The Samizdat Point
Time is running out
The events, still unfolding, initiated on the 6th of January with the storm on the Capitol, have, on the social media sphere, an impact that cannot be overemphasized. My point here is not to analyze the deep causes, implications and political significance of such an event. In this article I will try to focus on the social media aspects. It is not possible though to not have a broader view of what is going on, even if we only tackle technical issues. The reactions by social media platforms has been nothing short of incredible in terms of reach and synchronicity. What can we do about that?
A brief recap is necessary. On the 6th of January 2021 (the epiphany what a coincidence...) following the demonstration/riot/march/insurection that ended in what is the most confusing event of my life (9-11 was relatively clear as soon as the day after it happened: it was a huge terrorist attack) with the capitol being breached, happened the most important attack on free speech of our times. Social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, etc (the exhaustive list available here) banned Trump (a siting president of the US) from its accounts. The story does not stop here because in a largely farcical ultimatum Apple decided to remove Parler from its app store (Google already did it few hours ago for android). Another thunderstrike came later when Amazon announced that the servers of Parler would no longer have access to the AWS service it was using to make the application run.
That escalated quickly. So quickly that it is beyond reasonnable doubt that this was not jointly prepared among GAFA, and that it was planned long before the actual execution of the plan. There are obvious remarks with relation to social media:
If it happened to the POTUS it can litterally happen to anyone on earth.
GAFA censoreship can go much farther than just banning you from your account, and preventing you to acces to your previous, presumably legit, content. It can go as far undermining your very capacity to make things run. If you are reading this from a chromebook for instance, I urge you to let this idea sink in.
There are many angles to consider.
What can you do to protect your content and your internet access? On the short, medium and long term?
What can be done on a larger scale to protect free speech? Again on the short, medium and long term?
From a personnal point of view you need to diversify and have a backup strategy.
You need to physically have a record (on a thumb drive) of your content.
You can add to the physicall record an encrypted cloud record of your content. So basically you need to remember well two passwords : one to access your cloud password and another one to decrypt the content you have saved on the cloud. This content can contain an encrypted list of passwords/logins/identities you are using. Use open source, largely distributed encryption tools (like aes256). But you really need to remember them (not write them on any digital support, it is better to avoid paper support as well).
You need to diversify your presence on social media. A basic strategy is to open severall accounts with the same handle on different platforms: Gab, Parler (if it comes back), Minds.com etc. Of course you need to elect platforms adverising their support of free speech but don't hold your breath because they can be forced on the long run to bend the knee either to GAFA's or new legislation. The idea is to have a primary platform P where you express yourself. Other platforms are for backup in the following sense. You establish that on platforms Q, R, S etc. such handle corresponds to such handle on P. If you get kicked out of P, you can create a new account and spread the word on Q, R, S. Look at what Sci-Hub did across time. Encourage your followers to do the same.
You need to diversify within a same platform (if possible). I do have several twitter accounts. I now restrict my political comments to one account, and use the other one as a more professional account. Forget about statement like : these are my personnal ideas blah blah. Maybe reading "The trial" by Kafka is a good idea. You don't know who, why and following what due process you are going to be judged. Both of my accounts are not linked even if it is quite easy to make the link : the AI proposed that I follow myself on both accounts which is not surprising but you can be more cautious than me, I just needed plausible deniability at this point.
Maybe collect some cryptocurrency. Because banks may suspend their services. They can do it jointly as well (eg Alex Jones was suspended from using Paypal
On a longer perspective try to diversify the operating system/ecosystem you are using. Living under an Apple (or a Google one for that matter) monoculture is a bad idea. You need to have an open source OS (like Linux, OpenBsd or Freebsd for the geeks) that can work independently (Chrome OS should'nt even come close to your imagination).
From a more general point of view there are broad call to decentralization. All sorts of initiatives have been initiated (most notably this call by Jack Dorsey or this Solid project by Tim Berners Lee), but nothing concrete seems to have emerged. Sci-Hub using handshake DNS might be a part of the solution. Lets see how it works, but I have tested it, and it is not really easy for non specialists right now. This point is essential: as a computer scientist I have no trouble using command line crypto tools (actually this is what I do the most: I try to avoid clicking as much as I can, and I don’t care at all about the esthetics), but let’s get real people need crypto tools that works without being aware of such tools. Simply using PGP to encrypt mail is a pain in the ass (while I do use it professionally, it is costly). The first step is to develop the crypto tools, but the second step is to make your grand-mother able to use them. Finally, those crypto tools are going to be costly in terms or ressources. The incentives to maintain the infrastructure required (blockchains, distributed storage has to be done on your phone not on the cloud that is the point: you are the cloud) are a major part of this quest.
It is time to work. Like, now. How do we organize is not clear but projects will emerge. It is a bit more goal-oriented than wikipedia, so this point is not clear (you cannot just rely on the good faith and open participation). But there is a clear unifying goal in sight. It is a good start.