Instead of delivering services and software that unlocks value for their client industries, the software industry has spent the past decade or so trying to control their customers and their client industries. Why make software for hotels when you can control the hotel industry? Why make software for taxis when you can replace the entire industry with software?
So many fantastic quotes I could pull from the latest essay by Baldur Bjarnason, but this is my favourite, because it directly articulates something that’s always bothered me about companies like Uber and Airbnb. If they (Uber) really were intending to make taxis better, why didn’t they just write software for taxi companies, and sell it to them? Or write an open-source version, sell customization and customer support, and grow the business that way?
As Bjarnason writes, it’s because those companies were never about the software, they were purely about exploitation and control in the reckless pursuit of growth and returns on investment. A strategy that was only viable so long as US hegemonic power supported it, allowing Uber to ignore local regulations or strong-arm governments into abolishing them.
The whole essay is well worth reading, as it both sketches out how US power underlies the existing tech industry, and how with the rapid decline of that power, we’ve got a chance to build something better.
#tech #US #monopoly
