This is going to become more and more of a privacy problem in the coming years, mainly because: Millions of people use ChatGPT daily for a range of purposes, OpenAI noted, “ranging from the mundane to profoundly personal.”

The other problem is one that the US is causing for the free world. Most of the mainstream (centralised) social media as well as AI tools are controlled by the US. With the US more and more placing restrictions on the freedoms of speech, and legally compelling companies in its jurisdiction to hand over the data of their users (this is not new though as there has long been the PATRIOT and CLOUD Acts), there is more interest in citizens elsewhere in the world to preserve their privacy, protect minorities, defend their rights of association, etc.

I very nearly did a post recently about Venice, an AI tool: Venice.ai is hosted on a decentralised GPU computing network provided by third-party companies such as Akash, which operate data centres and GPU cards distributed around the world. This decentralised infrastructure supports Venice’s privacy-first architecture by processing user inputs without storing or logging prompts or model responses on centralised servers. Chat records are stored locally on the user’s device and can be deleted at any time, while the company only accesses users’ IP addresses, which can be masked with a VPN.

The challenge was that Venice is legally registered and operates under the jurisdiction of the state of Wyoming, United States. So I left that post undone.

It is no wonder that there is a bigger and bigger ground swell towards self-hosting and alternative social media today. I have done hundreds of posts about both of these types of alternatives, and it is good to see them all flourishing.

But AI itself is growing quickly, and I hope that we see more alternatives outside of US control as well, as the world does need some balance. You cannot have just one country dominating social media, AI, and other technology when the world is full of a diversity of cultures and beliefs, and we need to create safe spaces for everyone to participate in. It also brings home to me what I was recently reading about in the book ‘Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism’, that when you are operating on a global scale, you do need to navigate some very difficult, diverse, and challenging waters, and you do need to actually care about all of that if you want to be a global player.

The coming year may be an interesting one for technology globally (and maybe even broader than just technology). I still cling to my old mantra: Be careful of what you wish for, because you may just get it. Being a global and caring player in technology, means thinking in the global context, and especially of the cause and effect that will result down the line. South Africa has certainly already experienced this itself. In quite a few ways, South Africa is ahead of what may come to be in the US (not politically, but more around technology). The irony is some companies had headquartered outside of the US for tax purposes, and maybe the same thing will happen for privacy purposes in future…

Of course everyone has long had the opportunity to use alternative tools, alternative social networks, etc, so no-one can say they are forced to use anything. We do in fact have freedom of choice, but it is often our own friends and family who shackle us to something. The network effect is one of the most powerful rip currents I know of, that works against individuals and corporations.

But like I discovered myself over the last 12 months or so, after switching medical insurance, banks, social networks, e-mail provider, and more, sometimes once you’ve mad e change you wonder why you did not make the move a few years earlier. The grass is not always greener on the other side, but there are many lawns out there, and sometimes your eyesight just gets too accustomed to the colour and texture of one’s own grass (it becomes a box, which you need to think outside of).

See arstechnica.com/tech-policy/20…
#Blog, #privacy, #technology