0:00:00.000,0:00:18.750
36C3 preroll music
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Herald Angel: Please welcome our next[br]speaker, Adam. Adam will be talking about
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the politics of a supposedly neutral and[br]how you can read them Adam calls himself a
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survivor of the American capitalism so[br]please give it up to Adam and enjoy
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applause
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Adam: inaudible can you move the mic in[br]Yes, thank you. hi so originally this
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talk was supposed to be about algorithms[br]and then I realized that I was falling
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prey to exactly the thing I was trying to[br]critique so I expanded the title a bit
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in the talk between the entire system and
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an algorithm that is the kind of the[br]piece that is hard to discuss so I wanted
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to just start with mathematical[br]formalisms this is a variable it doesn't
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seem to have any political implications[br]on its own other than it can be used for a
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lot of things it can it can stand for[br]anything here's a variable squared this
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might have implications this could be used[br]to calculate the area of property that
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you own this may be fewer may be something[br]electrical triangles could be used in
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some kind of projection of Cartesian[br]coordinates over indigenous landscapes
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this goes boom now we start getting into[br]actual applications so yeah most of this
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might seem obvious or it might seem[br]completely foreign so just help fidget or
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something to give me cues yeah[br]mathematical formalism are sometimes
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considered objective but obviously they[br]only exist in a context so Howard Zinn has
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a book about his life called you can't be[br]neutral on a moving train there is that
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any mathematics exists in social[br]context that were constructed for a
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reason and then omission is almost equally[br]important if depending on what's
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happening it could be more important[br]omission would just be the things that
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are not included in your formula and your[br]algorithm silence is the voice of
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complicity I'm sort of misusing that but[br]no algorithms are the same as anything
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else you should follow the money if you[br]want to understand what's happening it's
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just a materialist and pretty effective[br]way of understanding things think about
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who created the algorithm what is it used[br]for what types of effects might it
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have and what would the alternatives be if[br]this wasn't the way that the subject
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matter was being treated. Unfortunately[br]algorithms are almost never part of
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public debate they're hidden there[br]they're the private property of
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corporations of governments who don't[br]think that we need to know what the
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details are they're hidden intentionally[br]or not behind the language of
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mathematics so in order to critique this[br]at this level of mathematical formula
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you need to be literate in both[br]mathematics and politics or sociology just
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they don't necessarily go together that[br]that immediately narrows down the number
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of people who might be talking about the[br]content of a formula so all I'm doing
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here is I'm just giving a few examples and[br]showing how something that might be
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neutral is absolutely not I'm starting[br]with human population, population
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obviously has been a hot subject for[br]centuries and the projections are wildly
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different and hypothetical and obviously[br]it matters a lot we're at a turning point
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in our planets ecology at least and so[br]when you see a graph like this you need to
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think what is this ? Why does it have[br]such a wide range ? There's this blue line
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that goes straight up but then there's[br]this other line that looks like some type
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of collapse or rebound back down to a[br]sustainable level and then you have the
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if you look at who's putting this out[br]there they're not interested in the
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political aspects at this top level they[br]actually want to take those out of their
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predictions although you see something[br]like the red dashed lines and those are
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80 % prediction certainty and the dotted[br]lines are 95 % prediction certainty
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I would say that's all pretty unlikely[br]because they haven't factored in some
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important parts about the world such as[br]the Earth's carrying capacity most
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estimates say that this red line or sorry[br]the estimates are very different but one
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plausible estimate is that we passed the[br]Earth's carrying capacity in 1992 in
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which case most of these curves are bogus[br]and something entirely different is going
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to happen to not include that in your[br]population projections is, I would say,
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irresponsible. Here's another publication[br]by the same well-meaning organization but
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this you can see there's, well, I'll let[br]you think about what that means for a
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second yourself this is the population [br]change in each country given in as
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a heat map so you see some populations[br]are growing more slowly than others some
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are growing quickly and you see these[br]little buttons at the bottom let you look
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at the more developed and least developed[br]regions which is another obstacle to
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participation, it's a pretty World Bank[br]sort of perspective the global
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development view and then you see that the[br]population of African countries is
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growing more quickly which throws a racial[br]element into it too and unfortunately
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that's how this type of map is used I[br]can't read this because it's too awful but
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but this is sort of the state of rhetoric[br]around population and the public
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discussion and this, the same author 1968[br]pretty mainstream is saying this is one
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way to take care of population growth.[br]laugh So you can see it gets bad
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quickly and we need to be involved in[br]actually re-conceptualizing these models
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We can't let there just be a graph like[br]this, that doesn't include this. We can't
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let there be a map like this that doesn't[br]talk about the power dynamics between
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countries and the history of racialized[br]politics. Yeah, here, just a few
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consequences of how population models[br]actually affect the world and then of
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course there are there follow-on effects[br]of population anxieties causing other
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political effects. Here's an alternative[br]model and this one is a bit more
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interesting I just wanted to paint the[br]status quo so that I could I could show
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you what the alternative might be. This is[br]a model that was actually the first. It
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was only put out a few years ago and it[br]was the first to combine the idea of
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ecological cycles with the[br]Earth's carrying capacity ecological
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resource consumption with class conflict.[br]In this case the humans are eating
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the planet, the planet slowly regenerates,[br]and the rich are eating the poor.
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This is actually, surprisingly, a[br]controversial thing to say.
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That predicts a completely different sort[br]of population trajectory than the United
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Nations drafted. The green line here is[br]the earth's resources, the red line is the
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commoners population and the blue line[br]are the elites. In this case there they're
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like a unchecked predator and as soon as[br]they're introduced they eat all the poor
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people, if you play with this model I have[br]an interactive version online you can
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sorry, this is not my model but I made an[br]interactive visualization for it that
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lets you change the parameters and see[br]what happens if you drag the inequality
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control back and forth then you see that[br]you can get a completely different
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behavior here you get the population[br]skyrocketing and then stabilizing and
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that's sort of just the natural thing[br]that you would do if there's a single
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predator-prey cycle and and you're you[br]know you're just rabbits eating grass for
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example I don't think there's time for a[br]tour right now unfortunately but it might
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be fun for you. The point I wanted to[br]make though that with this second
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predator-prey cycle between rich and[br]poor people, you're actually introducing
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Marxism into the formula. This has[br]been used to explain capitalism's
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periodic crises which capitalism still[br]won't admit exist, interestingly enough,
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capitalism says there's always some[br]external driver behind the crises but yeah
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so if you take this assumption in the[br]formula and you say capitalism does cause
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periodic crises and rich people are[br]acting like predators what do you do ?
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You need class struggle, you need[br]to create more equality. So this is
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just another example of how we[br]should try to be involved in the
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construction of these models and their use[br]in our world. Labor supply is also very
0:10:39.879,0:10:44.579
important but maybe not as interesting.[br]Don't worry about this ! I tried to not
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include math because part of the point[br]here is to make these ideas accessible
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with or without math but I did want this[br]picture up here just to show that in the
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dominant form, in the dominant[br]neoclassical economic perspective if you
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pay people too much they stop working and[br]if so you want to pay them just little
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enough that they work as much as they[br]possibly can and there are all types of a
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crazy assumptions built into these[br]formulas like humans are able to make
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rational choices rather than just taking[br]the next job in desperation I've never
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lived in this world I've only lived in[br]maybe this world where I want to fight
0:11:29.350,0:11:33.540
back against this formula as much as I can[br]sorry I'll let you read this if you want
0:11:33.540,0:11:40.250
but yeah this formula is missing all of[br]the things that relate to my working world
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like my motivation for working is not[br]just consumption of things. There's
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essential survival and then there's[br]wanting to be motivated by contributing to
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the world somehow there's organized labor[br]which i think about pretty often and most
0:11:55.480,0:12:01.990
jobs that would be another way out of[br]this formula and you can see the effects
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of this type of policy are that the[br]richest 5% keep getting richer and
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everyone else stays the same. More effects[br]of the neoclassical labor supply and then
0:12:16.820,0:12:20.940
this is sort of more active I don't[br]think there are a ton of people working on
0:12:20.940,0:12:27.649
this but I'd like to just go through the[br]question anyway. Wikipedia has never had
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paid advertisements and it's valuable[br]because people visit it extremely often
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and trust it, based on its reputation.[br]So if you put advertisements on here
0:12:42.040,0:12:46.529
people this is sort of, like this would be[br]the holy grail for most advertisers! It
0:12:46.529,0:12:50.760
would be that you would have your product[br]advertised on top of something that people
0:12:50.760,0:12:57.911
already believed so their skepticism[br]would be much lower there was actually a
0:12:57.911,0:13:02.430
discussion about putting paid[br]advertisements on Wikipedia in 2001
0:13:02.430,0:13:11.209
little-known fact Wikipedia was started[br]as part of a porn company Bomis and the
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the chief of this porn company Jamie[br]Wales said that there would be paid
0:13:15.019,0:13:19.920
advertising on Wikipedia caused a huge[br]fight a Spanish Wikipedia split off and
0:13:19.920,0:13:26.800
formed the Encyclopedia Libre Universal I[br]think it's called and pretty much because
0:13:26.800,0:13:31.620
of this fork Wikipedia was then forced[br]into not having paid advertisements and
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split off from Bomis when we do have[br]advertising on Wikipedia which brings in
0:13:37.910,0:13:42.689
money it's basically just two relentless[br]stream of money and we have to
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turn it off to not raise too much and [br]So here's the extremely materialistic
0:13:48.450,0:13:56.595
view of what could be done with Wikipedia[br]we have 244 billion page views per year
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We could put in for advertising slots [br]this is a industry standard number
0:14:01.440,0:14:05.370
in fact I think it's four per page so as[br]you scroll there would be more and more
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ads and then at this price we could bring[br]in almost three billion dollars a year
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which is a huge profit margin at the low[br]operating cost of 100 million. If you
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create this type of formula then you[br]have Wikipedia suddenly becomes and
0:14:22.410,0:14:25.804
something that you can buy and sell, it[br]becomes something that corporations would
0:14:25.804,0:14:32.600
want to take over and control the content[br]of it's obviously soulless. Here's another
0:14:32.600,0:14:37.910
view of advertising on Wikipedia. Who[br]creates the value in Wikipedia? The
0:14:37.910,0:14:42.220
editors do. Who's allowed to run the[br]fundraising campaigns only three
0:14:42.220,0:14:46.690
organizations actually my employer[br]Wikimedia Deutschland, Wikimedia
0:14:46.690,0:14:51.769
Switzerland and the Wikimedia Foundation,[br]which interestingly enough is the one
0:14:51.769,0:14:57.939
organization in the group of Wikipedia[br]chapters, it's the one organization which
0:14:57.939,0:15:03.550
is not democratically controlled. It's a[br]self-perpetuating board and this
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charismatic porn leader, Jimmy Wales (I[br]hope this is recorded) he's still the some
0:15:11.190,0:15:17.660
kind of honorary chair of the board he[br]has a renewable membership for life and
0:15:17.660,0:15:23.020
the board members appoint themselves yeah[br]so why are they allowed to be the only
0:15:23.020,0:15:27.461
ones raising money through Wikipedia[br]because they own the trademarks so it's a
0:15:27.461,0:15:30.991
pretty typical arrangement when it comes[br]down to it and there's some kind of power
0:15:30.991,0:15:37.940
sharing deal that although I know about it[br]and I was close to people who do
0:15:37.940,0:15:43.919
understand it I never learned what's in[br]there so I can't tell you much about it.
0:15:43.919,0:15:47.690
So if you follow this train of logic then[br]you can come up with another set of
0:15:47.690,0:15:53.509
formulas which is actually the flow of[br]value around Wikipedia and its content and
0:15:53.509,0:15:57.380
if we did that we might be able to say[br]hey there's there's an excellent argument
0:15:57.380,0:16:03.110
for having democratic control of the[br]resources and then more along those lines
0:16:03.110,0:16:07.449
if you take the same problem domain and[br]you and you come up with different
0:16:07.449,0:16:12.389
formulas inside of it you can you can do[br]things like say what would editors like
0:16:12.389,0:16:18.180
from this system that exists to post[br]advertisements which does exist by the way
0:16:18.180,0:16:23.160
if they're just not paid advertisements[br]editors might want a better way of sharing
0:16:23.160,0:16:29.010
the resources among themselves. They[br]obviously would fight tooth and nail to
0:16:29.010,0:16:34.429
prevent paid advertising from ever being[br]on there but they do want each other they
0:16:34.429,0:16:37.673
want each other's campaigns to be more[br]effective so that we're not constantly
0:16:37.673,0:16:45.300
showing banners with no return I also[br]wanted to point to this paper which is
0:16:45.300,0:16:49.370
the one that caused me the anxiety at the[br]beginning of the talk protective
0:16:49.370,0:16:53.939
optimization technologies and I would[br]love for you all to click it because it's
0:16:53.939,0:16:59.300
it's another it's it's like a formal[br]perspective of looking beyond the
0:16:59.300,0:17:04.449
algorithm at the entire system that the[br]algorithm is embedded in the slides are
0:17:04.449,0:17:09.020
attached to the talk link if you want[br]that's all I have does anybody feel like
0:17:09.020,0:17:28.530
asking questions? Extremely brave people[br]want to ask questions?
0:17:28.530,0:17:32.560
Question: Hi so I was five minutes late[br]but perhaps do you have more examples on
0:17:32.560,0:17:40.330
how you see some kind of a political not[br]twist but like background when you see
0:17:40.330,0:17:46.200
graphs or statistics? Do you have any more[br]examples when you see that happened how
0:17:46.200,0:17:49.960
do you detect this when you're a beginner[br]and you look at this statistical graph
0:17:49.960,0:17:57.640
how can you analyze it and find out what[br]the political background or like missing
0:17:57.640,0:18:01.870
preconceptions are?[br]Adam: Thanks I wish I'd prepared a few
0:18:01.870,0:18:09.790
more and I'm just doing this from[br]an armchair also I my day job is just in
0:18:09.790,0:18:13.670
programming and so the only reason I[br]think about this stuff is because I'm I
0:18:13.670,0:18:18.850
have spent a long time working for evil[br]companies unfortunately, and so I'm
0:18:18.850,0:18:22.710
always trying to second-guess what the[br]company is actually doing and, but
0:18:22.710,0:18:28.030
to do that there's no real trick that I[br]can think of it's really just the Chomsky
0:18:28.030,0:18:31.650
approach would be: follow the money![br]Where does the money come from? Where does
0:18:31.650,0:18:36.700
it go ? Why do people want this to[br]exist ? And so you have some formula,
0:18:36.700,0:18:49.120
some system if you have one in mind,[br]please suggest it! And then, yeah,
0:18:49.120,0:18:52.970
there's the thing that you could do like[br]literature review where you you just look
0:18:52.970,0:18:57.500
at similar attempts to look at that same[br]problem domain and find what people have
0:18:57.500,0:19:01.280
left out of the one that you're looking[br]at but but I don't think there's the
0:19:01.280,0:19:06.290
concrete system to do it because that that[br]would like allow you to invent everything
0:19:06.290,0:19:17.757
in the world so it's kind of case-by-case[br]as far as I can tell sorry.
0:19:17.757,0:19:23.540
Question: And if you were Jimmy Wales back[br]in the day and you would be setup like a
0:19:23.540,0:19:30.870
benevolent dictator for life, how would[br]you have faced yourself out? How would be
0:19:30.870,0:19:38.890
your take on? What should be the[br]correct way or correct way of Wikipedia
0:19:38.890,0:19:47.060
raising for example funds if in the end[br]the people who create value are editors?
0:19:47.060,0:19:51.340
Adam: When Wikipedia was first started it[br]was officially a membership organization
0:19:51.340,0:19:56.720
and so everybody who is editing or[br]uploading files or changing the source
0:19:56.720,0:20:02.470
code was considered a member in Germany[br]it's a Verein I think and so everybody was
0:20:02.470,0:20:06.490
supposed to have one vote for the board[br]of trustees and that pretty much takes
0:20:06.490,0:20:11.150
care of the problem right there if you[br]don't in Wikimedia foundation was
0:20:11.150,0:20:17.590
illegally changed to be a non membership[br]organization a few years in and actually
0:20:17.590,0:20:20.260
it was illegal because they didn't[br]announce it to the people who were
0:20:20.260,0:20:30.750
technically members so I suppose editors[br]would should feel free to sue the
0:20:30.750,0:20:35.910
Wikimedia Foundation for control for[br]example there's no statute of limitations
0:20:35.910,0:20:40.780
on this particular thing that happened[br]but in general I would say from my
0:20:40.780,0:20:46.160
tiny bit of experience doing grassroots[br]organizing an organization is something
0:20:46.160,0:20:51.110
like a child it's you don't want to have[br]it live in your house its whole life and
0:20:51.110,0:20:55.890
you don't want to be telling it to get up[br]and brush its teeth in the morning
0:20:55.890,0:21:00.090
the measure of success should be[br]something more like it takes a life of its
0:21:00.090,0:21:03.940
own it might be direction you didn't[br]consider and so to do that you have to
0:21:03.940,0:21:17.080
devolve the power from yourself. Does that[br]answer the question? Okay all right well
0:21:17.080,0:21:19.596
thank you so much for coming[br]I hope it was useful.
0:21:19.596,0:21:24.722
postroll music
0:21:24.722,0:21:48.000
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