#techpolicy #Internetfreedom #unemployment #privacy #lostgeneration #wtfeconomy

Feeling frustrated with the state of things? Unemployed or underemployed? Can't understand why Greece's debt makes you poorer? Think that the #OccupyWallStreet protesters are foolish hippies? What does tech have to do with this--with you feeling so anxious and out of control about now, the future, and everything in between?

Jon Lanier believes "tech" is causing massive unemployment. He thinks tech in itself is neutral, but the way we've structured tech (e.g., to encourage free content) makes us, the average peeps, poorer and creates a deep class divide.

Watch here for Lanier thoughts on technology, from the horse's mouth: http://edge.org/conversation/the-local-global-flip. (Video to the right, and ignore the dreadlocks if they bother you :)).

Lanier's thinking is along the lines of Columbia Law Professor Eben Moglen's RE: we've been duped by companies that own the servers to give up our communications freedom/earning power/etc. for Internet shiny objects like free email storage and status update likes.

Moglen's famed 2010 talk about that is here: http://www.law.columbia.edu/magazine/interactive/5848/view-more-professor-eben-moglens-2010-internet-society-speech

After hearing these guys explain what's happening and will keep on happening if we don't do something, doesn't it make you root for and want to use Diaspora even more? Diaspora is more than just privacy-based, distributed social networking. It's part of our desire toward freedom and sanity itself.