Alex: welcome everybody to a new episode of the Open Internet Pod. As always, I'm joined by Richard Paris, co-founder of Sado. And today the topic will be digital ownership and the open internet. Now we've we've spoken about this in various ways at various points, but we never really had an episode specifically about it. And I think that There are more and more things happening in the outside world where business models are failing, failing because they're no longer able to grow the pie. So they need to double down on value extraction and they're they're focusing more on the clients that they know they have for sure and they're trying to sub extract even more money from those while at the same time trying to cut all the bridges so nobody can leave. Right. And I think that's kinda like speaks to the whole idea of the open internet and digital ownership because it was built exactly for these type of situations where you need to get out and you have to have somewhere to get out too, right? Alright, so let's start with the news. I think this is very interesting. We'll start with the EU watch because that's the tradition of the show. But I thought it was very interesting. the the thing that hit me the most, I don't know if right, people are watching us from all over the world, but it's very interesting to see this idea of manufacturing consent, right? There's There's one of the easiest ways to manufacture consent is through polling. And you can always kind of game a poll to make sure that it says what you want it to say. And it's it brings me back to this idea that when you were reading about communist countries or totalitarian states, and like ninety-nine percent of the people voted for the only one candidate Richard: For the deer leader. Alex: that we have. To become president again, right? It was more a confirmation of what you are doing. And the latest stats from the EU digital de decade digital decade 2026 Eurobarometer says that ninety two percent of Europeans want more safety for their children on the internet. And it's just like, why bother with ninety two percent? Just say ninety nine per nine percent, you know. That's that's what you're trying to say anyway. Richard: Well, it's also it's a it's a it's a false question, right? Like, yes, every parent who are these eight percent of parents who don't want more safety for their children? Of course you want more safety. You asked the same thing about cars. Would you like cars to be safer for your children? Of course I would. okay, well then maybe we need to strike a balance, right? The fact that if you just ask people boldly, would you like your children to be more safe online? It means that eight percent of people out there think that the safety level is just fine, which tells you that it's not a safe place, but that doesn't, you know, that's that's not the question, right? That's of course everyone would like more of that, at what you know, at what cost, in relation to what changes would they want to have to, you know, take to do that. That's that's not been presented there. They've just shown that and the way it's written up I had to read through it's written up as like, yeah, that's a h hence our mandate to do all the things that we want to do. very much you know, you can see that you can see in the text of the thing that well that proves, right? Obviously people are supporting what we're doing, which it doesn't doesn't at all. so yeah, very much kind of man manufacturing that consent, like you say. It's a very interesting document because it's a lot of motherhood statements as they say, like, you know, mum's good, yes, of course they are. So Europeans are strongly in favour of like Europeanizing tech. Well Guess they should be. Alex: Yeah, and and it's it's also d the fact that when you see like, ninety two percent of European think that strengthening the protection of children and young people online should be a priority. There you then you go like, Well, I guess I I don't wanna be in that eight percent that doesn't say yes, right? There's like there's so many people that agree with this. I don't wanna stick out, we are social animals and we wanna belong. And that's how you manufacture consent. Richard: Well, just yeah, ca causes you to question why why am I not worried about this? Like should I be? Alex: Yeah, we should also let everyone know that ninety two percent of people think that Sato is the greatest project in the web three right now. So, you know. Richard: Ninety two percent of people think the open ed open internet podcast there should be more of it. Alex: Yes, yes. I I've read that. That was a great that was a very good, unbiased poll that was made not so long ago. Exactly. Richard: Both of us both of us voted very, very accurately. Alex: Yeah, but it it it's crazy, you know, it's and and it's all these like truisms, like eighty two percent of European citizens think that e the EU should reduce its dependencies on digital technologies from third countries. Like, okay. What are you gonna Richard: Hmm. Yeah. Alex: do with that? But it's it's very interesting because you know we're speaking of digital ownership and you know we're gonna get into it quite soon. but you kinda you have to see that these used to be like fringe things and now they're in the middle, right? Richard: Mm. Alex: and I'm thinking of this guy, Xbox owner loses decades of digital games after Microsoft deletes account. Richard: Yeah. Alex: And and it's it it's crazy to I mean, I've I've read this article. Did you did you have a look at it? Richard: Yeah, yeah. I I was actually aware of it 'cause it came up on another completely unrelated technical podcast I listened to about n system administration. So yeah, like it's an amazing story. Alex: Twenty five years of data, thousands of euros spent on games, my son's baby pictures, all because gone, all because Microsoft couldn't bring back a compromised account. And again, it it goes back to the idea that when the leverage is on the third party, you have nothing, right? All Richard: Yeah. Alex: you're about to get is an exit tax. Like which this happened to this guy. And this is why it's so important to understand what Sato is doing, you know, like sorry, I'm I'm I'm, you know, go talking my books, but Richard: Hmm. Alex: it it's it really is that sort of thing where you will not be able, Microsoft would not be able to do something like this on SATO network because they would not have the capacity to do it. Richard: No, if you if you have your ducks lined up, if you have your management of your own identity, then th this simply can't happen in the first place because the compromised account was the reason this happened and then their infrastructure went into some kind of overdrive and deleted it because it was compromised. you know, that's just not a thing a third party can do to you if you have, you know, personal control of your your data. so Yeah, I think it's it's just a classic case of like people having no idea and I think I mean there's so many more cases of of related stuff I think we should kind of handle outside of the news, but this just such a classic case of I think people not having realised when they signed up like just how fragile things were and just how far from having any level of control. that they were. Right. So people buy something, you pay for something, you feel like generally, you know, there comes with some kind of terms of service that's gonna cover my ass really. You know, I'm not gonna get too badly screwed and and that's not true, right? That's just not true with digital content. and people I think are learning it really slowly. Alex: Indeed. and and it's and it's one of those situations where like y y you get upset with this company, but at the same time your own assumptions regarding that company were not really based in reality, right? Because you thought that whatever happens, you'll you'll have an out. You know, that that Richard: Right. Alex: safety and convenience that that they kinda push on you. Not explicitly, but they kinda like you know, underneath Richard: Yeah. Alex: the surface they want to make you feel like everything's gonna be okay. Well turns out that, you know, you can get screwed over. And nothing no one has felt this more than all the gamers who happen to own a PlayStation or that are thinking of buying a PlayStation in the future because Sony is about to end the physical disc production starting in January twenty twenty eight. And again, it comes back to this idea of what do you own? How do you keep ownership in a digital space? And I think that's that's gonna be the the the topic for for today. But you know, how does the digital ownership tie into the idea of the open internet? Richard: well I think it's part of the same part of a whole, right? Digital ownership is if you think about the internet as a kind of digital world, a digital you know, place you live your digital life, then ownership is one of the the rights and the things you do as part of your life. so a lot of the things that you know, a dig an open internet, a lot of the reasons that's important to you, well, that relates to, you know, how you actually have control of your your digital content. So the simplest way to get started on thinking about the relationship, I was thinking about this earlier, is it's about your identity, right? So if you own your identity, if you control your identity, then you have a chance of owning the things that that o that belong to that identity. But if that identity is like rented or actually just vaguely granted to you by a third party and that ent you know, your that identity that's not yours, it belongs to them because it's behind the login system that they created on their machines, and behind their terms of service. That's the identity that owns the thing you bought, and that identity belongs to them. So you've got some tenuous l right to access it, but it doesn't really belong to you. And that I think is the real key way to understand it to get your mind kind of connecting it together. It's like, okay, so the thing that owns whatever it is, my online music collection isn't me. It's my Spotify account or it's my YouTube music account and that's not really me. There's much more to it than that in terms of the openness, like can you use the things that you own, et cetera. But I think we'll we'll get into that. But to start understanding that question, it's like who are you in the actual power relations there? And if you're not the one that controls the identity, then that identity owning things is meaningless for you. Alex: and it and it's and it's one of those things where you you kinda have to explain to people that there there is a how should I put it, there's a war or or a battle taking place between these mega corporations on who gets to have the most people Richard: Mm-hmm. Alex: or you know, bots or whatever you want. I mean people, let's say people on their fifthum, right? And Richard: Mm-hmm. Alex: and whenever you go to a website and you see login with Google, login with Apple, that Richard: Yeah. Alex: should, you know, spark spark something in your mind and tell you that that's Richard: Well Alex: that's a corporation taking charge of your identity online. Richard: Yeah. I mean there's a there's a reason why would they why does Google want to run the servers, the OAuth servers they happen to be, that do the work that manage that process? If they're you know, what are they getting out of it? 'Cause they're not just gonna o offer it for free because they they're nice people. So they're clearly wanting to expand their reach. The flip side of it is When we talk about that guy losing his Microsoft account, he w he was presumably a good Microsoft user and put all his kids' photos in the Microsoft OneDrive. What we're missing is anything he set up to log in with Microsoft also went. Right? So he may or may not have like he'll just have to go and find out which way the wind blows in terms of going to other places, other services he used if he was using that account as his login, right? Maybe they're they're well organized and they'll have a way for him to get back in. Maybe not. Maybe they're just like, Well, you have no way of telling us who you are. That's been deleted. Yeah, sorry, but whatever you've got with us is gone now too. Alex: Yeah, and and I think it's it's one of these I don't know like very depressing negative loops where account creation fatigue kinda opened Richard: Mm. Alex: the gate for Facebook and for Meta and Google and Apple to create the service. Richard: Yeah. Alex: Right, because people got tired of having to create so many accounts everywhere, right? But you don't Richard: Yeah. Alex: understand that. If if all your keys are on the keychain that Google or Apple controls, the moment your relationship with Google or Apple sours. The whole keychain disappears. Right? It's not like they take the keychain and they give you back all the keys. Like just the keychain was ours. No, they take the whole thing away. And Richard: Mm-hmm. Alex: it's it's y I think that people have to look a bit in terms of like what are the economics of this. For example, I was doing some research and I found out that every Google user in in the United States of America makes Google around four hundred and eighty dollars every year. So they have a a very good reason to keep you on their network to to keep all your information because you're literally creating money. I mean, ten people that's four hundred and eighty four thousand eight hundred dollars, a hundred people is forty eight thousand dollars, and you know, a thousand people is half a million and and they have millions and millions of users. So you can imagine how much money we're talking about here. It's not a like a little sum. And all of that money is literally money that could have been yours, could have been could have stayed in your wallet if you're using a network where all there are caps in places where you only pay for the actual use and you know you cannot be squeezed for, you know, paid twenty dollars for a service that costs twenty cents. Richard: Right. Well and and and if you just had some kind of even footing when it came to deciding what happened with that data. So someone had to make you an offer, look, you know, let us push our ads to you and we'll give you a dollar fifty. But they actually had to make the offer rather than they can just do a backroom deal with Google and the terms of service change underneath your feet and suddenly you've got ads in your email and you didn't anticipate it, right? That's the big difference, is do you d are you even close to being at the table when those decisions are being made? Alex: Right, if you and if you're not at the table, you are on the table as we as we all Richard: Ha ha ha. Alex: know. But it's it's true and and it's and it's one of these things where where it it just like happens very, very slowly and all of a sudden you get used to just clicking accept on any sort of terms of conditions because they're so long by purpose. On purpose. They're very long on Richard: Well I think yeah. Yeah. Alex: purpose, so you won't read them. What were you gonna say? Richard: I think it's it's it's quite subtle too, 'cause I was thinking about this in the shower and one of the things that happened is that stuff got dressed up. I mean it's like skewomorphic design, right? You know, the save i the save button is an old floppy disk that knows, you know, Gen Z kid and has a clue what it is, but just means that now. Right. So that we're mimetic creatures. We understand these these sort of pictures and so forth. So They used shopping trolleys and what's in your bag and that kind of subscription, right? They had this terminology for selling you. Well, no, for asking for your money for to rent out or to have tenuous access rights to something, but they use the I'm selling you something vocabulary and science that that you're used to from physical goods. So we immediately just imprinted the the the interaction with, well, this was like buying a pair of shoes or something in a shop, but it wasn't. Right. And so people very surprised. You know, of course, hidden in the terms of service, etcetera, is all the information about how it just s very much isn't the same as buying that thing. But it kind of just it wasn't just slipped in there. The desi those design decisions were there to make you comfortable, but they were also there to convince you that this was an everyday ordinary purchase, just like your others, and you own the thing. You know, you should feel happy that you've, you know, improved your life by bringing this thing into a you know, the whole commercial shtick. But It was masking the fact that this was no sale, this was this was the signing of a rental agreement. Alex: Exactly. And it's it's one of those one of those situations when where you even if you figure it out, you figure it out way down the line. Right? And and there's I remember how enraged people were when Google decided to read all your emails. And it's like, it's just randomized, you know, it's just for you know, doing better ads and blah blah blah. But you That came and went. And people just accepted Richard: Mm-hmm. Alex: it. And I think that the speed at which these things happen now have have gone up so much. You know, like the the water is starting to boil so fast that the frog is noticing. And Richard: Yeah. Well I think I mean it it's it's just like the first first people to do this kind of thing were seeing what they could get away with, right? Or like or very cleverly in a meeting, yeah, we could change this or do that and that would be slightly more profitable, we could change the way that works, right? Now people are looking at thousands of examples watching the competition do these kinds of things. And so everybody's starting to do it. Like everybody everyone in any corporate scenario now wants recurring revenue. So they're trying to turn anything they can into a subscription, cars, anything. and so yeah, the speed of i increase is is is vast. I mean it'll only stop increasing when there's no more ground to cover, right? When everything has had this process happen to it. Alex: And I will I will have a hot take right now. I I you might disagree with what I'm about to say, but I think that even services like Proton and Tutanota are funded in a similar way, but they are meant to offer like a some sort of like controlled opposition. But at the end of the day it's still some V C backed firm that they're giving you like, don't go on Google, do us because we are safe, we protect your all your data and so on. But at the end of the day, they they still have to abide by the laws of Switzerland or wherever they're based, and they have given away personal data on many, many occasions. So this whole idea of trying to solve the problem but still keeping everybody in the old model, I think that kind of has to go. Because until you're really Web3, where there is literally no way for people to take your stuff or to sell you in or stop you or enclose you and that's like a ground level right that you have. You know, that's when we can talk about digital rights. Right? Because right now we don't have digital rights. We have you know the illusion of rights. We we and we're s constantly surveillance. Richard: Yeah, so I mean I I agree. I don't want to cast aspersions at guys like Tudonoda and Proton because I think they're fighting a good fight. But to your point, yeah. Alex: They are fighting the good fight but they're the they have a lot of how should I put it economical incentives to do so. You know, they're they're not doing it out of the kindness of their heart. Richard: Right. Well I think I don't know. You know, people people found companies because they want to do the right thing. I think there there are two big issues. One for them, one is as you pointed out, the regulations, etcetera, where they're based, you know, trapping them on a lot of cases. and you know, notably someone like Mulvar did have, you know, gave away gave the police all of their records which were zero, which was well done. You know, they've they they'd thought that through and they did a good job. So it it's it's possible to fight the good fight. Alex: That's an exception. Yeah. Richard: Yeah, exactly. But it also it's the other side of it is just that economic battle, right? Proton is not huge. and they struggle every day to beat out a thousand other providers, including Gmail, which is awful, because in running things the way Proton do, if they keep fighting a good fight, if they keep things running the way they are then they're only able to get a very small sliver of the of the market because they can't out compete on marketing and promotion, et cetera, right? So they're always under economic pressure and that's I I think for the reasons you're saying, right? They they they're stuck in the old model in the end. Alex: But that's what I mean, like they should be embracing something like Salo Network because it would allow them to build something new without having all these constraints, but they still choose to do it the old way because in my opinion, they're not trying to change something, they're trying to take over from someone, right? The the the business model is to not to to defeat Google, is to replace Google, right? And if if I can become the Google of my side of the world, then that's what I'm aiming for. You know, I'm not aiming for giving people better services at a at a lower cost or you know, I'm just trying to manipulate the narrative so that I appear to be doing that, but in reality I just want to take over. Richard: Right. Well, all the same economic forces are there and there's a real, you know, pressure every step that they're gonna be pushed slightly the wrong way every time they lift their foot off ground. I I totally totally agree on that. And it's it's it's a constant problem. The the difference that you're looking for is could you do something like Protoma Proton Mail where the network stuff, the sending and receiving is separate from the data co data, you know, holding and is separate from the corporate side, right? So that they're all they're all different services, right? And so there isn't a way in to like be able to s to actually ever you know, for whatever reason, you know, you may never have wanted to, but your corporate overlords might make you start monetizing the fact that people can't leave, right? If if if you're in the if you've set your tech up the way that they have, that is always a risk to the users, right? And I would argue and therefore spend my life building something that that has an alternative set of models on it, that you have to break that that model to to break free. and so I think while they're you know, I would rather be using Proton than other mail services, for a bunch of reasons, they are still stuck, like you say, in a in a model that eventually is likely to give way to to a whole lot of economic pressures. Alex: Exactly. And I and I think that, you know, like I I'm wondering, are are are we witnessing you know, a split between the business model and consumer sentiment? Right? Like the the business model is is continuing to be this like, we're better than Google, but you have to kind of pay us 'cause we're fighting a good fight, but it's literally the same business model, right? And consumer sentiment that says, I don't want that anymore. I don't want to to pay these prices that are like a hundred times what it actually costs. I don't wanna have to to deal with all these login steps, like, you know, two factor authentication, all these crazy passwords. There is a a simple way of doing this. You know, you can do it with keys and it's so much faster. It just requires you to have a bit of discipline so you don't lose your keys, you're right. And and I think I'd much rather do that than have to have all these like authenticators on my phone and trying to remember all these passwords. It's just just not fun. Richard: Yeah. Well, I think I mean being responsible for your own security does have its own challenges, but the payoff is massive, right? Because like you say, you then wipe away all of these these things. you also have the ability to do things that you just can't in a password world, right? like have your software create a pair of keys for you that will let you do stuff securely for a short period of time and then just delete them. Right? 'Cause you can create personalities on the fly, right? This is a powerful set of tools that you just don't have on the current internet where essentially any any space where you can do things anonymously is being shut down. You're almost always having to sign in or validate in some way. but then even if you can you know, the things that you can do anonymously, you can only look, right? There's it's a it's a v it's a read only web for you, right? So you can w wander around anonymously looking at stuff, but you can't interact, you can't do anything, you can't have any Agency if you're anonymous. running your own security and identity software with things like keys, that can be managed by good software. You don't have to like spend your life doing cryptography or anything. But what it means is you've got the power to decide how those things happen. So you can create an anonymous account and interact, prove that you're the same person through that account, so you can buy and sell something as that identity securely while you're using it and then just toss the identity when you don't need it anymore. that's radically different to anything we see on the internet at the moment. Alex: Alright, that's a very high concept idea that you Richard: Mm-hmm. Alex: just put forward. How would you translate that into a a practical example? Like let's say we're we're we're normal people, how would that look like for us? I'm a father of three, Richard: Yeah. Alex: you know, I I have to take care of my family's Netflix accounts or stuff like that. How would this ma w way of doing things affect me in a positive way? Richard: There's there's a bunch of ways, right? So one is you just you wanna you want to you know, buy your spouse a gift. Right? Simple interaction and you want to do it anonymously until the birthday that the gift is for and you don't want ad tracking suddenly popping up someone in your household is looking for an anniversary ring. Like you know, it's a simple human interaction, but you want your privacy there, right? And we just don't have the ability to control that on the current internet. So you're running this bizarre risk that you're gonna get f found out for doing something totally innocent that you in fact quite positive that you just don't have any ability to act anonymously. Another example would be that you actually you want to buy a ticket to see someone speak about something political and you don't want that left in your your record, right? That's getting more you know more political, but you could do that, right? It could be a simple situation but I want to buy a ticket to that and I don't want a record of it going around. you know, I don't want to I live in a s you know a certain place and I want to buy, you know, I don't know pharmaceuticals that aren't that aren't legal that might be abortion pills or something like that, right? There's a there's a there's a thousand different examples where you might want your privacy while you're doing things. But right now the internet is set up to expose you all over the place and to share that information as much as possible. So I think these are the these are the cases where that really matters. you know similarly if you buy a blood pressure monitoring machine do you want your health insurance company to know all about it, right? There's like a lot of cases where you want an identity to use for one thing that's separate from another and it's nobody's business that those two things, you know, should be connected together. Alex: Yeah, and I and I think y you kinda like hit the nail on the head with with that last argument, at least in in my opinion, because it's literally giving the option of surveillance to the business model that is most extractive. Right? So so I'm like y I can end up in a situation where I get denied healthcare Or maybe I get fired from my work because they kinda find found out that I'm I'm I have a blood pressure issue and they're worried that it's gonna affect my work. And it's all these things that you could solve beforehand with cash that now that cash is getting phased out, Richard: Mm-hmm. Alex: you kinda kinda like get stuck into in this new version of the world. That is amazing for people who are in power, amazing for vested interests, but is anything but that for the average person. And how do you get Richard: absolutely. Alex: how do you get that average guy to understand these things? Because you know, like sometimes we have these discussions here and it feels like we're talking so high level, but it's such a down to earth problem that we're trying to solve. Richard: Well, I think the I mean, the big issue is where you get regulatory capture into this as well. So getting right back to the very heart of digital ownership, right? It's not just that companies can switch off physical things you might have bought, like your robot vacuum or whatever. But we've actually got the DCMA, which is worldwide now because of the intellectual property treaties, the WIPO treaties that most countries have signed, which makes it illegal for you to turn the thing back on, right? It actually makes it illegal for you to mess with your some physical thing you bought, like a robot vacuum. If you if you have the smarts or someone on, you know, eBay or wherever can sell you a little chip That you can plug into things so it works when they turn the cloud service off, that's illegal. You're not allowed to do that. You're not allowed to break locks on your own stuff. So, you know, when people kind of want to understand why this matters to them, right, that it's getting to the point where, you know, car companies could just decide, this model is, you know We don't want to support it anymore. Turn them all off, right? And it's illegal in most countries to Alex: John Deere does that. Richard: to retrofit that, right? And to to work around it. Alex: John Deere does this with the tractors. if you try to fix the Richard: Right, exactly. So Alex: tractor by yourself, it notices and it like shuts down everything. And it's it's crazy. It's something you bought and they can just like turn it off remotely. And it's another thing that I saw I heard about like Samsung TVs taking snapshots of what you're watching and sending it back to Samsung so they can sell it. So Richard: Yep. Yep. Alex: again, we are dealing mostly with the business model. It's a business Richard: Yeah. Alex: model that it can no longer grow the pie because we kind of destroyed the credit market. Okay, now now I'm going high level. But basically what I'm trying Richard: Ha ha ha. Alex: to say is that if you if you make money from a job, if you take a wage, your money is worth less and less, which means you can buy less and less. Which means the things that you do buy, the people who create those things try to get as much money out of you as possible. Because they know you can't afford other things. This is the basic in certification. You can buy the Richard: Mm-hmm. Alex: phone for a thousand dollars, but then you're stuck, right? And they they have you and then they can like squeeze you a bit here, squeeze you a bit there. And it's all about how much they can squeeze before you collapse. And Richard: Yeah. Alex: I think that this business model kinda has to end somehow because we are I think we're at this like end of the cycle. And I think stuff like NVIDIA, all these crazy valuation, SK Heinek and all that stuff, it kind of like brings to bear this idea that you can't really do that endlessly without having any sort of repercussion. And the way I bring it back back into the open internet is that your margin is my opportunity. Whoever notices these things happening. Well, our message to them is have a look at Sedo Network, have a look at the refactor and see how you can make money out of this by being a normal person, dealing with normal people and providing value. And yeah. Richard: Well, this is this is the amazing thing. I mean, it's not radical, right? It's going back to the idea that there are two bakeries on the street and maybe they both do fabulously well because some people like Abe's and some people like Susan's. But maybe eventually Susan takes over because Abe's product is substandard, right? But people can just choose which bakery they want to go to and get good honest service. And those businesses are motivated to you know, branch out into cookies or whatever it is if that's what the c you know, what customers are starting to be interested in. it's not radical. This is a very well understood way of running stuff. It's actually pulling the tentacles that make that sort of thing impossible out of the system. Right. So making sure that if you buy an IoT device and y like people come to Sido and start putting your IoT devices on a SIDO backbone where people can interact with their devices without a centralized data center, right? People can buy a device and they can know it'll continue to work for as long as they want to keep running it. That's you know, that's a real market and that's something that's very different, I think. And I think you're right, people are starting to see this and starting to feel like, God damn it, everything's a subscription now, right? Like I have to keep paying BMW to keep the heated seat function in my car that I bought, etcetera. And it's getting to the point where people are now looking at well, can can I have the washing machine without the cloud connectivity? Because they're just suspicious of like what that's gonna mean for them. Alex: I was watching a video the other day about this this guy who bought a Mercedes E190 from the 80s and used Richard: Right. Alex: it as an example for N shatification and showed Richard: Right, I s I think they the internet tried to s show me that same video, yes. Alex: And it just goes to show like how much better quality was back in the day and how they they they know how to make products that work. They're just choosing not to. Because again, it it's a question of you know maybe we're going too too far in the deep end, but as as the value of of money goes down you kinda wanna keep the prices at the same level. So you kinda have to cut things over and over again. And it gets to the point where you can't cut anymore. Then you have to find new business models and that's how you get these subscriptions and and so on, right? Richard: Yeah. Alex: and I think I think that when we're gonna look at these things like five, ten years into the future, we're kinda gonna see like when did we jump the shark? Was it the was it the subscription to have heated seats? Richard: Yeah. Alex: you know, was it was it the camera that monitors your face when you drive? Was it Samsung, you know, taking snapshots of what you're watching and sending them and selling that data? I think it's a combination of all of them. But again, this is your opportunity because the people who are doing these things, right, they know that this won't last forever, right? It's it's a kinda like a race to the bottom. But Richard: Mm-hmm. Alex: at the same time, there are things that are being built, there are alternatives happening, and you know, while private net networks use your data as a moat, the open internet gives the users a moat. A moat to protect themselves from all these sort of like predatory behaviors. Richard: Yeah, no absol absolutely. And I think it it it doesn't just do that in providing that protection, it also and those opportunities, it creates a much more vibrant space, right? it's you know Are you shopping at the hyper mall or are you shopping at those kind of bakeries on the street, right? Where you get real variation and you know, people trying new things, people doing new things. And the big thing to remember is in almost all of our interactions now, we're getting a sliver of the value out of them, right? All of our digital interactions, I mean the the classic one is just it's not just that Google or whoever are you know, squeezing every last inch of data out of you that they count ounce of data out of you that they can and then vending it for the highest possible value. They are doing that. The thing is not just that they're doing that, it's that they're doing that almost exclusively for their own benefit. You get the very minimum that they can give you in that that accounting. And you have no ability really, realistically in modern systems to to to change that to change that agreement or even to prevent them from changing the agreement itself underneath you. So getting out of that system, the thing that I think most people won't realise is that you can make I mean, forget the thirty percent tax on any kind of transactions on on iPhones, which is, you know, just a really egregious and obvious version of rent seeking. it's you know every interaction we're getting a of a a a a mile fraction of the you know the revenue support etc that we could be out of these things. So, you know, the the YouTube have done hi YouTube, I know we're on you, but they've done a great job of the classic American dream style one two where there's a few mega wealthy, very profitable, you know, creative you know, creators, influencers, whatever you want to call them out there, with channels. which which YouTube obviously likes that there to be fifty really popular ones then thousands of less popular ones. and that also makes people feel, look, like being being an influencer's a real, you know, career. It's something I could really pursue. but in that deal, those influencers are getting pennies on the dollar if that. I mean, they're getting just enough to become very wealthy doing it, so that the influence a myth can build around this business model for YouTube, right? It's it's no by no means a fair accounting. And in fact on an open run platform where people were getting a genuine percentage of the ad revenue they were generating for them s for their own from their own content, they could get they could do on a few thousand viewers what it takes millions of viewers to do on something like YouTube. And I think that's the real difference is the ability to have, you know, we're gonna make it come home to people, the ability to do something like that and build a business around, you know, a a thousand to two thousand customers like like a lot of small businesses actually operate on. that's a real thing on an open internet. And the only reason it's not a real thing on current internet is because of enclosure and because people are trapped into these systems and because of a lot of regulation around, you know, things like compliance and stuff that makes it impossible for people to run their businesses. That's that's something that you can change and something you can be part of making that difference just by starting to to use it. Alex: Yeah, I think this this idea of client and server, right? Where where Richard: Yeah. Alex: the server where the server dictates the terms of the deal and it's Richard: Mm-hmm. Alex: a bit like you know, that scene in Star Wars with Lando Carizian getting s screwed Richard: Yes. Alex: over by Darth Vader and he's like, I have altered the deal. Pray I don't alter it further. And that's the way Richard: Yes. Alex: it feels when when you deal with these companies, you know, like Your only option is to accept the the terms and conditions, right? You have no recourse. and what the open internet does, what something like SATO network does, is to create like a constitutional layer that everybody has to adhere to, right? So in the face of the network, Microsoft and user XYZ556 have the same rights. They are treated equally, they have the same rights, they can behave. according to the rules of the network and they can coexist and they cannot impinge on one another just because one has more resources. Richard: Yeah. Absolutely. So you can still you could still do things like say on Alex tube I'm only hosting videos about frogs and you know you could dec Alex: Hey, don't steal my idea. Richard: sorry about that. Anyway, and I could have a you know only videos about pancakes. Whatever, you can still do what you want to do. You can run your accounts, your businesses, your things, a as you wish. No one's telling you you have to cover content that you don't want to, et cetera. But the f inverse is also true. If I send a message, it goes out across the network. I don't need to ask anyone's permission. Doesn't mean anyone needs to pay attention to me, but it also means I don't need to ask anyone's attention permission, including Microsoft or whatever. So I can send, you know, like emails kind of used to be but but never had any economic way to to keep forcing it forward where, you know, they would just be broadcast across the whole network and they'd get to wherever they were going. That's a real thing on on CIDO, right? So nobody can can change your ability to do that. No one can lock you out. So when you make a deal with a company, it's them and you. Every single time it's them coming to you, you making a decision. It's no ability to lock you in. If they change what they're doing, you can walk away because they cannot stop you. And that's a very, very different experience. And I think, you know, one of the things I see when people start using, you know, CIDO tools like the video call or whatever is, afterwards when you ask them about it, you know, there may be comments about the UI, I wasn't expecting this, you know, 'cause they're used to using something else or whatever. But the when you point out you know, wasn't it enjoyable, you didn't have to log in, you didn't have any issues and and they suddenly realize if they remember their last call Yeah, yeah, like two people couldn't get onto the Zoom call because Zoom was trying to force them to download the app and wouldn't let them use the browser or whatever it was. yeah. The per and then, you know, the person who started the call did it from their personal account accidentally, so the whole call ended forty five minutes in 'cause that was the limit of the call and they had to switch over to the paid account, whatever it is. Just being free of all of that and and having a v you know, just a seamless thing where, yes, you know, you're paying for a service if you're paying for it, but you're you're paying for what you get. and things like making a video call should be so close to free. They should be you know, watching one ad should pay for a thousand video calls 'cause ninety nine percent of what is happening is between you and the people you're talking to and no no company's involved. Alex: Exactly. And and it's it's one of those situations where it's literally a few pennies cost you ten dollars in a monthly subscription and you have to use some app. And Richard: Yeah. Alex: whenever you wanna invite someone to have a chat with you on your app, the link tracks that person and also tries to get that person to download the app as well and Richard: if if they don't have to create an account themselves just to use it, et cetera, et cetera. We w and we've we've Alex: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Richard: we've gotten used to the idea that that's like, you know, on a phone you can call someone with just their number, but you know, we've gotten so used to like, is so and so on signal or are they on telegram or are they on WhatsApp or how do I contact you? And that you can't just talk to each other across applications. It's this sort of weird thing we've just gotten used to. Which is funny because they fought, you know, there was a long, hard fight, funnily enough, by legislators to stop that nonsense between telcos back in the day. Alex: Yeah, and I I think, you know, coming back to this idea of like account creation fatigue. if you like to be free and do things your own way, you're gonna love the open internet because it's basically that. It's it's allowing you to to do all these things that now have so many layers of friction at a fraction of the cost, if not free, without any sort of repercussions or having to remember passwords and stuff like that. And it's literally a better alternative. It's a better product. Sure, you know, it's gonna take some time to grow, but it is the better product. And anyone who enjoys having that sort of control over their own life, digital life, you know, if you want to talk about digital rights, I think, Richard: Mm. Alex: you know, if you want to write a book about it, I think SATO Network should be a chapter in itself. Richard: Ha ha ha. Alex: Because it is literally digital rights. And it's rights that we used to have in the real world. For example, you have a phone subscription to a w a contract. They cannot change the contract. You know, they have to get Richard: Mm. Alex: you on a new contract if they want to change it. But online, they just press a button, they change the deal, you have to accept, otherwise you're out. That's you know, we can't live with that anymore. Richard: No, I think it was like I talked about like you cleverly using the language of shopping for shopping carts and bags and stuff to kind of convince people who are doing the same thing they were before. The That was subtle. What was not subtle is corporate response to the laws and I'm talking about this what I mentioned before, things like DCMA, right? Like going hard at it, corporates went hard at it to try and take as much of the ground as they could when it came to legislating not just the internet but then digital goods and all of those sorts of things, right? So they were never going to stop people from being able to repair, I don't know, a hammer that they owned. But somehow because we got digital stuff into things and that's now most of our tools, most of our daily objects have a digital electronic aspect, they managed to sneak in. We get to tell you what you can do with your own thing. And that's that was a full court press. That was that was some hard work by corporates wanting to take ground away from consumers and we pay for it. every day in in a bunch of ways around the products and services that we get. and so to your point, I think the open internet alternatives are better on a on a bunch of things. They're they're better user experiences in the classic is my you know, is this web product good? Because they don't have dumb lockouts. They don't have, you know, cut offs because you you haven't got the right account level, et cetera, et cetera. you know, th those bad experiences you have where you can't get raised customer service or you you need to log into your email to get the email to unlock your email, those kind of dumb things just just don't happen. At the same time they're a better experience because just like CDs used to cost, you know, thirty dollars in Australia and you can now download the music for a fraction of that. The same thing can happen again because if you were just giving the artist directly what they got from your purchase, if you gave them twenty cents for downloading the zone, they'd be absolutely over the moon. Right. And so it can be a better product in both ways. The user experience can be better, but the overall product experience could also is is by definition better because there's less rent seeking and extraction happening between you and and the product itself. Alex: Yeah, I think I think in a in a more simple way you could say that er anything that you can think of that you wanna do, you probably can do it and you won't b have to ask permission from anyone to do that thing, Richard: Mm-hmm. Alex: right? And you won't have to pay Richard: You won't have to ask permission and you won't have to pay tax. Alex: Yeah, basically. Basically that's the the TLDR. And I think, you know, Richard: I could have just said that at the start maybe. Alex: I I don't I I think that's like a as good of a pitch as you're gonna get. And I Richard: Yeah. Alex: think that this new wave of the internet is actually coming. I think that we're delivering on a promise that was made decades ago by other people. Richard: Right. Alex: And it's it's a it's a very strange feeling, but it was, you know, it's was it's unavoidable. And I think that all these business models that are squeezing normal people, just like tr trying to nickel and dime them every single way possible, I think that's gonna eventually create it's already creating this like tidal wave and Richard: Mm-hmm. Alex: you know, the people who are watching us, the people who are listening to the spot i you know, if if you're a coder, this should be music to your ears. If you're a marketer, this should be music to your ears. If you have a business, this should be music to your ears. Because you will be able to just like you do with AI for you know, work, you could leverage AI to do more work in less time. Here you can generate more wealth, you can build faster. And not have all that overhang that I'm can tell you, like it's gonna get way Richard: Mm. Alex: worse. You you're gonna be afraid to write something in signal or whatsapp because maybe the system will read it and you'll get problems at work, or maybe the system will read it and you won't be able to buy medicine for the same price, or the food that you're Richard: Mm. Alex: buying, they find out you you ate too much meat. no, we can't have that, right? So I think I think you know it sounds very bleak. But it's also very positive. It's positive because you have a way out, you have an exit. And this you know, not only is the grass greener on the other side, but you get to, you know, keep the the cows that you graze on that pasture without Richard: Mm. Alex: being worried of, you know, the man coming to get you. Richard: Yeah, absolutely. I think it's it's it's really exciting because I think there's also so much more space for v for vibrancy and cool stuff, right? The the more providers who get better results from serving users better can only result in cooler shit for everyone, right? That's the that's that to me is one of the big promises is just get away from the shopping mall, corporate internet to something that's actually vibrant and alive and has a space for you and has cool stuff that you didn't think was was out there. Alex: My my slogan, my you know, catchphrase for this episode would be cooperation instead of corporation. And Richard: Ha ha ha. Alex: and I think that kinda like sums it up. What do you think, Richard? Richard: I like that. I like the co opa cooper. Yeah, I'm I'm dyslexic so sometimes I might have trouble d disambiguating the two, but I think that works. Alex: Alright, is there anything you wanna add a closing comment or Richard: No, no, it's been a it's been I think a really fun episode. There's there's a bunch of stuff. I mean it's actually a really rich and and interesting topic to go over. So thanks everyone for joining. And yeah, keep your eye on on what we're doing at Sidoa, come along and and and start using these tools and see how just how good they can be and just how different the experience can be, how much better it can be. Alex: Yes, I completely agree with your assessment. Thank you so much, everybody, and we'll catch you next week. Don't forget to follow the open internet pod on your favorite podcast app or on YouTube and share this video with friends, family, and even random people on the street, just top people on the streets. And hey, have you guys seen this? It's a great pod. Take care. Richard: Thank you everyone.