A few months ago, the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) published A Policymaker’s Guide to the “Techlash” - What It Is and Why It’s a Threat to Growth and Progress. “Does information technology (IT) solve problems and make our lives easier, allowing us to do more with less?,” asks the ITIF report. “Or does it introduce additional complexity to our lives, isolate us from each other, threaten privacy, destroy jobs, and generate an array of other harms?”
It wasn’t all that long ago that digital technologies and Big Tech were largely seen as catalysts for positive change: the Internet had become a global platform for collaborative innovation; social media was a liberating force, helping democratic uprisings like the Arab Spring; and the smartphone was transforming the lives of people all over the world.
But, the 2010s saw the emergence of what’s come to be called the techlash. The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) defines techlash as “a strong and widespread negative reaction to the growing power and influence of large technology companies, particularly those based in Silicon Valley.” The term seems to have originated in a November, 2013 article in The Economist, which said that tech elites are turning out to be some of the most ruthless capitalists around, and “will join bankers and oilmen in public demonology.” By 2018, techlash was one of eight shortlisted entries for OED Word of the Year.
The ITIF report was published toward the end of 2019, a few months before the advent of Covid-19. Given that digital technologies, - the Internet in particular, - have kept economies and societies going during the biggest shock the world has experienced since WWII, perhaps the techlash will now disappear and digital technologies and Big Tech will once more be viewed in a positive light. But, that’s not likely to be the case, because, as the report reminds us, fear and opposition to technology is nothing new.
“People have long opposed new technologies, fearing they would be unsafe, destroy morals, hurt jobs, harm children, and lead to a range of other purported ills.” Throughout the Industrial Revolution there were periodic panics about the impact of automation on jobs, going back to the so-called Luddites, - textile workers who in the 1810s smashed the new machines that were threatening their jobs. And, while the automobile was welcomed in the early 20th century as providing safe and fast transportation, we’ve also seen major issues over the decades, including safety, - the US had over 36,000 traffic fatalities in 2018, - pollution and congestion.
What gave rise to the techlash? The report cites several reasons. First of all, the honeymoon is over. We now take for granted advances that once seemed magical, e.g., the Internet and Web in the mid-1990s; search engines and e-commerce a few years later; smartphones, streaming music and video in the 2000s; and so on.
And, even when IT was largely seen as a positive force, books and article started to appear countering the hype and utopian claims IT is often prone to,- like Nicholas Carr’s IT Doesn’t Matter, which argued that companies overestimated the strategic value of IT, which was diminishing as a source of competitive differentiation because it was increasingly ubiquitous and commoditized; and Sherry Turkle’s Alone Together, which warned that technology was having an increasingly negative impact on our social interactions.
“But the fuel for the techlash fire came at least in part from actual events, including, among others, the revelations Russia used social media platforms to interfere with the 2016 U.S. elections, Cambridge Analytica misused Facebook data for political purposes, and Google was investigated for antitrust violations,” said the report. Over 37% of respondents to a recent survey by the Pew Research Center said that humans will not be better off in an increasingly AI-based future due to displacement of jobs, increased surveillance, cybercrime and cyberwarfare, and reduced control over their lives.
The report argues that “To thrive and be competitive in the next phase of the digital economy, countries must resist techlash and promote acceptance of technology… Rather than techlash, we need ‘tech realism’ - a pragmatic recognition that today’s technologies, driven in particular by IT, are like virtually all past technologies: They are a fundamental force for human progress, but can in some instances pose real challenges that deserve smart and effective responses.” However, “giving into techlash passions would slow down economic and wage growth, reduce national competitiveness, and limit progress on a host of critical societal priorities, including education, community livability, environmental protection, and human health.”
To make its case, the report examines 22 of the most prevalent techlash issues. Let me briefly summarize five of these issues along with the report’s couterarguments against each.
Tech Companies Are Destroying Consumer Privacy. The most pervasive criticism of Internet and tech companies is that they’ve given rise to a so-called surveillance capitalism that’s eroding the online privacy of unwitting victims. But, in fact, online users “are well aware they are providing data in exchange for services, and they derive enormous value from the fact that these services are often free… A balanced and focused national privacy bill can address most of these concerns.”
Online Platforms Are Exploiting Consumers. Activists frequently argue that consumers aren’t receiving adequate compensation for their data, which is worth more than the goods and services they get in exchange. This is the equivalent of “expecting television without ads or subscriptions. But companies cannot provide goods or services without earning income. This can occur through direct payments from customers or through indirect payments from advertisers and sponsors.”
Social Media Facilitates Disinformation. Mass media technologies, - e.g. pamphlets, newspapers, radio, television, - have long been subject to manipulation and propaganda. But, the problem has grown more acute as ad-driven business models thrive by stoking anger and polarization with sophisticated AI algorithms. “Government, industry, news media, and the public all have roles to play in addressing the problem … by making advertising more transparent, improving enforcement for improper ads, tightening restrictions on ad content, and increasing requirements to confirm the identity of advertisers.”
AI Is Inherently Biased. Given that AI algorithms are trained using the vast amounts of data collected over the years, if the data include past racial, gender, or other biases, the predictions of these AI algorithms will reflect these biases. This is particularly serious in areas like predictive policing and in the use of AI by courts and correction departments to assist in bail, sentencing, and parole decisions. “To reduce the potential for algorithmic bias to cause harm, regulators should ensure that companies using AI comply with existing laws in areas that are already regulated to prevent bias.”
IT Is Destroying Jobs. Fears that machines will put humans out of work are not new. But automation fears have understandbly accelerated in recent years, as our increasingly smart machines are now being applied to activities requiring intelligence and cognitive capabilities that not long ago were viewed as the exclusive domain of humans. Covid-19 will likely exacerbate this issue as firms accelerate their embrace of IT and automation. “While for hundreds of years technology has eliminated jobs (e.g., buggy-whip makers), it has also created new jobs (e.g., automobile mechanics) and boosted living standards, which have resulted in more demand for workers doing the same tasks (building houses, educating people, selling goods, etc.)”
“We should not go back to the naïve utopian era of IT as savior,” writes the ITIF report in conclusion. “We should instead critically examine the impact of new technology to help maximize its value and limit harms… overall, succumbing to techlash is likely to reduce individual and societal welfare. Policymakers should resist techlash and embrace pragmatic “tech realism”—recognizing technology is a fundamental force for human progress that also can pose real challenges, which deserve smart, thoroughly considered, and effective responses.”
I didn't know yet that techlash was one of the shortlisted entries for the OED Word of the Year in 2018. This whole article was an interesting read. Now I'm interested in the other most prevalent techlash issues and I am going to read about them.
Posted by: Eri | June 07, 2020 at 07:35 AM