market, price fixes, and primarily acquires other firms to consolidate power. Its R&D spending, while substantial in absolute terms, is a relatively small share of its revenue and rarely produces successful in-house products beyond search and Gmail.
Tech giants primarily maintain dominance through high switching costs, which make it difficult for users to leave a platform without losing their connections or data. They then use their monopoly power and legal threats to prevent interoperability that could lower these switching costs.
Cory Doctorow argues that blockchain is not a solution for social media lock-in because it doesn't address the core problem of centralized choke points in digital infrastructure (like email providers blocking certain servers) and wastes energy. Federated protocols are presented as a more viable alternative.
Strategies include passing legislation like the Access Act (mandating APIs), creating legal defenses for bona fide interoperators, appointing special masters in antitrust settlements, and altering government procurement guidelines to mandate interoperability for purchased goods and services.
Yes, especially those that obtained mergers through false pretenses (e.g., Facebook's acquisition of WhatsApp and Instagram). Breakups, though lengthy and complex, are crucial to reduce the scale that causes harm and to moderate the anti-competitive behavior of the entire tech sector.
14 Actionable Insights
1. Advocate for Privacy Laws
Support and advocate for the establishment of a freestanding federal privacy law with a private right of action, enabling individuals to sue for privacy violations and hold all parties, including tech giants, accountable.
2. Prioritize Internet Infrastructure
Focus efforts on improving the fundamental structure of the internet and reducing the power of giant companies, rather than attempting to perfect individual platforms, as the internet is a shared resource.
3. Mandate Government Interoperability
Advocate for all levels of government, including school districts, to mandate interoperability in their procurement guidelines, refusing to buy proprietary tools without assurances against vendor lock-in and for modification rights.
4. Support Access Act Legislation
Advocate for legislation like the Access Act, which mandates large tech firms to expose APIs for interoperability to third parties, under strict privacy rules and oversight from a joint committee.
5. Protect Interoperability Legally
Advocate for laws that provide a legal defense for bona fide interoperability efforts, even if they technically infringe on copyright, patent, or terms of service, provided no other laws (like privacy) are violated.
6. Appoint Special Masters
Advocate for regulatory bodies like the FTC to appoint special masters as part of settlement agreements with monopolistic tech companies, ensuring that legal threats defend users rather than stifle interoperability.
7. Unwind Deceptive Mergers
Advocate for unwinding corporate mergers that were approved based on false pretenses or lies to regulators, rather than imposing fines, to deter future deceptive practices.
8. Break Up Harmful Monopolies
Advocate for breaking up large companies whose scale directly causes harm to society, especially when other remedies like fines have proven ineffective in moderating their conduct.
9. Migrate Groups Off Platforms
For groups stuck on monopolized platforms, use bots and scrapers to enable communication with an alternative service, gradually migrating members by showing off-platform activity and then severing the link once a critical mass is reached.
10. Customize Your Technology
Alter the software and technology you use to make it work exactly how you want it to, rather than compromising on its default design.
11. Improve Facebook Experience
Manually unfollow all friends, pages, and groups on Facebook to eliminate the newsfeed, allowing you to selectively view content and potentially reduce time spent on the platform while improving satisfaction.
12. Monitor Political Ads
Volunteer for projects like NYU’s Ad Observatory by running a browser plugin that collects political ads you see on Facebook, contributing to public research on ad enforcement and disinformation.
13. Support Extreme Poverty Directly
Send money directly to people in extreme poverty via GiveDirectly.org/thinking, allowing them to use the funds for their most pressing needs, as they benefit significantly from even small cash infusions.
14. Cultivate Diverse Hobbies
Engage in a variety of non-work-related hobbies like bouldering, mixed martial arts, running psychology studies, and writing essays, even if amateur, for enjoyment and personal fulfillment.
5 Key Quotes
I don't think we have an AI crisis except for the crisis of people credulously thinking that if we do enough statistical inference, eventually it will be intelligent, which is about as plausible as if we do enough horse breeding, eventually it will turn into an internal combustion engine.
Cory Doctorow
Facebook has all of these problems, but one of the biggest ones is that whenever they discover that something that's good for their users is bad for their shareholders, the users lose.
Cory Doctorow
The fixing the internet is much more important than fixing the platforms. And fixing the internet means taking power away from giant companies. And whereas fixing the platforms means perfecting them.
Cory Doctorow
You offered me this software. I used it. If you didn't want people to modify it, no one told you to make it.
Cory Doctorow
If it's cheaper to break the rules than to follow them, then you invite more rule-breaking, right? As Camus said, sometimes you execute an admiral to encourage the others.
Cory Doctorow