This book characterises today’s internet along four axes, outlines the respective benefits and challenges, and explores how our digital future may develop.
The early days of the internet were marked by cognitive dissonance expansive enough to include both the belief that the emerging social cyberspace could not be controlled by governments and the belief that it was constantly under threat of becoming fragmented. Twenty-five years on, concerns about fragmentation — the ‘splinternet’ — continue, but most would admit that the Great Firewall of China, along with shutdowns in various countries during times of protest, has proved conclusively that a determined government can indeed exercise a great deal of control if it wants to. Meanwhile, those who remember the internet’s beginnings wax nostalgic about the days when it was ‘open’, ‘free’, and ‘decentralised’ — qualities they hope to recapture via Web3 (which many argue is already highly centralised). The big American technology companies dominate these discussions as much as they dominate most people’s daily online lives, as if the job would be complete after answering “What’s to be done about Facebook?”. The opposition in such public debates is generally the EU, which has done more to curb the power of big technology companies than any other authority.
