Re: [arch-d] Splintering (fragmentation) vs Centralization vs Users

[Toerless Eckert <[e-mail]>]

Brian,

When you say "centralization", what do you mean ?

If one Internet bookseller has one server in Seattle for all its global
customers, is that centralized, or is it decentralized because its just one
out of many equal booksellers with servers on the Internet ?

If the same bookseller has millions of servers to buy books all over the planet,
is that decentralized now, or do you call that centralized, because the Internet
enabled that one bookseller to eliminate most others ?

How can therer even be an answer to these questions without admitting that
we do have an interest in the higher-layer reasons and implications of our
protocol work, and that we can not even make technical judgmenets with that 
"use-case" discussion. 

And i thought we also already agreed that we needed to be more precise in terminology,
such as attempting not to use centralized/decentralized for everything unqualified.
E.g.: monopolization was bought up as another good term to distinguish cases.

Cheers
    Toerless

On Fri, May 05, 2023 at 09:39:17AM +1200, Brian E Carpenter wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> After a little off-list discussion, I have a few more general thoughts
> on this topic. (I won't identify the other person in that discussion,
> to respect their privacy.)
> 
> I mentioned that some security technology that we develop could be
> "dual use", e.g. useful both for privacy and useful for walled gardens.
> So perhaps we should be careful when evaluating new ideas that they
> cannot be used for undesirable purposes as well as the intended purpose.
> If we consider that both excessive centralization and excessive
> splintering (a.k.a. fragmentation) are bad things, does a new technology
> drive those tendendencies? Could we design it differently to avoid
> this?
> 
> Is there scope for IAB guidance to the IETF about what aspects of
> protocols, especially security protocols, might encourage or discourage
> either centralization or splintering?
> 
> That could be a productive use of the IAB's resources where we might
> have some impact. Discussion of wider societal, commercial and
> political issues in the IAB and IETF would get nowhere, and in my
> opinion is best left to ISOC.
> 
> There's very clearly a 3-way tussle, and that makes all discussion
> difficult, especially since each national government has different
> goals. ASCII art:
> 
>                 Users
>            (freedom of action,
>                 privacy)
>                 /    \
>                /      \
>               /        \
>       National          Global
>    governments -------- businesses
>    (defend or          (capture &
>     control             exploit
>     citizens &          customers)
>     economy)
> 
> Regards
>    Brian Carpenter
> 
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