Jared Cohen - The New Digital Age

We also want to thank the guys from Peak Performance, particularly Joe Dowdell and Jose and Emilio Gomez, for keeping us healthy during the final stages of writing.

And to our families: From Jared, a very special thank-you to Rebecca Cohen, who during our writing process went from being a long-distance girlfriend to a wife. Throughout, she has been an intellectual partner, and served as one of our most helpful advisors. Her expertise and knowledge of the legal system brought up a number of provocative questions that ended up becoming defining features of several chapters. Also a special thanks to Dee and Donald Cohen, Emily and Jeff Nestler, Annette and Paul Shapiro, Audrey Bear, and Aaron and Rachel Zubaty for being such a supportive family. There is also a special debt of gratitude owed to Alan Mirken, who is a veteran of the publishing industry and in addition to being a great uncle (pun intended), is always insightful in his advice and guidance.

From Eric, a lifetime of thank-yous to Wendy Schmidt, who brought a sense of humanity and purpose to a dry technology executive. She bridges the human and technological worlds flawlessly.

—E.S., J.C., January 2013

NOTES

Introduction

The Internet is among the few things: This quote is adapted from part of Eric Schmidt’s speech at the April 1997 JavaOne Conference in San Francisco. The original quote is “The Internet is the first thing that humanity has built that humanity doesn’t understand, the largest experiment in anarchy that we have ever had.” We have adapted the quote to our current view, which is that it is not the first thing, but instead “among the few,” with others including nuclear weapons, steam power, and electricity.

it is the first that will make it possible: The printing press, the landline, the radio, the television, and the fax machine all represent technological revolutions, but all required intermediaries.

50 million: See figures for year 2000 in “Estimated Internet Users (World) and Percentage Growth,” ITU World Telecommunication Indicators (2001), referred to by Claudia Sarrocco and Dr. Tim Kelly, Improving IP Connectivity in the Least Developed Countries, International Telecommunication Union (ITU), Strategy and Policy Unit, 9, accessed October 23, 2012, http://www.itu.int/osg/spu/ni/ipdc/study/Improving%20IP%20Connectivity%20in%20the%20Least%20Developed%20Countries1.pdf.

more than 2 billion: See figures for year 2010 in “Global Numbers of Individuals Using the Internet, Total and Per 100 Inhabitants, 2001–2011,” International Telecommunication Union (ITU), ICT Data and Statistics (IDS), accessed October 8, 2012, http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/ict/statistics/.

from 750 million to well over 5 billion: See sums for years 2000 and 2010 in “Mobile-Cellular Telephone Subscriptions,” International Telecommunication Union (ITU), ICT Data and Statistics (IDS), accessed October 8, 2012, http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/ict/statistics/.

projected eight billion: See total for both sexes’ population in “World Midyear Population by Age and Sex for 2025,” U.S. Census Bureau, International Data Base, accessed October 8, 2012, http://www.census.gov/population/international/data/idb/worldpop.php.

many old institutions … reallocate the concentration of power: This concept was something we had discussed for a while, but it wasn’t until a conversation with our good friend Alec Ross that we were able to capture it in this way. He deserves shared credit for this concept. See Alec Ross, “How Connective Tech Boosts Political Change,” CNN, June, 20, 2012, http://www.cnn.com/2012/06/20/opinion/opinion-alec-ross-tech-politics/index.html.

banned the use of mobile phones: “Better than Freedom? Why Iraqis Cherish Their Mobile Phones,” Economist, November 12, 2009, http://www.economist.com/node/14870118.

unreliable access to food, water and electricity: “Iraq: Key Facts and Figures,” BBC, September, 7, 2010, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-11095920.

garbage hadn’t been collected in years : Zaineb Naji and Dawood Salman, “Baghdad’s Trash Piles Up,” Environmental News Service, July 6, 2010, http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/jul2010/2010-07-06-01.html.

CHAPTER 1

OUR FUTURE SELVES

five billion more people: The World in 2011 : ICT Facts and Figures, International Telecommunication Union (ITU), accessed October 10, 2012, http://www.itu.int/ITUD/ict/facts/2011/material/ICTFactsFigures2011.pdf. The above source shows that as of 2011 35 percent of the world’s population is online. We factored in population increase projections to estimate five billion set to join the virtual world.

Consider the impact of basic mobile phones: This fisherwomen thought experiment came out of a conversation with Rebecca Cohen, and while we put it in the context of the Congo, the example belongs to her.

650 million mobile-phone users in Africa: “Africa’s Mobile Phone Industry ‘Booming,’ ” BBC, November 9, 2011, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-15659983.

close to 3 billion across Asia: See mobile cellular subscriptions, Asia & Pacific, year 2011, in “Key ICT Indicators for the ITU/BDT Regions (Totals and Penetration Rates),” International Telecommunication Union (ITU), ICT Data and Statistics (IDS), updated November 16, 2011, http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/ict/statistics/at_glance/KeyTelecom.html.

The majority of these people are using basic-feature phones: Ibid. Compare mobile cellular subscriptions to active mobile broadband subscriptions for 2011.

life expectancy is less than sixty years, or even fifty: “Country Comparison: Life Expectancy at Birth,” CIA, World Fact Book, accessed October 11, 2012, https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2102rank.html#top.

This will even be true: One of the authors spent the summer of 2001 in this remote village, without electricity, running water, or a single cell phone or landline. During a return trip in the fall of 2010, many of the Maasai women had crafted beautiful beaded pouches to store their cell phones in.

China’s expansive “shanzhai” network: Nicholas Schmidle, “Inside the Knockoff-Tennis-Shoe Factory,” New York Times Magazine, August 19, 2010, Global edition, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/22/magazine/22fake-t.html?pagewanted=all.

machines can actually “print” physical objects: “The Printed World: Three-Dimensional Printing from Digital Designs Will Transform Manufacturing and Allow More People to Start Making Things,” Economist, February 10, 2011, http://www.economist.com/node/18114221.

a full-sized replica motorcycle: Patrick Collinson, “Hi-Tech Shares Take US for a Walk on the High Side,” Guardian (Manchester), March 16, 2012, http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2012/mar/16/hi-tech-shares-us.

“social robots” that can recognize human gestures: Sarah Constantin, “Gesture Recognition, Mind-Reading Machines, and Social Robotics,” H+ Magazine, February 8, 2011, http://hplusmagazine.com/2011/02/08/gesture-recognition-mind-reading-machines-and-social-robotics/.

In 2012, a team at a robotics laboratory in Japan: Helen Thomson, “Robot Avatar Body Controlled by Thought Alone,” New Scientist, July 2012, 19–20.

Consider the twenty-four-year-old Kenyan inventor Anthony Mutua: “Shoe Technology to Charge Cell Phones,” Daily Nation, May 2012, http://www.nation.co.ke/News/Shoe+technology+to+charge+cell+phones++/-/1056/1401998/-/view/printVersion/-/sur34lz/-/index.html.

placed the chip in the sole of a tennis shoe: Ibid.

Mutua’s chip is now set to go into mass production: Ibid.