Innovation

“We’re in danger of losing what’s made the internet the most important medium in history, a decentralised platform where the people at the edges of the networks – that would be you and me – don’t need permission to communicate, create and innovate.” Technology writer Dan Gillmor wrote these sentiments over 12 years ago, lamenting how large centralised sites, social media platforms, and ever-encroaching algorithms were changing the internet.

“This isn’t a knock on social networks’ legitimacy, or their considerable utility,” he continued. "But when we use centralised services like social media sites, however helpful and convenient they may be, we are handing over ultimate control to third parties that profit from our work, material that exists on their sites only as long as they allow.”