How the tech industry has let us down
Having spent long enough in the tech industry to be considered an industry veteran, I have an unwavering belief that technology has the potential to make our lives infinitely better. The industry has done a lot towards this goal but lately I think my industry has gotten it wrong and in doing so, has let our customers, partners and governments down.
On 6 August 1991, the launch of the World Wide Web offered infinite opportunity. It allowed people to work from anywhere, share anything and anyone could sing, create or trade their way to business success. It removed the need to go to the right schools, work for the right organisations or have access to huge funding. It promised an egalitarian paradise where ideas and goods could be traded directly with consumers from Alaska to Auckland.
Jump forward nearly 30 years, my industry has made three key mistakes which resulted in it running the risk destroying the one reason it exists: to connect people with opportunity.
Mistake 1: It has bitten the hand that feeds it
Billions of people worldwide have joined online communities and search engines. They did so with the reasonable expectation that their photos, conversations and personal information would be respected. But being an irresponsible custodian is not the only way these organisations have turned on their communities. In the quest for increasing returns, the consumers who created the real value in these organisations have been cut out of the loop. In turn, they receive no return of value from the information they invested or the communities they helped to build. The start-ups of yesterday have become like that kid at school who wants to trade lunches but then runs off with both of them.
Mistake 2: It has re-centralised power
Rather than the promised network of decentralised peer-to-peer exchanges, power has re-centralised in the hands of a very small number of corporations which, just like the ones they were trying to replace, clip the ticket on every transaction and make the rules as they go along. This has resulted in consumers having less custody than ever over their transactions, information and choices. History has proved again and again that power in the hands of a few never ends well.
Mistake 3: It has rigged the innovation process
While promising otherwise, the tech industry has built a business environment rigged against value and innovation. Silicon Valley has developed from a place of ideation and opportunity into the modern version of the British public school system, while our industry scratches its head about lack of diversity. The result? Good ideas have more barriers to market entry than ever before. Unless you know the right people, go through the right programmes and have funding from the right people then just forget it.
As I said, I believe that technology can make our lives infinitely better. And the tech industry can live up to its promise of an equitable, value-based and people-centric business ecosystem. Blockchain is an evolution of current technology, which with its inbuilt transparency and permanence, removes the barriers that my industry has unwittingly imposed in its quest for success. Most importantly, it enables decentralised ownership and governance — a place where we don’t need to trust in companies to keep their promises to “do no evil.” Blockchain, done well, is by design a system that can afford power equally to all of its community. It’s my absolute belief that, in time, it will finally deliver the fair transfer of value that technology enables.
While the tech industry has made some monumental cock-ups, support for a better way is swelling. The industry has an opportunity to right the wrongs and deliver on its promises, and I for one still believe it will.
