nchyinotes

[nchyinotes]

Service Design Short Course at Central Saint Martins, Dec 2017

[nchyinotes]

Women, Whistleblowing, Wikileaks 

Renata Avila: Guatemalan human rights lawyer and digital rights expert; plays a central role in the international team of lawyers representing WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and his staff.

Sarah Harrison: renowned British journalist and human rights defender. Former researcher with the Centre for Investigative Journalism and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism; worked at WikiLeaks in 2010 (the height of its groundbreaking publication of US military and State Department documents).

Angela Richter: acclaimed Croatian-German theatre director, activist and author. Her interest in WikiLeaks led to the 2012 theatre piece “Assassinate Assange", and she staged "Supernerds" (a large scale transmedia-project dealing with mass surveillance, co-produced with German national TV) in 2015.

Found this through: Met and worked with Renata in London at a Thoughtworks Ideation Day, and was super inspired. Googled her, found that she was an author of this book, and pre-ordered it on OR Books.

Review

5 / 5

there were a few grammatical mistakes and typos, but aside from that - i enjoyed the topics, i loved the conversation format, the way the chapters were organised, each woman had a different background which i personally found fascinating and added a new perspective on each topic. i also really enjoyed the footnotes, found them very helpful. and of course, the ideas contained in the book are very important and timely, and motivating. a quick read but packs a lot of information, highly highly recommended. i enjoyed this immensely, though i didn't agree with every opinion expressed. although sarah mentioned at the event they they made the conscious effort not to highlight their female-ness, as in being 3 women writing and talking about this topic, is an act of feminism enough. and while sarah did talk about her personal experience as a woman (which was appalling and illuminating), and they discussed the treatment of chelsea manning in depth, i thought this was a missed opportunity to bring awareness about other women activists, how their experiences differ from men and why, how this could be remedied - as a woman who is interested in getting more involved in activism, these are all things that would be very interesting for me to know. this could have been just one conversation/essay to be added to the book.

My Takeaways

There is a movement for access to knowledge and the preservation of privacy.

the battle for access to knowledge has created the potential basis for a movement: battle of preservation of privacy, anonymity, struggle to make knowledge open and accessible for everyone

if we need to reduce the aims of the movement to one goal, i would say it would be to preserve freedom of thought.

for that, to have real freedom of thought, you have to eradicate surveillance. you have to preserve freedom of expression. you have to enable access to knowledge, fight censorship, and also enable creation. because how can you have freedom of thought if you are just passive recipients?

This is important because of huge media inaccuracies.

H: having seen the media at close first-hand, and having seen inaccurate stories both from inside and from being a subject of stories - having seen articles that appear in the news about wikileaks and edward snowden and even myself - has made me much more skeptical about mainstream reporting. when you see news that you are actually directly involved in, it’s shocking to see how the facts of the matter are not presented correctly; its spun, and sometimes even outright lies are used. … i think only understood the full extent to which the media deceive us after working at wikileaks.

fact checking (18)

journalists assume that the public need a journalistic filter on the information to which we are all entitled to have access. they don’t mind seeing agency stripped from the people. at the end of the day, journalism is all about power and control. problematic: vast amounts of documents still unpublished, pace of release is so slow.

RA: when you are in a country in conflict, you are exposed to different versions of a story constantly and to be public and private accounts of events.

the combination of scientific data and localised interpretation is really important in places like guatemala and other underreported countries, which are places where very little data is collected and limited research is done.

This is especially prominent in relation to reportage of the Global South, due to Eurocentric perspective.

the ‘facts’ regarding international events, reported from a eurocentric, remote perspective, are often misleading or even detrimental if one wants to gain an accurate idea of what is going on in the world. mainstream reporting just provides an incomplete snapshot each time a terrible event happens and emphasises the importance of certain events and downgrades others. … furthermore, due to language and cultural barriers, there are often many facts missing from the media portrayal of events in the Global South, often reported by people who do not really know the locality they are reporting from. … of course, international media coverage is also constrained by business decisions - for instance, it is more cost effective to send a foreign correspondent to a particular country occasionally, rather than having regularly on-the-ground reporting. furthermore, media organisations are still in love with the idea of exclusivity, and so are reluctant to build partnerships with local outlets. (22)

media focuses on attacks that target people with a specific western, middle class lifestyle - west only reacts with outrage when victims are white. media avoids personalising certain atrocities

Media acts as propaganda = Western propaganda, which people are not willing to realise.

media just isn’t interested in repression of western dissidents. politicians don’t want to foster a kind of self reflection regarding their own countries —> state of denial and hypocrisy in the west

ignoring such repression is a way for many people in the west to maintain their own personal freedom and privileges

by taking such  view you don’t FEEL oppressed

—> very sophisticated form of totalitarianism

real dissent is from the marginalised

this emerging totalitarian state is very tempting and appealing to people in some respects

risk of this totalitarianism esp in global south

appeal of totalitarianism: "consider someone who has connected to the internet for the first time, in a guatemalan village. because they cannot afford the super-plus plan on her little mobile phone that would give them “full access to internet, without restrictions or filters” they instead have only Facebook, a platform controlled by a private company whose sole real interest is profit and market share. and as a result they will have a poor internet for poor people, w which will only extract their data. it will offer a limited space for creation, it will place them at a greater risk of surveillance, monitoring and discrimination. that is the idea the mainstream promotes as “access”. obviously, this will very significantly alter the kind of content that people in the global south have access to. your freedom is circumscribed by poverty. an internet without net neutrality simply replicates structures of inequality and exclusion. = preserving an open and free internet, preserve whatever is left of civil liberties, to organise with others + circulate info and ideas (30-31)

problem of control and commodification of the user - free access to the network via their platform is the most efficient way to create a massive biometric database.

users are engaged in this endless cycle of consumption, unaware that all information that is hosted on Facebook has been completely privatised

users’ actions, personal connections, political opinions, cultural tastes, emotions

tech creating great inequality, must make the exclusion of benefits visible.

new tech has been built on top of existing social/economic inequality

while they will be able to connect to the internet, marginalised won’t be able to use it for effecting meaningful change in their lives. they will simply be connected to devices that control, measure, monitor, predict.

dangerous levels of inequality in the world today will bring more instability and war.

... because of this information asymmetry, having access to the source document is paramount.

the way which wikileaks operates aids self determination. the documents and archives wikileaks publishes, allow any member of the public to gain a greater understanding of the world around them, and to utilise the documents to try to effect change however they wish.

secrecy is the best friend of corruption, incompetence, waste of public resources

potentially the unreleased NSA documents could help us better understand the surveillance capabilities of central american countries and how those who are the targets of such surveillance protect themselves.

importance of source docs - in talk

impossible for people to not have biases, there is no neutrality— why source documents are so important, so read as many as you can, and as many different world sites as possible

But it is important to note that the balance of powers in our societies is such that elites are not affected by the availability of such evidence.

in some situations, it’s not a question of evidence being leaked - it doesn’t need to be leaked, it is already out there in the public domain.

even though we were witnessing a massacre in real-time committed by a supposedly “civilised nation” (gaza massacres end of 2008), and even if we had in-real-time evidence of grave human rights abuses, everyone was too busy celebrating the New Year to care.

and that is because we are all passive recipients..

How do we have the public change from passive recipients to active participants of news?

too early to expect people to think for themselves and gain confidence in their own judgment. people are very used to being patronised and lectured by approved ‘professionals’ and it is actually very comfortable to be told what to think and not to have to exercise any responsibility.

living in a collective illness of desensitisation

very few people actually do something after having learning about injustice through the mainstream media. few feel empowered enough or are propelled to act. the news is presented to them in a passive manner that seems to be designed to encourage passive consumption.

work has been compartmentalised in such a sophisticated, complex way. you end up engaged in this tiny little aspect of a larger system. you don’t see the connection between your own work and its broader impact, their effects becomes so blurred that you don’t really take responsibility for your own actions anymore. (61)

AR: at a certain point, i just became very cynical and very typically western in my outlook. i was obsessed with my won life and with feeding my ego. however, living in that way made me really miserable after a while. my own cynicism and narcissism conflicted with my upbringing. at some point i just couldn’t ignore the propaganda.

there has to be a real promise of a solution for public to (feel like its worth to) get involved in the struggle.

brutality has been normalised everywhere

having a concept of what we would like our society to be like

develop new models of utopia, political systems

real lack of utopian thinking

we can’t bring socialism back (need new kind of socialism?), people are clearly not fulfilled or satisfied by consumerism

people who will control this machine have a very specific ideology and set of ethics

keep an eye on the important topics you care deeply about, no matter what is going on in the side

why engage in activism?

activism = natural, as a citizen of the world (aeon article, eric liu/cin?) (RSA josh peterson??) inaction is not an option, i’m not fighting because i will win, but because its the right them to do

duty as citizens - look at the oddments, accountability mechanisms. power to disclose information about wrongdoing - cannot be taken away, even tho many freedoms from original internet are gone

How can we make it so that web based activism can be successful?

web-based activism clearly has a serious downside. people have switched from congregating in public spaces, to express their opinions and engage in political discussion, to having these conversations on online platforms. what makes this shift so alarming is that the platforms are owned and controlled by private entities, so now a great deal of political debate takes place not at rallies or on the street but on twitter, on Facebook, on google - all of them private platforms.

Remedying Eurocentric reform efforts

eurocentric: rights of european and american citizens are at the centre of these reform efforts. equality across borders is the missing ingredient, both in the reporting and the policy debate.

evolution of state, increasing enmeshment with big tech corps

evolution of the state, increasing enmeshment with big tech corporations. google’s apparent omnipotence today is based on this infinite appetite of its constantly learning, all-devouring machine. it’s not just that google is being used by the government or collaborating with the govt. google has actually been integrated with the govt.

tech companies experienced pushback from their consumer base that forced them to change their behaviour. you can show these companies that they will be hurt in the market unless they adhere to the ethics and laws that are dominant within our society. (vodafone transparency report = law enforcement disclosure report)

brain drain issue

global tech companies are hoovering up all the good people working in: tech, activists, social justice lawyers, who are under resourced who get great job offers and cannot say no bc they have families and are fed up with living a precarious life. —> think creatively to find a place for such people

bad feminist - not the minorities personal burden to change a larger system

a comparison between ISIS and silicon valley

two aggressively expanding global movements: most compelling youth movements of our time. ISIS vs silicon valley capitalism?

ISIS: concrete and tangible outcome (to occupy territory and to have control over resources + create state)

silicon valley: domination is in our minds = far more dangerous [not sure if i agree, isis wants this too?]. political influence and importance is growing, eg. treated like head of state by govts (THE AMAZON ARTICLE)

fantasy of a light western easy lifestyle

much more of a global reach ??

taking up functions that used to be performed by national govt, globally and at a cost that local providers can’t compete with.

importance of techno literacy + architecture of internet

techno literacy

since tech is being used to censor and surveil us, we can’t protect ourselves or fight on this terrain without understanding the tech ourselves

getting kids to engage in culture of technological creativity

vital for people in the global South to create and distribute their own content, ideas and cultural expression

battle for control of infrastructure: without exercising some degree of control over the infrastructure of the internet, we will always have very limited time in which to act before our operations are disrupted or shut down.

we need to create tools that will help us protect ourselves - decentralisation, autonomy, digital sovereignty

whats important is: decisions you take as a collective, how you design public policies around access, software, hardware. role that technology plays in building and maintaining that sovereignty.

design institutions that could enhance the power of decentralised political action

govts respond to snowden and wikileaks by normalising what was once clandestine, doubling down on efforts to surveil, make what used to be illegal surveillance legal

“we have lost the custom of regularly meeting in a really free space for the exchange of ideas - whether on or offline - which is a precondition for any revolution.” have we tho?

any org that becomes too large acquires a certain institutional character.

snowden and manning managed to break out of culture of organisations they were embedded in. even when they joined these institutions, their primary allegiance was to the freedoms and ideals they associate with the internet" (84-86)

US media pitting manning vs snowden:

settled on one of them as being more correct/virtuous than other. he has become part of the collective psyche in the way manning hasn’t.

snowden: actions are seen as courageous because in terms of commitment to US constitution

women in the world of digital dissidence

… role is downplayed within their own community / media and dismissed by govt = gives them greater room to act “with women, there are other ways to control and silence them” (65)

role of women in activism is downplayed reflects daily reality we are part of the problem and solution media try to bring women down - reducing women to those roles / pigeonholing (even male journalists who worked with her specifically) celebrate women and their voices narrative in the media = always more sexy to report about guys escalation of trump as president = epitome of problems, good thing to turn things around?

wikileaks impact on activism

before & after situation

many journalists shied away, very few courageous/principled people who fought the good fight, after a while it faded away and we didn’t tackle the problems (of private censorship). didn’t go strong enough against US persecution

those in power: silence / house arrest western dissidents/journalists, pull funding from media

silicon valley politics to be exposed ?

revelled net of relationships between govts, journalists, silicon valley - unveiled more than just the documents

1.secure online dropbox in most major newsrooms around the world - from julian

2. mass publications - massive amounts of data sets put online, setting up independent journalism + orgs, ability to check source docs

—> lasting impact on journalism —> activism

alexandria library of human kind?

“radical transparency”, seen as activism

2014 vs now

1. started book at 2014, became v negative in end of the book - manipulation, power monopoly are very concentrated

hard to be hopeful: before felt like areas of tech where civil society had some semblance of control. but our control is eroding and tech is infiltrating every sphere of society, so avenues for self determination is reducing every day.

at some point internet was a huge hope? / optimistic -“gears of hope”

sadly, ability of citizens in general to affect and really use internet as tool of empowerment for change is over — vast centralisation, activation of various points of control in layers of internet

it used to be tool of communication, now embedded in all key activities of people —> control. silicon valley has hand in the heads of everyone

exporting around the world - Facebook zero - controlling system we are trying to fight in west are solidify + exported as MO to rest of the world

2. (beginning of book:) how to get more information vs (now) how to separate + deal with info

policy as a solution

state has been demonised, private sector is great - look at local govt as ally, bc they can regulate

combat with litigation, regulation

fragment them + stop them growing before its too late (like that amazon article??)

make this point part of political agendas for everyone

tech belongs to the core of your democracy, doesn’t just belong to entrepreneurs etc

get into legislative process, to get right leg

laws are being passed by people who have no idea what they’re talking about (IPIL)

rhetoric by NATO: “weaponising of information”

whistleblowing, truth is a weapon to undermine our democracies. exposing things framed as political warfare.

why is whistleblowing so important?

if no one discloses, we cannot fix it. need to defend right to anon whisteblowing

whistleblowing + journalism will always be an act of courage, will never be completely safe

lawyers/pro bono legal ??, tech people who build the systems/mechanisms = important people, need more solidarity. support economically + legally whistleblowers when they come out

Other notes - new technologies could have operated as a decentralised platform of liberation, as opposed to what are public-private partnerships of control and oppression

People and resources mentioned

important characters & events: assange, snowden, manning

what is a whistleblower?

guatemalan history

[nchyinotes]

So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed by Jon Ronson

the spambot left me feeling powerless and sullied. my identity had been redefined all wrong by strangers and i had no recourse. (3)

“a researcher in technology and cyber culture and director of the virtual futures conference”, “creative technologist” (4)

“you’re proposing yourself as the real mccoy, as it were, and you want to maintain that integrity and authenticity.” (5) “we’re not quite persuaded by that. we think there’s already a layer of artifice and it’s your online personality - the brand jon ronson - you’re trying to protect.” … “that’s why i say you’re using it as brand management.” … “and that’s what’s annoying me so much,” i explained. “it’s a misrepresentation of me." (6)

“it’s about the terror isn’t it?” “the terror of what?” “the terror of being found out,” he looked as if he felt he were taking a risk even mentioning to me the existence of the terror. he meant that we all have ticking away within us something we fear will badly harm our reputation if it got out - some “i’m glad i’m not that” at the end of an “i’m glad i’m not me.” i think he was right. maybe our secret is actually nothing horrendous. maybe nobody would even consider it a big deal if it was exposed. but we can’t take that risk. so we keep it bored. maybe it’s a work impropriety. or maybe it’s just a feeling that at any moment we’ll blurt something out during some important meeting that’ll prove to everyone that we aren’t proper professional people, or in fact, functional human beings. i think that even in these days of significant oversharing we kept this particular terror concealed, like people used to with things like masturbating before everyone suddenly got blasé about it online. with masturbation, nobody cares. whereas our reputation - it’s everything. (31)

delaware laws: if jonah had been found guilty of ‘lying or publishing fake news” in the 1800s, he could have been publicly whipped! (53)

i suppose that when shamings are delivered like remotely administered drone strikes nobody needs to think about how ferocious our collective power might be. the snowflake never needs to feel responsible for the avalanche. (56)

“i always felt like a fad. i felt like i was going to be hot for a second and then i would disappear. so i had to act while i could. and there was just some deep seated … some very dangerous and reckless ambition. you combine insecurity and ambition, and you get an inability to say no to things.” (60)

I suddenly remembered how weirdly tarnished i felt when the spambot men created their fake jon ronson, getting my character traits all wrong, turning me into some horrific, garrulous foodie, and strangers believed it was me, and there was nothing i could do. that’s what was happening to justine, although instead of a foodie she was a racist and instead of fifty people it was 1.22 million (75)

So there it was: at aryan nations, you didn’t need to be an actual Jew to be jew ish. and the same was true on twitter with the privileged racist justine sacco, who was neither especially privileged nor a racist. but it didn’t matter. it was enough that it sort of seemed like she was. (77)

her destruction was justified, sam biddle was saying, because justine was a racist, and because attacking her was punching up. they were cutting down a member of the media elite, continuing the civil rights tradition that started with rosa parks, the hitherto silenced underdogs shaming into submission the powerful racist. but i didn’t think any of those things were true. if punching justine sacco was ever punching up - and it didn’t seem so to me given that she was an unknown PR woman with 170 twitter followers - the punching only intensified as she plummeted to the ground. (78)

a life had been ruined. what was it for: just some social media drama? … with social media, we’ve created a stage for constant artificial high drama. (78)

he was just like everyone who participates in mass online destruction. who would want to know? whatever that pleasurable rush that overwhelms us is - group madness or something else - nobody wants to ruin it by facing the fact that it comes with a cost. (79)

in psychology it’s known as cognitive dissonance. it’s the idea that it feels stressful and painful for us to hold two contradictory ideas at the same time (like the idea that we’re kind people and the idea that we’ve just destroyed someone). and so to ease the pain we create illusory ways to justify our contradictory behaviour. (81)

"but aren’t you turning the criminal justice system into entertainment?” i asked (85)

judge ted poe’s critics - like the ACLU - argued to him the dangers of those ostentatious punishments, especially those that were carried out in public. they said it was no coincidence that public shaming had enjoyed such a renaissance in mao’s china an whittler’s germany and the KKK’s america - it destroys souls, brutalising everyone, the onlookers included, dehumanising them as much as the person being shamed. (83)

but mike hubaecek thought his shaming was the best thing that had ever happened to him. this was especially true, he told me, because the onlookers had been so nice. he’d feared abuse and ridicule. but no. … their kindness meant everything, he said. it made it all right. it set him on his path to salvation. (87)

“social media shamings are worse than your shamings,” i said suddenly to ted poe. he looked taken aback. “they are worse,” he replied. “they’re anonymous.” “or even if they’re not anonymous, it’s such a pile on they may as well be,” i said. “they’re brutal,” he said. i suddenly became aware that throughout our conversation i’d been using the word they. and each time that i did, i felt like i was being spineless. the fact was, they weren’t brutal. we were brutal. (88)

for the first time in history we sort of had direct access to ivory-tower oligarchs like (donald trump and rupert murdoch). we became keenly watchful for transgressions. after a while, it wasn’t just transgressions we were keenly watchful for. it was misspeaking. fury at the terribleness of other people had started to consume us a lot. and the rage that swirled around seemed increasingly in disproportion to whatever stupid thing some celebrity had said. (88)

“the justice system in the west has a lot of problems,” poe said, “But at least there are rules. you have basic rights as the accused. you have your day in court. you don’t have any rights when you’re accused on the internet. and the consequences are worse. it’s worldwide forever.” it felt good to see the balance of power shift so that someone like ted poe was afraid of people like us. but he wouldn’t sentence people to hold a placard for something they hadn’t been convicted of. he wouldn’t sentence someone for telling a joke that came out badly. the people we were destroying were no longer just people like jonah: public figures who had committed actual transgressions. they were private individuals who really hand’t done anything much wrong. ordinary humans were being forced to learn damage control, like corporations that had committed PR disasters. it was very stressful. “we are more frightening than you,” i said to poe, feeling quite awed. poe sat back in his chair, satisfied. “you are much more frighting,” he said. (90)

her motives were kinder than that. she was also someone whose shaming frenzy was motivated by the desire to do good. (123)

"dragging down justine sacco felt like dragging down every rich white person who’s ever gotten away with making a racist joke because they could. she thought her black AIDS joke was funny because she doesn’t know what it’s like to be a disadvantaged black person or to be diagnosed with AIDS. … Some sorts of crimes can only be handled by public consensus and shaming. it’s a different kind of court. a different kind of jury.” (128)

eventually, general motors was forced to admit the plot and apologise to nader in a congressional hearing. the incident proved to him, and later to max, that the car industry was not above trying to shame its opponents into silence in its battle against safety do gooders, and that people in high places were prepared to ingeniously deploy shaming as a means of moneymaking and social control. maybe we only notice it happening when its done too audaciously or poorly, as it had been with ralph nader. (143)

if our shame worthiness lies in the space between who we are and how we present ourselves to the world, max was narrowing that gap to nothing. whereas jonah’s gap was as wide as the grand canyon. (144)

brad blanton: many of us “live our lives constantly in fear ob being exposed or being judged as immoral or not good enough.” to eradicate those feelings = radical honesty (158)

shame can factor large in the life of a journalist - the personal avoidance of it and the professional bestowing of it onto others. (168)

almost none of the murderous fantasies were dreams dup in response to actual danger - stalker ex boyfriends, etc. they were all about the horror of humiliation. … shame internalised can lead to agony. (170)

max mosley: as soon as the victim steps out of the pact by refusing to feel ashamed, the whole thing crumbles. —> jon realises this is wrong (176)

but the shifting sands of shame worthiness had shifted away from sex scandals - if you’re a man - to work improprieties and perceived white privilege, and i suddenly understood the real reason mark had survived his shaming. nobody cared. max survived his shaming because he was a man in a consensual sex shaming - which meant there had been no shaming. … of all the public scandals, being a man in a consensual sex scandal is probably the one to hope for. max was a target of no one - not liberals like me, not the online misogynists who tear apart women who step out of line. (186)

i think we all care deeply about things that seem totally inconsequential to other people. we all carry around with us the flotsam and jetsam of perceived humiliations that actually mean nothing. we are a mass of vulnerabilities, and who knows what will trigger them? (189)

how could almost identical shamings annihilate one man and leave another without a scratch? (193)

“the way we construct consciousness is to tell the story of ourselves to ourselves, the story of who we believe we are. i feel that a really public shaming or humiliation is a conflict between the person trying to write his own narrative and society trying to write  a different narrative for the person. one story tries to overwrite the other. and so to survive you have to own your own story. or you write a third story. you react to the narrative that’s been forced upon you. you have to find a way to disrespect the other narrative. if you believe it, it will crush you.” - mike daisey (200)

then she left new york. “in new york your career is your identity. i had that taken away from me” (justine) (201)

i think she still felt ashamed, but maybe not quite so much. instead, she said, she felt humiliated. (after 5 months) (203)

clive’s point was that the criminal justice system is supposed to repair harm, but most prisoners - young, black - have been incarcerated for acts far less emotionally damaging than the injuries we noncriminals perpetrate upon one another all the time - bad husbands, bad wives, ruthless bosses, bullies, bankers. (228)

james gilligan: the world’s best informed chronicler of what a shaming can do to our inner lives, which is why he’s so opposed to its renaissance on social media (245)

“universal among the violent criminals was the fact that they were keeping a secret, a central secret. and that secret was that they felt ashamed - deeply ashamed, chronically ashamed, acutely ashamed." it was shame, every time. "i have yet to see a serious act of violence that was not provoked by the experience of feeling shamed or humiliated, disrespected and ridiculed. as children, these men were shot, axed, scalded, beat, strangled, tortured, drugged, starved, suffocated, set on fire, thrown out of the window, raped, or prostituted by mothers who were their pimps. for others, words alone shamed and rejected, insulted and humiliated, dishonoured and disgraced, tore down their self esteem, and murdered their soul.” for each of them the shaming “occurred on a scale so extreme, so bizarre, and so frequent that one cannot fail to see that the men who occupy the extreme end of the continuum of violent behaviour in adulthood occupied an equally extreme end of the continuum of violent child abuse earlier in life.” so they grew up and -“all violence being a person’s attempt to replace shame with self esteem” - they murdered people. … and when they were jailed, things only got worse - they were further humiliated because officers thought this was how to get them to obey, when it did the exact opposite and stimulated violence instead. (249)

jonah had a house in hollywood hills and a wife who loved him. he had enough self esteem to get him through. but i think that in front of the giant twitter screen he felt for an instant that same deadness that gillian’s prisoners had described. (250)

therapeutic communities in prisons

the word forever had been coming up a lot during my two years among the publicly shamed. jonah and justine and people like them were being told, “no. there is no door. there is no way back in. we don’t offer any forgiveness.” but we know that people are complicated and have a mixture of flaws and talents and sins. so why do we pretend that we don’t? (255)

This has been a book about people who really didn’t do very much wrong. justine and lindsey, certainly, were destroyed for nothing more than telling bad jokes. and while we were busy steadfastly refusing them forgiveness, jim was quietly arranging the salvation of someone who had committed a far more serious offence. it struck me that if reshaping would work for a maelstrom like raquel, if it would restore someone like her to health, then we need to think twice about raining down vengeance and anger as our default position. (260)

the sad thing was that lindsey had incurred the internet’s wrath because she was impudent and playful and foolhardy and outspoken. and now here she was, working with farukh to reduce herself to safe banalities - to cats and ice cream and top 40 chart music. we were creating a world where the smartest way to survive is to be bland. (266) [not sure if this is true, though i do think there may be a chilling effect/more calculated curating is encouraged]

“it’s the algorithm shifting things around and wondering what, from a mathematical standpoint, is the story that needs ob e told about this person.” (268)

“but there is a chilling of behaviour that goes along with virtual lynching. there is a life modification. … they have signs of PTSD. it’s like the stasi. we’re creating a culture where people feel constantly surveilled, where people are afraid to be themselves.” (268)

our own social media surveillance network (269)

of course, no prurient or censorious bureaucrat had intercepted justine sack’s private thoughts. justine had tweeted them herself, labouring under the misapprehension - the same one i laboured under for a while - that twitter was a safe place to tell the truth about yourself to strangers. that truth telling had really proven to be an idealistic experiment gone wrong. (270)

social media gives a voice to voiceless people - its egalitarianism is its greatest quality. (271)

“but its scary. after all that’s happened, what’s funny to me… i don’t want to go anywhere near the line, let alone cross it. so i’m constantly saying, ‘i don’t know farukh, what do you think?’” (272)

michael fertik: “the biggest lie is the internet is about you. we like to think of ourselves as people who have choice and taste and personalised content. but the internet isn’t about us. it’s about the companies that dominate the data flows of the internet.” (276) … google make many when anything happens online, even the bad stuff.

scott kelley, your speed signs, feedback loops, thomas goetz ‘harnessing the power of feedback loops’

adam curtis: echo chambers, “they got trapped in the system of feedback reinforcement. … feedback is an engineering principle, and all engineering is devoted to trying to keep the thing you are building stable.” (281)

“i suddenly feel with social media like i’m tiptoeing around an unpredictable, angry, unbalanced parent who might strike out at any moment … it’s horrible.” … we see ourselves as nonconformist, but i think all of this is creating a more conformist, conservative age. (282)

how twitter mutated from a place of unselfish conscious honesty into something more anxiety inducing

people he spoke to: luke robert mason, michael moynihan/jonah lehrer, justine sacco (twitter aids girl), judge ted poe, gustave lebon (research referenced), dave eshelman/zimbardo, adria richards, max mosley, mercedes haefer, princess donna dolore, brad blanton, andrew ferreira/alexis wright, mike daisley, lindsey stone, michael fertik, clive stafford smith, jim mcgreevey, james gilligan, scott kelley

[nchyinotes]

Show your work! by Austin Kleon

these were the tips that were helpful to me as a hoarder. so advice in the book about: not oversharing, having your own domain name & not relying on social media & having own mailing list, identifying your real peers, meeting up IRL, not feeding the trolls, selling out, passing around the hat asking for little donations - didn’t necessarily speak to me.

Tl;dr Talk about the things you love. Your voice will follow. Share what you love, and the people who love the same things will find you.

Look for something new to learn, and when you find it, dedicate yourself to learning it out in the open. Document your progress and share as you go so that others can learn along with you. Show your work, and when the right people show up, pay close attention to them, because they’ll have a lot to show you. (199)

For people who want to

Spending the majority of your time, energy, and attention practicing a craft, learning a trade, or running a business, while also allowing for the possibility that your work might attract a group of people who share your interests. (5)

What you should be after you read the book

They’re cranking away in their studios, their laboratories, or their cubicles, but instead of maintaining absolute secrecy and hoarding their work, they’re open about what they’re working on, and they’re consistently posting bits and pieces of their work, their ideas, and what they’re learning online. … by generously sharing their ideas and their knowledge, they often gain an audience that they can leverage when they need it - for fellowship, feedback, or patronage. (2)

How to get there

The best way to get started on the path to sharing your work is to think about what you want to learn, and make a commitment to learning it in front of others. Find a scenius, pay attention to what others are sharing, and then start taking note of what they’re not sharing. Be on the lookout for voids that you can fill with your own efforts, no matter how bad they are at first. (19) 

1. Find a scenius

Musician Brian Eno’s model, where great ideas are often birthed by a group of creative individuals - artists, curators, thinkers, theorists, and other tastemakers - who make up an ecology of talent. … many of the people who think of as lone geniuses were actually part of “a whole scene of people who were supporting each other, looking at each other’s work, copying from each other, looking at each other’s work, copying from each other, stealing ideas, and contributing ideas.” … it acknowledges that creativity is always, in some sense, a collaboration, the result of a mind connected to other minds. (11)

Being a valuable part of a scenius is about what you have to contribute - the ideas you share, the quality of the connections you make, the conversations you start. … think more about how we can nurture and contribute to a scenius

2. Be an amateur

The world is changing at such a rapid rate that it’s turning us all into amateurs. Even for professionals, the best way to flourish is to retain an amateur’s spirit and embrace certainty and the unknown. (18)

3. It sounds a little extreme, but in this day and age, if your work is online, it doesn’t exist. (23)

4. Take people behind the scenes, and become a documentarian of what you do (share day-to-day process). Send out a daily dispatch, or at least show what you’re working on RIGHT NOW on a regular basis. Turn your flow into stock.

Audiences not only want to stumble across great work, but they too, long to be creative and part of the creative process. By letting go of our egos and sharing our process, we allow for the possibility of people having an ongoing connection with us and our work, which helps us move more of our product.

Documenting and recording your process

If you’re in the very early stages, share your influences and what’s inspiring you. If you’re in the middle of executing a project, write about your methods or share works in progress. If you’ve just completed a project, show the final product, share scraps from the cutting room floor, or write about what you learned. If you have lots of projects out into the world, you can report on how they’re doing - you can tell stories about how people are interacting with your work. (48)

Of course, don’t let sharing your work take precedence over actually doing your work. (55)

Be open, share imperfect and unfinished work that you want feedback on, but don’t share absolutely everything. … The act of sharing is one of generosity - you’re putting something out there because you think it might be helpful or entertaining to someone on the other side of the screen. (57)

We all carry around the weird and wonderful things we’ve come across while doing our work and living our lives. These mental scrapbooks form our tastes, and our tastes influence our work. (75)

Turn your flow into stock. (61)

“Stock and flow” is an economic concept that writer Robin Sloan has adapted into a metaphor for media: “flow is the feed. It’s the posts and the tweets. It’s the stream of daily and sub-daily updates that remind people you exist. Stock is the durable stuff. It’s the content you produce that’s as interesting in two months or two years as it is today. It’s what people discover via search. It’s what spreads slowly but surely, building fans over time.” sloan says the magic formula is to maintain your flow while working on your stock in the background. In my experience, your stock is best made by collecting, organizing, and expanding upon your flow.

In my experience, your stock is best made by collecting, organizing, and expanding upon your flow. Social media sites function a lot like public notebooks - they’re places where we think out loud, let other people think back at us, then hopefully think some more. But the thing about keeping notebooks is that you have to revisit them in order to make the most out of them. You have to flip back through old ideas to see what you’ve been thinking. Once you make sharing part of your daily routine, you’ll notice themes and trends emerging in what you share. You’ll find patterns in your flow.

When you detect these patterns, you can start gathering these bits and pieces and turn them into something bigger and more substantial. You can turn your flow into stock. For example, a lot of the ideas in this book started out as tweets, which then became blog posts, which then became book chapters. Small things, over time, can get big.

Your influences are all worth sharing because they clue people into who you are and what you do - sometimes even more than your own work. (77)

It helps tell a good story about yourself (and your work)- work doesn’t speak for itself.

Human beings want to know where things came from, how they were made, and who made them. The stories you tell about the work you do have a huge effect on how people feel and what they understand about your work, and how people feel and what they understand about your work affects how they value it. (93)

Structure is everything: dan harmon’s story circle, kurt vonnegurt’s story graphs, gustav freytag’s pyramid

5. Don’t be a hoarder.

“The problem with hoarding is you end up living off your reserves. Eventually, you’ll become stale. If you are giving away everything you have, you are left with nothing. This forces you to look, to be aware, to replenish… somehow the more you give away, the more comes back to you.” - paul arden

There’s not as big a difference between collecting and creating as you might think. … “I’m basically a curator. Making books has always felt very connected to my bookselling experience, that of wanting to draw people’s attention to things that I liked, to shape things that I liked into new shapes.” - writer and former bookseller Jonathan Lethem (76)

Your influences are all worth sharing because they clue people into who you are and what you do - sometimes even more than your own work. (77)

Best of all, when you share your knowledge and your work with others, you receive an education in return. It brings you in contact with people. “They write to you. They telephone you. They come to your bookstore events and give you things to read that you should have read already.” - christopher hitchens (119)

6. Credit is always due.

If you share the work of others, it’s your duty to make sure that the creators of the work get proper credit. … You should always share the work of others as if it were your own, treating it with respect and care. (84)

You also rob all the people you’ve shared it with. Without attribution, they have no way to dig deeper into the work or find more of it. (85)

Attribution is all about providing context for what you’re sharing: what the work is, who made it, how they made it, when and where it was made, why you’re sharing it, why people should care about it, and where people can see more work like it. (85)

Another form of attribution we often neglect is where we found the work that we’re sharing. It’s always good practice to give a shout-out to people who’ve helped you stumble onto good work. (85)

Don’t share things you can’t properly credit. Find the right credit, or don’t share.

7. Talk about yourself at parties

8. Teach what you know

Think about what you can share from your process that would inform the people you’re trying to reach. “Make people better at something they want to be better at.” - Kathy Sierra (117)

The minute you learn something, turn around and teach it to others. (117)

Teaching doesn’t mean instant competition. Just because you know the master’s technique doesn’t mean you’re going to be able to emulate it right away. You can watch franklin’s tutorials over and over, but are you ready to start spending 22 hours a day smoking meat that will sell out in 2 hours? Probably not. If you’re me, you’ll pay the $13 even more gladly. (116)

9. You want hearts, not eyeballs

10. Go away so you can come back. (190)

the designer stefan steigmeister swears by the power of the sabbatical - “everything that we designed in the seven years following the first sabbatical had its roots in thinking done during that sabbatical.”  (192)

i, too, have experienced this phenomenon: i spent my first two years out of college working a non demanding part-time job in a library, doing nothing but reading and writing and drawing. i’d say i’ve spent the years since executing a lot of the ideas i had during that period. …  period to recharge and get inspired again (192-3)

“and the reality is that most of us just don’t have the flexibility in our lives to be able to walk away from our work for a full year.” (193)

11. Begin again.

When you feel like you’ve learned whatever there is to learn from what you’re doing, it’s time to change course and find something new to learn so that you can move forward. You can’t be content with mastery; you have to push yourself to become a student again. (197)

[nchyinotes]

What is the most pressing issue in tech ethics today? - APPG Roundtable

Themes

1. Trust in the kit you’re building and (end) use of it - including consumer trust, business confidence, cybersecurity 2. Bias and diversity - in tech industry, panels, avoiding hard coding unconscious, unfair bias 3. Public understanding, dialogue and skills - includes digital retraining for work, but more focus on access to improving your own knowledge in day to day use.

Catching public up with the debate - giving people the language and confidence to engage confidently on the issue as engaged citizens and not just consumers (maya desai)

Making sure benefits of tech are geographically and socially spread

Lots of talk about transparency

But in a way, transparency is broken as a concept because the onus is too much on the individual (doteveryone)

4. Opportunities and use of (collection/use of) data & AI - what existing rights / civil liberties do we have (human rights, etc), and how do they apply here and what additional things do we need to add or apply on top of that

GDPR is the starting point/foundation here, anything we propose should be built on top of it

data adequacy point of view

what do we do beyond compliance?

Ethics (and privacy) by design, rights based approach

Checks and balances within the design process - eg. google people and AI research pair

The data (input), algorithms, and practice are all separate questions to be scrutinised, but do also ultimately need to be looked at comprehensively.

There is a lot of new jargon and terminology (ie. blockchain), but should peel back the technology and think about what is actually new in the situation - does it reveal a new ethical problem that isn’t already regulated?

5. Boundaries of acceptable use of robotics + ML

At what point do we prefer an imperfect algorithm/AI to a more imperfect person?

Other interesting points

This group wants areas where you can make a practical difference through public policy in the next 5-10 years

A point about the importance of framing

Danger of framing something as an either or, between economic impact + ethics (ie. opening more data for economic growth and the creation of new markets, vs protecting citizens and privacy)

Danger of using the word “balance”, because things can be balanced in 5 million different ways.

Should be labelled as "dual advantage”, where risks can be lowered and opportunities can be raised

Should be framing as opportunity instead of risk, getting right balance

shouldn’t use “balance” as terminology, things can be balanced in 5 million different ways

Strategy: International coordination - we have all the rules we need, but putting it all together and harmonising it for global market impact

UK’s best exports: UK law is far and reliable, and businesses are fair and sensible (brand fairness)

UK’s regulatory framework on AI as a whole is pretty good

Developing the UK as leading ethical tech destination, how this can be positioned as a competitive advantage (for business) - how we as a country maintain competitive edge

New unit in DCMS - digital minister, trying to recruit people to run it - apply!  

[nchyinotes]

Criminology Seminar Series - From Corporate Killing to Social Murder

March 1 2018

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/criminology-seminar-series-from-corporate-killing-to-social-murder-tickets-37941422817

Speaker: Professor Steve Tombs (Department of Social Policy & Criminology, Open University)

“Corporations kill in a variety of ways across diverse sites and spheres of activity. Such killing is ubiquitous, routine and widespread – notwithstanding formal attempts by states to prevent and respond to such deaths. Focusing on a sub-set of such deaths in the UK, and state attempts to regulate these, this paper argues that these should be understood as state-corporate violence, best captured by the term ‘social murder’. Grenfell Tower has come to represent many things to many people since the tragic fire on 14th June. Prior to that date, the Tower was a home to hundreds of residents – if not, according to some of them, a particularly pleasant one. The aim of this presentation is two-fold: first, to understand the reach of states and corporations into what is often represented as a private sphere, namely the home; and, second, to better understand the mass killing at Grenfell Tower, and the ripples of harms subsequently engendered, as phenomena produced by state-corporate policy and practices.”

Thoughts: Although I was obviously aware of the Grenfell Tower happenings, I hadn’t done any in depth reading or research into it, and definitely had not analysed it from a criminological lens. Gave great background information for me to learn about what actually happened, which highlighted the horrendous failings of a state to its people, and all the different harms that the victims suffered. We touched a bit on corporate manslaughter in my final year criminology module, so it was interesting on an academic level to analyse this tragedy within the framework of corporate killing or social murder, and awareness of other examples that it brought up. It was a real shame that there weren’t many people there, because it was 100% worth going to. I attended this lecture on my birthday, and it was a great way to spend my birthday imho (Funny side story - I was walking back home in a very somber mood kind of lost in thought about this, when I found one of my friends waiting outside my apartment and I was really confused. Turns out my friends and sister had planned a surprise birthday party at my flat LOL, so that was cute too!).

Notes

Critical criminology, corporate / white collar crime

Activists working for better work conditions

Experiences of survivors/residents - not based on direct contact with; not necessary in this case because massive testimonies in public domain (verbatim testimony)

Value free social science - an illusion? Not value free, politically charged.

Different ways we can look/think at it, they’re not mutually exclusive, in fact it’s all of these things.

Grenfell tower in context

1) One of the poorest places sitting in one of the richest areas

Constituency of kensington is the wealthiest in England

RBKC is the most unequal borough in England, since 2010 the inequality has widened (Coad) - by 2017, difference in life expectancy is 22 years (and this had increased 6 years)

Grenfell Tower + Kings Road LSOA (lower super output area)

2) Fractious relationship between social housing residents across Borough and the KCTMO [set up to at an arms length manage council housing]

Conjecture / opinion: Having edificies like grenfell tower + their inhabitants is a bummer because they’re barriers to gentrification. What they what is to cleanse the borough of the poor residents.

Grenfell Action Group formed in 2010 as a way of articulating / furthering rights of residents at tower, and joined Unite Community (part of the trade union) in 2015 during refurbishment

Dangerous nature of refurbishment of tower - KCTMOs decision to replace zinc cladding with cheaper aluminum panels [more flammable], saving 293k pounds

Grenfell Action Group blog post: KCTMO - Playing with Fire! (predicted 7 months before the tragedy!)

It was the cladding which contained the fire inside the inferno

Grenfell as crime (?) - yes

Can we think of what happened there as a crime?

1. Serial killer - Whirlpool

Portrait of a serial killer [Whirlpool Corporation HQ or Hot Point?? in Benton Harbor, Michigan]

Produces electrical / hot point / dryers ??

Found out something was wrong - faulty machines? Advised you just not to leave them unattended? No product recall, compensation was offered.

→ “Shepherd’s Bush tower block fire caused by faulty tumble dryer”

Still no recall, compensation, replacement

Consumer groups have been saying not to use plastic bags for electrical goods cause they’re flammable

Trigger of Grenfell was a plastic bag fridge freezer in the native hot point

1) All Party Select committee last October - slipped out by rep of Whirlpool that they knew about defects of tumble dryer in 2006. They were selling dryers which could catch fire and kill people for 9 years before they owned up to it.

2) Information requests -- 10 deaths, 100s of serious injuries, in 10 year period associated with white goods, 50%+ were associated with hot goods

Grenfell is just another series of deaths by them

Lots of attention on residents & management, some attention on contractors, but

Whirlpool basically got off scot free

2. Corporate Manslaughter and Homicide Act - isn’t fit for purpose?

10 years after the act, only 1 medium sized company has been prosecuted

Police claim they have about 35M documents to process on way to passing charges to CPS, last year they claimed worked through about 100k

Any charges won’t be until 2019, and generally any charges under the Act have taken 3-4 years

3. Health and Safety and/or FIre Safety legislation

2009 Similar precedent / different consequences - Southwark, 6 people died. Not sufficient evidence to proceed with (manslaughter) charge.

Southwark Council fined 650k under ^^

4. Will the prosecutions achieve justice?

Many survivors just want the crime to be considered a real crime - on par with others.

Trend in 21 successful prosecutions is: deals with individual senior managers to let them off the hook, to plead guilty for corporations.

No justice against individual people.

If successful for health and safety, it’s a fine. And the money is largely through the council (tax) / residents. So the people most hit by any fine will be the poorest residents of the borough.

Don’t repare the harms

Grenfell as social harm - via various dimensions (harms produced)

Social harm captures chains of processes or states of affairs rather than merely acts. Captures all the dimensions (ripples, synergistic, cumulative + long term effects)

Physical harms

deaths

injury (burns, head, fractures)

ill health (exposure to hydrogen cyanide & asbestos - made light of, smoke inhalation)

exacerbation of existing health problems (more dependent on drugs/alcohol; chronic conditions with those impoverished - type II diabetes, chronic heart disease, childhood obesity - no control over diet in temp housing)

Emotional / psychological harms

Survivors

Grief at loss - people, pets, possessions

Recall of horrors

Guilt at survival (self harm, suicide attempts)

Being rehoused in another high rise accommodation

For local community

Constant visibility of the tower - what the means/does to them

Emergency service workers

Other communities

Living in high rise accommodation with the same/similar cladding [to be removed] - in fear of their lives (living in limbo)

Cultural / relational harms

Relocation and loss of networks [what makes life worth living? When they need it the most] - lack of access

Bare existence of temporary accommodation - no piece of mind, waiting, uncertainty - obscure experiences

Death as a result of cost-cutting and contempt (Imogen tyler: “social objection”)

Most powerful cultural harm

Their voices were not listened to by council or management

They know their friends burnt, as it happened, because they didn’t matter

For 200k cost saving, in the richest borough

Election year: The council gave rebates to top earners, sold off 2 estates for over 4M

Lack of national and local state response

Contempt was reinforced

People had to self organise (in response)

Delays, broken promises, half truths and lies

Contempt again reinforced by ^ to survivors

Eg. rehousing, chair of inquiry, home office ‘amnesty’

→ Contempt which caused the fire is the contempt that the survivors continue to be treated with

Financial and economic harm

Financial costs to households

Costs to RBKC (plus legal costs, fines) - and thus to local tax payers

??

Grenfell as social murder - in context of a (systematic) withdrawal of social protection

Grenfell as state-sanctioned violence?

Part of the withdrawal of a system of social protection - constructed since the 1830s

Deregulation and lack of enforcement from (2004) 2010 onwards, especially at local level.

Eg. numbers of inspections decreased dramatically: in health and safety at work, food safety, pollution control, fire safety

Which was put in place to mitigate the worst effects of profit making in early days of industrial capitalism

Or to prevent, as Engels (1969) called it, social murder

Social murder is the consequence of withdrawing social protection

Questions

Greatest example of corporate murder: (Bopar) India, 1984 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhopal_disaster

Also - flint water crisis

http://time.com/4188323/michael-moore-flint-racial-crime/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/02/12/here-are-the-stunning-social-costs-of-the-flint-water-crisis/?utm_term=.86a634877060

Appropriate response?

Redress isn’t to be found through the law?

Workers health & safety will not be guaranteed in retrospective application of the law

Won’t change the fact that council doesn’t want those residents in the first place

Will be guaranteed by empowering workers collectively, through trade union organisation.

Relationship between state + companies?

Companies operating in more than one local authority - claim they never knew what compliance meant?

Primary authority scheme (by Blair) - it can reach a contractual agreement with one authority for it to be its primary. What happens is that newcastle city council becomes a buffer that protects Greggs from enforcement in all other areas.

Really important bc companies have lobbied for it, and totally changes the structurally shifts the balance of power

Market enforcement ? because lucrative for councils [ like the Amazon thing]

Whirlpool has been protected by its local council all these years

Esoteric piece of law?

Only reason it’s enforced is because of insurance companies?

Is the state / corporate bodies something that can be used progressively?

State undertaking limited functions on behalf of citizenry

While states can provide greater/less protections, and some contexts can be more/less harmful

Still in context of capitalism - individuals are more or less valuable commodities

The only way to stop corporate crime is to abolish the corporation (which is a criminogenic entity created and supported by the capitalist state)

Diane vaughan analysis of the challenger ??

They didn’t want to murder them, they just didn’t care about them

[nchyinotes]

Ravi Naik: Your Data, Your Rights - Nov 11 2017 (@ Glass Room London)

[nchyinotes]

War, Journalism and Whistleblowers: 15 years after Katharine Gun's truth telling on the verge of the Iraq War

March 2 2018

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/war-journalism-and-whistleblowers-15-years-after-katharine-guns-truth-telling-on-the-verge-of-the-tickets-42350362073#

“15 years ago, as a GCHQ employee, Katharine Gun leaked a memo revealing US spying operations on UN security council members. This simple act of bravery helped to galvanise the mass movement of opposition to the Iraq War. It also served as a telling reminder of the essential role played by the press in speaking truth to power and upholding the fabric of democratic life. A generation on, the legacy of that leak is writ large in a resurgent politics of resistance to the warfare and surveillance state on both sides of the Atlantic. This unique event brings together a panel, including Katharine herself, to discuss the lessons of that leak, and ask: What can and should we be doing - journalists, scholars, activists, citizens, policymakers - to do justice to the immeasurable public service performed by whistleblowers?

Speakers include: Katharine Gun (former GCHQ linguist and analyst responsible for the 2003 leak); Thomas Drake (former senior executive of the US National Security Agency); Duncan Campbell (award winning journalist, author and TV producer); Matthew Hoh (former US Marine and State Department official serving in Afghanistan and Iraq); Jesselyn Radack (national security and human rights attorney representing Ed Snowden among other whistleblowers); Silkie Carlo (Director of Big Brother Watch and leading voice in the campaign against the UK's repressive surveillance and official secrecy laws). We will also be airing an exclusive video message from Dan Ellsberg who leaked the Pentagon Papers in 1971.”

Thoughts: This was easily the best event I’ve been to on this gap year so far (and i’ve been to A LOT). I had actually come in with no expectations and not much knowledge of whistleblowers or any of the speaker's, and I had decided to come based on curiosity and proximity of location. So I definitely didn’t expect to be so overwhelmed by how emotional and intense this night was. Hearing everyone’s stories (for the first time) was inspiring, and left a deep impression on me. And it was amazing to be in the company of the supportive community that was gathered there - people respect and believe in human rights and equality, and people who are dedicating their lives to putting forth the truth, who truly care and are fighting for a better world and future. The audience engagement was actually what made this night so emotional. When the third question was asked by a young woman, who was an Iraqi journalist, she began to cry when asking what she could do as a journalist to stop the destruction in her country. Katharine started crying as well, and said that she had failed. She cried several more times throughout. There was also an audience member at the end who about how he tried to blow the whistle at the UN, who has been chronically unemployed for 24 years since. Listening to the people talk about the consequences whistleblowing had for them, and the injustices they faced (Jesselyn had a miscarriage, chronic unemployment despite extremely qualified), there is also what they said about what we can all do, and it all felt very pessimistic, and I felt slightly overcome with a feeling of dread and despair. It was hard not to feel utterly depressed at the world / what I was hearing. But I think events like these are so important because they’re inspiring, and they lend support and renewed motivation and validation hopefully, for people who have blown the whistle and who may need the courage in the future. The solidarity between the panel members was palpable. And it was hard for me not to feel like tearing up when Tom Drake said that he wouldn’t be here with Jesselyn. Before this, I think I had taken for granted all the major whistleblowers I had heard about and what they had given for the public interest - Snowden, Wikileaks, Panama Papers, #metoo, NHS. I never thought much about the individuals themselves, and the toll this would take on them or the emotional resilience required. Really eye opening, and I hope to educate myself further about whistleblowers protections (which was barely touched on in my employment law module!), and to look for volunteering options where I can help.

NOTES

Act of truth telling by people (not apps or systems)

People willing to risk their lives and jobs to speak truth to power (telling secret stories of surveillance)

Free press + whistleblowing under threat

Duncan

Katherine: Difficulties in the way journalists interpreted/presented her material

Dnotices (?) - used to terrify journalists until reforms of 1980s, penalty for journalists to receive info (as heavy as source)

1960s - gave us daniel ellsberg (vietnam war) - from the post!!

British official secrets act

Tom kiok - appalling agreements between blair & bush after afghanistan invasion??, never published, both sides were jailed (journalist + source)

Reality winner - compromised by magazine set up by snowden ??

Newspapers: NYT published disinformation supporting iraq war and didn’t publish stories brought to them around tom

Espionage act, the daily telegraph ?

Katharine

Why didn’t 100s of other people who received the email at GCHQ do the same thing?

Memory has important part in people’s decision making processes

Remembered horrific scenes of retreating iraqi soldiers waving white flags in surrender and being blitzed by US aircraft (turkey shoot?) - when she was 13

Despair at the lack of humanity

Iraq suffered 10 years of sanctions

Poor people of iraq had suffered 10 years of war, then 10 years of sanctions = terrible sanctions

When bush/blair suddenly focused on iraq, everyone was just like what, why? What does it have to do with 9/11 stuff?

While at GCHQ, conference in san diego - invited to board US aircraft carrier, was told by extremely young naval officers that they would deploy this in 3 days to iraq

Started some personal investigation into realities of what was going on in iraq

Saw target iraq + war plan iraq books in local bookshop

Clearly there was no case whatsoever

Duplicitous nature - lots of fudging on the issue

Jan 31 2003 - memo from NSA, asked for all domestic and diplomatic nations on UN council, for all gambit of knowledge that would be favourable to US goals (“not GBR of course, haha”)

Assumption that of course GCHQ would do it, this is what we want you to do. Not even an ask.

Thought about it over the weekend, but already made up her mind because felt like an impending train of disaster and she had to stop the wheels from turning.

Printed it off next monday in office

Creedence to journalists that took a punt on the email, because they were very concerned about reality of it (she did it anonymously) - brave step in publishing

Govt held her on ?? without bail / charge

Liberty found out who she was and gave her lots of support/advice

Lost all her friends immediately

Couldn’t go to work

Did deliberately to make life miserable for her

Charged in nov 2003 - plead guilty or not guilty?

Didn’t feel guilty, felt justified in what she’d done → pleaded not guilty

Only defence: public interest/necessity

Asked AG for all his legal advice

Dropped charges in 3 weeks, claimed they had no evidence (but she had confessed?)

Wasn’t willing to have legality of war discussed in war room.

15 years on, don’t feel any safer - what has the war on terror achieved? Even more concerned, raising a child in this world.

We need to support whistleblowers bc they’re really under attack, journalists who are doing their job, investigatory powers act (challenged in court) - prevent them from grabbing more power because they’ve taken so much already

Norman

Daniel ellsberg - pentagon papers

Someone unknown made it possible for observer newspaper to illuminate truth about manipulations, deceptions, extent to which US/GB are willing to go to drive the war train to get the dogs to war (poodle??) in iraq

Became a huge admirer of katharine gun before we knew what her name was

Daniel ellsberg speaking about katharine gun

First person prosecuted in US (espionage act), don’t have an act like UK (official secrets act)

1) Clearly higher than top secret classification document

Someone very high in GCHQ was clearly dissenting progress toward an illegal war

Cable from NSA asking GCHQ to help in intercepting of communications of every member of security council of UN

Rely on british to commit criminal acts for them (bc they were explicitly not allowed to)

2) This was not history, this was a current cable, and before the iraq war had actually started

Intimidation, blackmail, knowing private wants - intention was to coerce UN security council vote, with material tapped

She only actually had accidental access, wasn’t that high ranking

She acted almost immediately on pursuit of illegal war on illegal means

Dan regrets not putting out the documents available to him in 1964, years before he actually gave them - of bombing, war

Didn’t have precedent to instruct him on that

Could have been much more constructive in preventing that war if acted immediately

If US had gotten wind of it before, would have probably gotten an injunction. Was hardly covered in the US, whereas lots of

US had to give up plan of getting supporting vote in UN

Blair and govt went against earlier promise to not go ahead with war unless it was supported by the council, without legitimating precedent

One of the only few whistleblowers who didn’t wait, and wasn’t dealing with historical material. Judgment that what she was being asked to do was wrong, revealing what she knew was wrong.

“Information that bears on deception or illegality in pursuing wrongful policies or an aggressive war. Consider acting in a timely way to whatever cost to yourself.“

Tom drake

9/11 was a seminal event for many people (probably up on this panel)

Shadowy beast - had joined this system (the NSA)

9/11 triggered a whole host of secret decisions at highest levels of government, and he happened to be there.

Chosen to go there due to NSA outside stakeholders saying you need new blood - is generally quite inbred??

Became the justification for public consumption (esp by dick cheney)

“never let a crisis go to waste”

C change occurred in secret

Very first priority after 9/11 was this was the excuse to invade iraq

He began to inquire as to what was the intelligence, as plans for war were basically set

Part of job is to understand what was going on

Crypto Linguist background - asked arab linguist what we have on iraq, bc intelligence is supposed to be non political, not manipulated or framed, or made up lol

NSA itself had blanket surveillance of basically any electronic signal in iraq at this time

Kept coming back to him that there was no intelligence (threats) on iraq

Culminated in someone who shared with him later that the intelligence between invasion of iraq was a lie ??

Culminating meeting? Before formal decision was made, clearly a pretence, where general colmon powell made trip to UN and proceed with what US knew was slam dunk intelligence

Made clear that despite doubts of powell, intelligence regarding weapons of mass description was absolute/etc/slam dunk

Those on the outside to give expertise stayed silent

Crucial to get passage of second resolution as ultimate cover for US led coalition in invading iraq

Jesselyn

Representing hacktivists, journalists, whistleblowers

Was a whistleblower herself, same era as Katharine, on info that had been suppressed on war on terror, and prosecution of first so called american taliban

Justice department attorney in ethics office

Placed under investigation but no reason why, placed under bar’s no fly list

Miscarriage, 100k money she didn’t have

Prosecuting tom drake for espionage - one of the most serious charges against an american, 4th time someone who wasn’t a spy had been prosecuted for it (3rd was dan ellsberg)

Over a dozen people under obama ended up being pursued under this act

Trump has renewed this with vigour, going after reality winter (25) to make an example of her

Tries to keep these cases very secret, that’s why espionage act is being used to keep behind

Matthew

She tried to save the lives of millions of people, many of whom were his friends

Wars in syria, libya, yemen

Thanked her parents in the audience - Strength, integrity

Whistleblowing is continuous, you don’t need state secrets on your computer screen to

VFP carrying banner of “never again”

Aligned against a media that takes part in glorification of war, honours militarism

Deification that occurs - has to stand up and get clapped at all sports games

It’s standing up and speaking the truth about the greeds of war + who’s profiting from them

By choosing to come here and tweet out a picture of katharine is participating in standing up for the truth

Back end - if you don’t act on your conscious or do what is right, moral injury/guilt of it is devastating, and it’s seen in US veterans community (iraq/afghanistan 6x likelier for suicide) - need to do something rectify your mind and soul (for participating in an unjust/wrong organised killing)

PTSD is the lowest rate of suicide, it’s by combat related guilt, v well documented

Silkie

Prev. on legal team for liberty

Campaigner

Met & was inspired by tom + jess 5 years ago in holland, was just starting out as a journalist, couple months after snowden

Change from public & govt since snowden - to reinstate same abuses of power

Necessary for a free society, whistleblowers as last resort to protect those values. We don’t have a democracy otherwise.

Official Secrets Act - v punitive legislation that protects power for sake of power (no accountability), no balancing of whether state secrets need to be protected for national security

We need accountability for good governance

Reaction in UK to snowden has been the worst

Law commission suggested new legislation to punish/deter whistleblowers, sentences increased, journalists punished too

Investigatory powers act - new surveillance legislation, most authoritarian surveillance regime of any in history, almost limitless power

To collect data, intercept communications, hack devices on a bulk basis (potentially population wide)

BBW has ongoing legal action against mass interception, mostly passive

Optic nerve program 2008, GCHQ - to train facial recognition program

Hard to envision more enabling program for state to commit abuses of power

State surveillance framework is one of easiest ways for govt to grow & expand its power, its one of the symbols of power in digital age - information is power

Bulk surveillance regime after 9/11 isn’t really effective / doesn’t really work - there was actionable intelligence recorded before the plot, but it wasn’t seen or picked up (probably because of millions of info being processed all the time)

If we protect, maintain, uphold democratic values within us

Changing political futures

Court of public opinion is what always wins, despite government

Panel

Journalists that do justice in the stories that whistleblowers have to tell, esp. In UK, are few and far between

Guardian editorial published today against Leveson inquiry - serious questions about so called free press

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/mar/01/the-guardian-view-on-leveson-part-two-look-ahead-not-behind

Julian assange never mentioned

Iraqi journalist - she was only 13 when iraq war happened, what she can do to prevent further destruction in her country as a journalist

Refuse to accept continuous lies churned out by so called humanitarian about protecting ME from despotic leaders - if that was such a concern, why not in Yemen or saudi arabia

Katharine feels like she’s failed

Appalled at people anti iraq that are pro syria

Destruction isn’t being reported the way war policy is now - subjugation + punishment for people in ME (who will not be subjected to american control)

Implications of military men with no political responsibility, risen in ranks of organised murder - now in civilian posts (of government)

Organise + demand an end to it

Anyone voting for Clinton or Trump was voting for war, they were both war parties

Continue to resist on the ME people behalf

Observer failed as well - only published memo 1.5 months after it was given to them?

This is an ongoing story - katharine was not called by any inquiry, we don’t know who authorised the memo or the GCHQ operation, why the case was dropped, who made those decisions + on what basis

Funding model for whistleblowing organisations

Work way below what a normal lawyer/advocate’s salary would be

Desperately need the funding

Liberty - legal representation to whistleblowers

Public funding + support

Immediate danger of safety, employment opportunities after?

Tried to blow the whistle on UN, and hasn’t had paid employment for 24 years

Often bankrupted, blacklisted, broken - chronic unemployment despite degrees, resumes, experience in govt. People best serving the government are the whistleblowers.

Hard to get through airport security

If you have the opportunity to employ a whistleblower, please do so

After you going through the government ringer of being called a traitor, terrorist sympathiser

Tom drake works full time at Apple, had total support from them

Trying to find professorship

Business he started failed bc no one willing to partner

People have tried to help him - as an engineer, consulting in silicon valley

In severe debt, 2nd mortgage, was a senior exec

Tom would not be here today without jesselyn.

Life goes on

You can choose your conscience > career, freedom

We are all in this together

I hear the bells of history in my years each and everyday

Power does tend to corrupt, absolute power corrupts. You want to keep, expand power. It’s a pathology.

At risk from these power structures

Many people who profit from power - literally and figuratively

Those who are expendable, doesn’t matter that they’re human, they deserve what they get. Collateral damage. Form of organised genocide.

UK-US, deep transnational state relationship [1946, secret signal intelligence relationship], work in tandem and have for years

Permanent war and conflict society/economy

Nurses & care workers on abuse of elderly, office workers on accounting fraud, bank staff on banking things - don’t get publicity that we give them. We need more publicity to be given at every level, show that this is the right thing they do, support them at whatever low level. We assume whistleblowing has to be at highest hierarchy.

Doomsday book - nuclear war leaks dan ellsberg never got to dump?

US proposed complete annihilation of china even if they had nothing to do with war ??

Hire a firm to discredit you

Rawest, emotionally charged meeting - duncan

I did what i could, and you can be proud of that

People who tried to tell the truth about palestine has been silenced in the most systematic way (labour party) - has to do with military us policy. Mortecai monunu??? Whistleblower

Ted (theodore) hall

Manhattan project, scientists

Katharine: Depriving them of their moral authority

Save the world club

Intellectual struggle when choosing to whistleblow/reveal things

Jesselyn - when she whistleblew was the first time she slept soundly. How to do it, who to go to - how to do it most successfully, safely, loudly.

Most whistleblowers don’t have internal debates about what to do, have known in their gut what they should do.

Moral responsibility of journalist or editor? Haven’t even trained journalist to look at that.

Support & looking at long term consequences of putting everything on the line - who are your personal support networks, what would life actually look like?

USA has destroyed 3 generations of iraqi lives

When your own country has become an empire and engages in the utter destruction/insanity

After 9/11, USA declared the whole world a battlefield

Media democracy festival

[nchyinotes]

Blockchain and the Law Workshop @ UCL

April 26 2018 

https://www.ucl.ac.uk/laws/events/2018/apr/blockchain-and-law?mc_cid=d361c2bb54&mc_eid=f20555d56f

“The workshop deals with emergent economic, political and legal phenomena in the field of FinTech. It pursues two distinct goals. First, it intends to generate awareness and facilitate a better understanding of the actors, phenomena and dynamics of the new financial order. Second, it explores the political and legal implications of financial and technological innovation based on blockchain technology. These debates will constitute the basis of an edited volume that introduces practitioners and researchers to the regulatory and political challenges of blockchain technologies and its diverse uses.”

Thoughts: To be honest, I found this quite dry. Even though I knew the layout of this event, I still think I expected this to be more of a lecture style and cohesive delivery of material that everyone agreed on, which obviously is never what panel events are like. But I still found that the content was very scattered, information was repeated, and some of the information seemed quite generic. I was definitely not impressed with the speaker that spent most of her presentation talking about AI and its implications - just seemed like she recycled an old presentation and somehow thought it would fit into a workshop specifically about blockchain?? Though I did learn overall, it just wasn’t very consistent or necessarily what I thought I’d get out of this session. Some things I found especially helpful: the three token types explained (by multiple different people haha), the comparison between token launches and other types of funding, and Prof. Ioannis Lianos’s insights on regulatory challenges.

NOTES

Panel 1: Fintech and Blockchain: State of play of the industry

Julian Leitloff, Co-founder & CEO of Fractal Blockchain

Deutsch bank background

Equity crowdfunding

Similar

investors are young and male

Interests of people investing have similar interests: product driven (i need to use this), return driven (privacy), cause driven (i care so much about data privacy)

Similar funding dynamics: Most of the funds are allocated right at the start - people make up their minds before the actual launch

Inherently different

International

More like a currency valuation - the token value does not depend on revenues, isn’t the same as just equity. → tokens not dependent on revenues but on usage (return token ←→ utility token)

Open and transparent way to fundraise for open source projects - token launches

Building this international community is really hard to do - actual international capital market

166 nationals involved

Components of a token launch

Florian Glatz, President of the German blockchain association (Bundesblock)

Thomas Bertani, CEO of Oraclize and EIDOO

Leading data delivery (connection between blockchain applications + any other context)

99% of the market cause started early

Eg. decentralised insurance (delay / smart contracts?), gambling games (implementing lotteries), exchange scalability

HMRC policy paper - vat exemption?

FCA sandbox program

Sterling-backed ERC20 token - allowed to issue sterling pound tokens on the public chain in a regulated manner (using digital identity cards to send payments would facilitate the KYC process on both business and usersides: onboarding of new users into blockchain space). Simple P2P payments without intermediaries.

technical complexities

Uncertainty around value of the coin

Switzerland is moving really fast, and encouraging new startups. Guidelines from FINMA (for financial licenses)

Exchanges: centralised / decentralised

Change one crypto to another, huge implications in regulation because operator in one case is actually holding on to the money VS exchange operator is just facilitating transfer + has no way to steal money or instruct money to move in a way not approved

Wallets: custodial/non custodial → implications

Still not defined

Custodial: If you are a provider of a wallet, and you are custodial provider (can prevent user to spend independently money), you will need a license for KYC

Non custodial: Technical service (can just download and run software themselves) → technically impossible to do KYC

ICO/tokens: classification of tokens, requirements

Robert Kilian, General Counsel, N26

Traditional fintech / fintech bank - 850/900k customers, v small bank, but have to report to 20 regulatory authorities on a daily basis

What’s especially interesting is solutions around digital identity services & Regulatory reporting (there’s a whole world to discover), beyond payments

Every authority has working groups + understands the business models

2 main hurdles

Blockchain based payments (cryptos + settlement systems/target 2) are not very widely accepted on european market, problem in every B2C business

Tech capacities & solutions are all very early stage, need to step up in regards with bringing specialised blockchain fintechs with other banks/fintechs. How you can put them into other solutions/technologies

Ben Whitby, Director of Compliance, TokenCard

Was at HSBC

Prepaid card platform built on ethereum to realise/extract value of ethereum/TLC?? token into Fiat, enabling that through mastercard and other issuers

Built on decentralised - you are holding those assets and they’re under your control (vs custodian wallet or bank, where custodian holds those assets)

SSL technology is driving public/private key infrastructure

Transactions you operate on an ethereum network can be seen by anybody, except your name isn’t associated with it (its your wallet’s address)

People can send you information/tokens if they have your wallet’s address, you can’t stop that. Operators can’t stop it either. [ie. terrorist sending them in]

Need some mechanism of sanctions

Data that is provided to blockchain is open + transparent

Lots of talk about scanning your documents (raw files) on to the blockchain for a digital identity: problem, because once your identity info is on blockchain, even though its encrypted, encryption deteriorates over time + as computer gets more sophisticated. I wouldn’t put anything on it that you ultimately wouldn’t mind being made public.

Youport, sovereign, UN’s 2020 -- will all push forward digital identities, in 2-3 years will probably have to use them

DLT vs public chains

DLT: Reduce operational cost, T+10 seconds. Barriers to entry here are v v significant, good for existing players

Public: support entrepreneurial activity. Enter into an ecosystem and grow your chain

Tokens: evolution of where we are in society, fractional capabilities are game changing, and transacting at near 0 costs, with massively increased trust because you know assets are going to go from point a-b

V important to determine difference between utility and payment tokens

Shouldn’t regulate tokens with yesterday’s regulations

Structure it properly and not hamper the innovation

Personally doesnt use internet banking lol

Sending photos on email/internet is horrible

Risk cannot be delegated - due diligence is important

Panel

Startups are working on quantam computing resistant encryption

People will eventually move to decentralised, non custodial solution

Hackable point is overdone - because systems develop overtime. You never store data on the blockchain, only metadata (??).

Blockhchain is the only proof you have of the timestamp? can’t remove it

Blockchain is the only  censorship resistant mechanism that exists today - internet is censored by the government

Liquid assets - can easily sell, more appealing to investors

ICO vs equity funding

ICO: upsides - international market, easy access. Downsides - Technical capacity (wallet, install this, get to know this to the customers, which is a huge process), security

 Panel 2: Blockchain and Fintech: Emerging legal issues

Victoria Birch, Partner, Norton Rose Fullbright

For AI to be accepted in any given market, it needs to be perceived by participants in the market as meeting minimum ethical/legal standards

Why are ethical values important?

Humans make decisions against a background of implicit societal ethical norms

AI is capable of autonomous decision making

AI is trained on past data and live operational date and takes on societal norms

Liability, reputation

Eg. HR decisions

Legal risks: supply chain impact, civil liabilities, consumer impact, contractual implications, criminal liability, regulatory breach, human rights/reputation, data privacy, etc  

Smart contracts and stuff

Michael McKee, Partner, DLA Piper

European banking authority has defined virtual currency (digital representation used as a means of exchange and can be transferred/stored/traded electronically, not issued by a public authority, not necessarily attached to a fiat currency) - doesn’t have a backer and is decentralised, often are cryptographically secured

3 different categories - not necessarily legal

Payment (ie. bitcoin) - do not entail any claims on their issuers.

Are they money?

Problem with terminology

Store of value - Don’t function well as store of value, lots of volatility

Means of payment - not widely accepted

Unit of account - no

Utility - designed to give their holders access to blockchain powered services/platform, don’t generally create an issue for financial services regulators

Asset - attract most attention from regulators, usually associated with ICOs, that represent debt/equity claim. Offer some interest in profitability of the project - v similar to traditional securities.

Regulatory rationales?

Lots of abusive behaviour has been associated with eg. ICOs

Capacity to manipulate the market, ponzi schemes

ML and terrorism

Retail investors ?

Reducing transaction costs

Risk to global financial system

Forms of regulation

Top down - how people expect

Bottom up - typically industry led

Businesses policing risk - not so much regulation but business decisions by big players in payments world (lloyds bank)

Recent legal and regulatory developments

Supranational level: financial stability board (to G20), european commission action plan, IMF

US is ahead of the game:

CFTC dived in early (regarded as a commodity from a securities perspective, and a property from tax POV)

token issuers and exchanges are “money transmitters” (register and comply with AML/KYC)

FCC has taken very tough stance on ICO - if its an ICO its regarded as a security

UK

Case by case approach (v british), more nuanced in different ICOs (utility vs those that have a more security slant)

Tax: not subject to VAT, but yes to income/corporate gains tax

Germany - the opposite approach to US/UK (capital gains don’t apply, VAT does apply, because they are treated as means of payment)

EU: 4th money laundering directive includes electronic stuff

China takes hostile approach, cracked down on crypto exchanges, banned ICOs

Russia not so hostile, but has a draft bill on digital assets that states that digital financial assets aren’t legal means of payment

Challenges

Protecting retail investors

Internationally harmonised rules?

Whether integration or isolation in cryptos from traditional financial systems

Energy consumption - does this one huge downside outweigh all the rest?

Dr. Philipp Hacker, Humboldt University Berlin

Crypto securities regulation: ICOs under EU financial law

5B (ICO) vs 200M (VC) - blockchain fundraising in 2017

What you want is to avoid a US class action lawsuit (Tezos ICO - securities class action. Personally liable). 7 ICOs are facing this.

EU doesn’t have class action laws

3 archetypes of tokens:

Currency - not securities (exception of “instruments of payment), possibly subject to payment services regulation (PSD2)

investment (assets) - eg. DAO. prospectus regulation, free put option, crypto bank run

Utility - eg. filecoin, comparable to shares in companies (or securitised debt?). Disclosure duties and withdrawal rights, free put option, cryptobank run.

Negotiability (+)

Voting rights (+/-)

Future cash flow / dividends (-)

Possible appreciation in value (+)

Is this enough? 1 / 2 revenues. Two possibilities and zero case law:

1. Enough if expectations of profit raised by promotional materials

2. Generally not enough → financial risks stem from product functionality risks, better addressed by consumer law. Exception if AIV clearly dominates consumptive aspects.

Generally not securities → advantage for ICO system in EU

Recommendations:

Internal: Safe harbour for tokens - disclosure requirements

External: international convention

Dr. Deni Mantzari, University of Reading

Dr Anna Donovan, UCL Laws

Panel

Corporate governance - deep governance issues in open source/DLT communities

Light touch approach, compliant ?? regime

Algorithmic fairness paper

Singapore is the blockchain disneyland

Courts role (vs regulation) in liability - US/singapore

AI liability - victorian cases about when your horse loses control lol

EU courts probably going to get involved, and they’re quite experienced in dealing with technological change

Growing role for expert witnesses with tech background

Common law places them well in responding sensibly with traditional principles that have manifested themselves in new ??

 Panel 3: Fintech, Blockchain and the Law: Regulatory Challenges

Dr Matteo Aquilina, Financial Conduct Authority

Talking about blockchain: 1. cryptos, 2. DLT in general

Consumer protection, market integrity, competition in interest of consumers

Cooperates with financial stability part (bank of england) [FB/PC]

Money has 3 core functions

Roughly 60% of BTC transactions are for illegal (years ago, when it was more niche)

ICOs vs standard capital raising - information asymmetry + uncertainty (company is so young) are extreme

Advantages: Improving organisational resilience, improve transparency, efficiency / removing intermediaries / saving costs in existing services

DLT as a game changer not in reforming old services, but eliminating/creating a completely new service

FCA as a whole is a believer in this technology, but we shouldn’t underestimate the risks (esp in consumer protection area + competition in future)

Regulatory sandbox

Dr. Tomaso Aste, Chair, UCL Center of Blockchain Technology (CBT)

Blockchain for regulation

Transactions are verified by a large community, community verification is hard to tamper, verified recorded immutable history of fair play reduces reputation?? → trust

A coordination technology that can create efficient marketplaces from illiquid environments that are not naturally connected and trustworthy

Use cases - Maison Project

Enabling real time regulatory reporting

Enabling a mortgage switching service

Limitations

Basic motor of blockchain is consensus - super inefficient

Consensus requires community validation

Information must be accessible to all network participants

In most cases, this is not affordable - Conflicts with proprietary rights on data, privacy, security

Reliable time stamping?

Research is needed

Prof. Ioannis Lianos, UCL Faculty of Laws

2 main views of regulation

Public interest - who are we protecting? Investors, consumers, etc

Private interest - new competitors to the market?

2 main issues:

1) What is a regulatory problem to be solved? Market failure

Privacy as a theoretical issue - as the equality parameter of competition (after microsoft linkedin merger)

But blockchain doesn’t bring up risk for privacy issues in comparison to digital platforms

Competition authorities often focus on horizontal - potential entrants + substitutes

But also suppliers and buyers are part of this thing

^ looking at porters 5 forces

Competition authorities duty to protect and promote competition and innovation

What about fairness?

Architectural advantage of various companies being able to influence ecosystem (incl. regulators) in a way that is in favour of their own interest. Narratives out there serve particular actors.

Blockchain → bottlenecks? (network effects/externalities)

Ethereum as indisputable platform of choice for tokens

Mining - highly concentrated, 5 operators control 85% of hash power

GDPR’s right to be forgotten vs blockchain immutability

Adaptive algorithms? Harder to deal with learning algorithms  

Schumpeterian approaches ←→ imperfect competition

Permissionless innovation - experimentalism - principle of precaution

Currently missing from regulator’s approach: lots of interaction/collab with firms, but not much public consultation (for other stakeholders POV, like consumers)

Self regulation of industry - probably in the form of rating agencies

2) Different tools that regulators have at their disposal

Robert Kilian, General Counsel, N26

Prof. Iris Chiu, UCL Laws

Ben Whitby, Director of Compliance, TokenCard

Panel

EU financial law is heavily based on model of centralised systems (commercial registers)

See what other technologies we have that are decentralised (eg. cloud) - pretty much the same problems (IT, DP, financial regulation)

Public consultation is key, esp in financial regulation / new tech / entrepreneurship

Public chains are the ones that are going to enable innovation, DLT is great for incumbents to strip out costs n such

Crypto assets are borderless in nature, so needs more international coordination

Pittsburgh g20 OTT space - clear guideline

Utility + currency tokens don’t act like securities, consumer law is probably better

Primary (great ambiguity in asset tokens - should be regulated, not be treated like a financial offering) + secondary market (what sort of trading markets are we promoting and whether that is in line with what consumers want) dimension of ICOs

Regulators do engage with public - publishing many discussion papers

Blockchain will enable a much more competitive enviro

Competition authority should promote more Interoperability standards (open banking), more transparency in the market might encourage collusion?

1844 railways act

Regulators get blamed whether they regulate or not

V wait and see - probably foreclosure of one of the big platforms not giving access to a competitor

Functionally equivalent in law

[nchyinotes]

What is to be done? Games for Social Impact (Cybersalon @ Newspeak House)

January 25 2018

http://cybersalon.org/what-is-to-be-done-games-for-social-impact-next-event/

Over 2.2 bln people world-wide will be playing games in 2018. A hit game is fun but also an opportunity for deep learning and transformative experience. As technology, politics and urbanisation makes our lives more complex, games can help us to learn faster about things we need to know to thrive in this new post-truth world. Cybersalon.org will host a panel on how game creatives and social innovators can put spotlight on real-world challenges like state and work surveillance, fake news and anti-democratic practices of modern governments while providing inspiring game experience.

Rich Metson – game designer and OFF GRID co-author. The game reveals the world of surveillance and invites player to explore the avoidance and defense techniques.

Amanda Warner –”Fake It to Make it” US-based web games author and interactive designer interested in fighting propaganda and confusion in Mainstream Media in US and beyond (joining via Skype from US)

Osmiotic Studios – Hamburg-based authors of “Orwell” game, sharing the key points from the development and potential of the game for impact

Ben Greenaway – Cybersalon’s games reviewer who will discuss Anders Norén’s Riot – Civil Unrest and also impact of AI and AR in Games for Change

Simon Sarginson – Senior UX Developer at Splash Damage will review the game “Orwell”

Chairing Rosa Carbo-Mascarell – London-based game designer and Corbyn Run game co-author , Creative Director for Game Jam and Games For The Many

THOUGHTS: I thoroughly enjoyed this event. Attended out of sheer curiosity, as I saw the listing on Newspeak House. I hear about video games everywhere and have heard/watched interesting video game analysis, but have never really played video games or seen the appeal. I’m always interested in different creative mediums used to reach people and engage them beyond just entertainment purposes (while also providing the entertainment, but not letting that dilute the message behind it). So I definitely appreciated being introduced to all these video games that hope to make social impact. I found them all fascinating - I even bought the Red Strings Club! I also got to play a bit of Off Grid afterwards, which was quite cool. Looking forward to when it comes out. The panel was the highlight for me though, I found the discussion about video games as a medium informative and thought provoking.

EDITED NOTES

Off Grid the Game (Rich Metson)

Hacking, data privacy

POV of a technophobe trying to understand political impact

End up doing malicious things for a good goal

Collecting data as you go along, to build a profile

Off grid is “simplistic” (ie. a solution in the game to distract a guard is to hack the radio channel to change it to a sports channel so the guy listens to the radio for longer) to make a point

Read more: http://offgridthegame.com/ and http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2018-01-15-off-grid-is-about-the-principles-of-hacking

Fake it to make it (Amanda)

Targeting people who genuinely believed fake news

Higher level of skepticism + notice/fact check, explain to others/advocate how its spread

Don’t understand that it’s easy to

financial incentives (profitability of ad revenue)

Outcome map - Start with high level (what needs to happen in the world, what needs to support)

Best way for people to gain a deep understanding

Background in training and education

Skill development, behaviour change

Jeopardy: very typical game used in education, but game structure has very little to do with message - the challenge was not connected to learning goals

Game with a goal with defined set of rules to reach it

Power for people to struggle

Integrate skills, behaviours into mechanisms of game

Stories from teachers about impact

Read more: http://www.fakeittomakeitgame.com/ and https://kotaku.com/fake-news-video-game-is-a-little-too-real-1793660926

RIOT (Ben Greenaway)

RIOT, civil unrest (advocate)

Simulator

Real time strategist for police or rioters

Agency issue in games

Layer of AI/separation/representation (2D/3D)

First person = generally OK

Especially in RT strategy games

How does it feel like i’m actually there?

Model computes a reaction to your input for each game character based on different elements (training, adrenaline, etc)

Friction between intent + reality

Game is produced as response to real world events, testimony of what he experienced

Gamespot blogspot, leonard menchian

4 real world historic events (italy, greece, Spain, Egypt)

Simulation tool: how to have player agency in historical event

Key characters that were photographed in Venezuelan + chile events are baked in to the game

Not historic reenactment - fuzzy rean??, real world rules based

Is there ever a winning police/rioter strategy

Pilots use simulators

Experiments - protein folding, scientific testing

Simulation as prediction

Social change as a game (how its portrayed)

RIOT is documentary + offering new POV

Read more: http://riotsimulator.com/ and https://www.gamespot.com/articles/how-the-worlds-riots-inspired-a-video-game/1100-6405315/  

Simon Sarginson

Visceral effects of digital in political engagement

Exploring ideas in games: 3 games of how we interact with governments

Accessible, not very deep

How we deal with influence + govt

Games used to ask qs or answer (how can)

1) ORWELL (Goal: to find terrorists)

How public info makes you easily identifiable

More invasive

1. You get kind of bored looking through people's lives, demotivation of subject its trying to portray

2. You have a lot of power. People's lives are highly ambiguous, where you choose to surface = hugely important

Uncomfortable tension ran there with narrative of game, you’re working for an evil government

Participating, not just watching (like other art). Your agency in this. You are a pawn of evil!

Politically slanted

More: https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/bn3m35/orwell-is-a-game-about-surviellance-with-a-major-blindspot or http://www.surpriseattackgames.com/portfolio-items/orwell/ or https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/4/17062366/orwell-keeping-an-eye-on-you-game-surveillance-short-play

2) Papers, Please

Working as border worker

Tension: face horrible choices - if you do moral things, you pay out of own pocket

Mundane, you just want to get through it - it becomes an annoyance

Involved in process, goal: keep family alive

Very visceral way how people can be stuck in this system

More: http://www.papersplea.se/

3) Red strings club

Info broker influencing people with drinks, like big organisations (do?)

Social influence as personal vs traditional advertising

Role of influence in our lives - trans humanist slant

More: https://www.polygon.com/2018/1/22/16911206/the-red-strings-club-review or https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/the-red-strings-club-review/1900-6416838/

Panel

Lots of political engagement in other art forms, why not in games?

1930s in terms of timeline (where film was)

games come out of something inherently not political - the arcade, for entertainment, to disappear into something entirely different

language is still in development

only recently have video games been considered art, early times

pressure isn’t yet there from us - i need more from this game, i want you to address real issues, not just fantasy escape

reasoning, political will, game making power hasn’t come together in one package yet

when collabs happen, are often mismatched = entertainment game vibe, not in the most positive way

financial incentives, not well positioned to have independent voice. even movie industry while v large and organisational

you need scale to have political message

(young medium, the market, requires some certain independence from the way we make games)

Is there a way to speed up that process?

make better cameras (like lumiere brothers?)

unity engine didn’t think it would politicise game dev but it has (was to democratise), so much easier to do it.

we actually are able to focus on political content more, and have an ability to enter the market and compete commercially, given enough time.

comes down to tooling - access to toolkit to broader group of people

try to do too much ?

beyond confines of game just for entertainment

interaction = what makes games unique, can expose interesting ways of political process

if a game is not fun, no one will use it (unlike film, books)

harder to get entry levels/newcomers into making something interesting?

knowledge required to do a v complicated simulation = v extensive technical

games is difficult medium to use, bc hard to express politics through mechanics and not everyone can create simulations

How do you motivate existing game makers to do this?

game jams - melting point to do ideas, but nobody actually finishes them (a money thing, staying power needs financial)

paolo ?? short games on oil, drones

crowdfunding

consequence of democratisation of more accessibility to making games

if you have a broader set of people contributing content to the field (not CS people), you’ll have different stories told

ie. paperboy falling into pothole into street

politics comes from everywhere - more political games just cause you have more games

Why are society’s most vulnerable people never involved in games that comment on their lives?

south side of chicago - meant to try to engage community in grassroots led basis

maturity of the medium

indie developer without funding, hard to research communities on field (have to just do it on internet)

matty brice, nicky case (coming out) - there are people from marginalised communities making games

channels for conversations to get started

minimal toolkit to get involved, recognising that we need other input (ideation developers, modders, etc)

making games moddable ? modder culture

For Amanda: who is your audience? the people that need the information are not seeking it out

her relatives (lol)

middle of the road people, who are not so unreachable

students - digital literacy in schools

??? GTA ??

speaking up when you think something is a bit heavy handed, voice concern, pressure on studios to compete with you and make something more important / sensitive to issues

star wars battlefront 2 - in game payment system

v bad planning on EA, oversold on promise of game before release (beta & reddit)

debated in EU courts now

so much rooms for games like GTA to explore deeper in to ?? worlds ?? —> will sell more copies of they do

big boys and girls: they don’t absolutely own the market like they used to

[nchyinotes]

the future of wikipedia (katherine maher & lucy crompton-reid)

February 3 2018

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-future-of-wikipedia-tickets-42271530285# 

Thoughts: So this was kind of my first foray into open knowledge/culture, and there were two parts to this day - the first was learning about wikidata and how to query it and contribute to it. This was pretty cool and actually what I had initially signed up for because I want to get out of my comfort zone/learn a new skill for research, but I did feel a little over my head haha. The second part I actually just found out about on the day, and stayed for. This was a talk about the future of Wikipedia, and it sounds pretty awesome tbh. I came in knowing nothing about Wikipedia, how it works as an organisation (it’s a non profit!), or how the site is maintained or who contributes, or what its missions are. Katherine is a great speaker. And while the talk was obviously very specific to Wikipedia, I think I was able to learn about all sorts of topics I’m interested in - how NGOs operate and are funded, how huge collaborative projects work, acknowledgment of and potential solutions to structural barriers that promote limited diversity in contributors of the collaborative projects, the bias that results from this, the impact of new technology, and their vision and belief in the public good of open knowledge. Was a very well spent day for me.

lucy

global movement for open knowledge

non profit

free and open access to info/knowledge = driver of social/cultural/economic development, fundamental right

work with cultural + educational organisations to enable them to contribute to a democratic understanding of the world

3 programs:

1) diversify editing community + content

not reaching + representing every community, voice, sum of human knowledge

gender gap, minorities

2) promoting open knowledge

3) education and learning

reach and impact?

metrics: people we reach, editors we have, ??

social bias + impact? how open knowledge genuinely improves society

katherine

wikimedia is based in san fran

300 people at the foundation, all over the world

“a world in which every single human can share in the sum of all knowledge” - aspirational statement, room for everyone to participate (+ create knowledge), not just consume

asymptotic, active

the more info on wikipedia, the better resource it’ll be

people who contribute to wikipedia, if they come with a partisan view over time become more neutral

wikidata (structured and linked data), wikimedia commons, DBpedia

populations are shrinking - japan, russia, europe - where wikimedia is well known + prominent

sub saharan africa

means of knowledge production hase been changing over time

the way we consume, faith / trust / research in institutions is on decline and shifting into influencers/personal trust networks, interfaces are changing (go beyond browser)

internet: info —> communication medium

native > additive experience in their lives

how do we want to evolve in response to the way world is changing?

hopes + fears for free knowledge

wikimedians

talked to experts (futurists, technologists, policy, arts, etc) - how they anticipate the change to be

what did we learn?

knowledge gaps + biases = highest concern

wikimedia doesn’t serve the entire world (language coverage, breadth of coverage, representative)

structural inequality prevents us from achieving ^ mission

who is creating the reliable sources that wikimedia relies on?

adapt to world’s changing knowledge needs

leverage new technology (video? open ML?)

more people in institutions (science, cultural, edu) want to join but dk how

direction:

becoming an essential infrastructure of the ecosystem of free knowledge

anyone who shares our vision will be able to join us (barriers)

knowledge as service - how to serve more people, ??

knowledge equity - ensure that info that exists doesn’t just have large numbers but a breadth and depth that is truly reflective of the world and serves it in a meaningful way

Panel

at a personal level, what do you want to see for open knowledge by 2030?

more people to know what open knowledge means

successful in communicating value of what this means to a broader audience

more entities participating, the more healthy the ecosystem is

—> advancing the concept of it

structural barriers that exist?

leisure time, literacy, gender inequity, marginalised communities are not usually secondary sources because historically haven’t been able to challenge dominant narrative — still replicating canon (way they evaluate sources, relies on means of knowledge production which is very traditional)

awareness, access (affordability)

where in that hierarchy do we sit?

balloons for the internet (some big tech companies ??)

incentivising local language production?

how to identify these gaps / barriers and breaking them down so more people can participate

notability? deletionism? guidelines as a community, when they’re appropriate? where to strike that balance to make sure it’s accurate + reliable, but also easy to contribute.

community conversation

oral citation? how to rely on this, which is far more prevalent than we give it affordance for

what does notability look like in a community, language, culture? their own validation methods within different areas?

NYT - considered newspaper of record? lawsuit in california by gay softball league of san Francisco. NYT wrote about the case, but never mentioned their ethnicity. everyone that wasn’t decided gay was POC. — active exclusion happening in sources we think are reliable. what are our paradigms for liability anyway? even though that was the crux of the issue of the case.

hidden, implicit bias

fake news

how we enable people to be more aware of bias (not our own, but in interpreting/analysing the media and recognising it)? how important that foundation has a educational ???

should wikipedia position itself as alternative to mainstream media?

wikipedia ranked more trustworthy than BBC, 1 survey, by 2 points —> horrifying

wikipedia relies on secondary sources. if trustworthiness in BBC declines, that’s bad for wikipedia!

i want you to use wikipedia, but you need to ask those questions and CHECK CITATIONS to become a participant and not a consumer - be a critical reader

what can we do to advocate on the need for media literacy, more funding for research??

engage with educators, learners (and not just uni) - how to google stuff, read + edit wikipedia

wales community!

investment in science community - impact of brexit?

wikimedia engaging in the culture community - partnership with cultural + educational institutions

how is scientific information actually diffused in society?

natural partner for us

how do we bring that community into the wikidata community?

corresponding investment in open science

working with researchers / research community

lots of communities struggle with open data structure, how to maintain catalogues, etc - we are building the tools that do that, but not thinking of it as tools beyond wikimedia. wiki base can be used as an asset by so many other institutions - more info to be available to the world, helping other orgs, etc. —> makes everything better for everyone

automation of content creation?

vietnamese - automated almost all stubs?

stub articles = incentives to create (what is this - short wikimedia article)

wikimedia is fundamentally a human pursuit

machines can augment human work in ways that can be quite helpful - washing machine

multilingual people!

entirety of the ecosystem and identify gaps across all language communities we have

who decides what those gaps are?

opp of wikidata to reveal that

resources - implicit in convo - the fact that there are so many resources invested in western world + global north, what do we need to do to create equity ?

tremendous asymmetry - agency, power in decision making

when they see problems, wikimedians are highly incentivised to make a change

all the more reason to have more voices in the room

1) "human project" - neural machine translation, challenges of ML and machine content creation. challenges of people knowing about machines involvement (turing test?)

ML already exists on wikipedia

how do we use it in a way that’s consistent with our values

3 things

it has to be open - difficult in AI, because transparency doesn’t mean much bc we can’t think the way machines do. intention, legibility, explainability - why was this software made, what should it achieve

inclusivity - biases in datasets we’re training. open, transparent around datasets using

can receive feedback from public

consent - making sure people working on projects consent to the way ML is being used in projects, know how/why it’s happening [ no one wants something being done to them]

2) future financial sustainability of the movement

71.6M USD to keep foundation running this year

very little money for world’s 5th most popular website

created an endowment in last two years - trying to raise significant one to protect it into the future

even if cannot build on it, want to keep it at least open

what resources we require to keep this running into future? gap between where we are and want to be? sustainability in long run?

model is amazing, no one owns it bc of open licensing, building a life long relationship with people for what wikimedia stands for

3) china

blocked in china

people don’t write in chinese only in china - from variety of places in the world

we want to be there for when we’re unblocked, ready + present for chinese public to have access in meaningful way

deliberately trying to effect policy in org to support the description of these things in public? significant portions of UK not represented in publicly meaningful sense. difficult for wikimedia to address that issue.

rural-urban gap in wikipedia bc of nature of secondary sources, media

concentrates around population density, where communities not urban are not represented

even within communities in city - marginalised communities are not recorded in

who creates culture? it just is, what we live.

stuart hall - nature of who creates culture and where it comes from, production of culture (high brow > the one we all live, which isn’t documented)

oral citation project in india - traditional game kids play, no ones ever written it down

daily lived culture is not good at documenting, haven’t found way to address this

reflection of the world

what does knowledge equity really mean? and how do we program for it?

when thinking about core articles, how to raise quality of those and to keep them relevant?

tool - ores?? to evaluate article quality

opp to see what those gaps are, assess in more automated way, based on verifiability (not just density of info)

build tools to help editors maintenance function, or where quality gaps are, so there’s a continuous effort to update + maintain them

can do this not just for one language, but for all

project tiger - with google. how to identify main drivers of traffic (specific pages etc), and make sure the quality is good, and point people to work on that.

worried about losing relevance in the future? things to do to stay relevant?

we don’t know why people leave / fall out of contributor pipe line

give ourselves metrics to be able to evaluate that, so we can focus on retention as priority

rateability -

no one knows that simple english wikipedia exists!

how it’s being utilised by third party reusers

the way we’re composing info so that it becomes reusable! that it offers a service - answers the question, solves the problem

broken connection - maintaining consistency between wikimedian + re users. complying with licensing terms?

Seeing the work you’ve done being credited - for retention.

why based in US?

affordances from a policy POV that do not exist in other places in the world (USA) - hosting controversial or illegal content

intermediary liability protections (nuisance lawsuit)

rotating figureheads of leadership?

awareness + participation

knowledge equity as a priority, yet to determine how that looks like and what changes we need to implement to get there

global secretariat that could be stationed around ??

recently identified 6 countries where there is gap between awareness and ??potential - india, nigeria, iraq

marketing - in language of the community, “awareness raising videos”, ads written by communities themselves

changing what we think contribution + dedication looks like?

data typology on wikipedia that presents different types of data ?? presenting as much info in symbolic / visual forms?

multimedia integration

blockchain?

generally don’t think it’s good for wikipedia (from engineers)

persistence of information - revision history, revisions

feels like a diversion from existing stack

lots of arab wikimedians to be are refugees, with videos, names, locations, sitting on so much data that they want to put on open source etc. lack workshops in camps, any way to get into camps?

how to seek external funding on migrant communities?

big funder didn’t recognise that digitisation of stuff and getting it onto wikipedia was cultural preservation

institutional POV: do they actually want us to come in?

cultural heritage component

wiki loves africa + wiki med + wiki deutschland - building offline editing environments?

when there’s momentum as a community —> generally leads to structure

[nchyinotes]

Fintech: the future of financial institutions — with Clifford Chance

November 30 2018 

https://www.legalcheek.com/lc-careers-posts/event-fintech-the-future-of-financial-institutions-with-clifford-chance/

Below are the key themes around which the session will be structured:

Cryptocurrencies’ rocky journey towards the mainstream

ICOs: Where next?

The emerging fintech regulatory regime

Smart contracts and international law firms

The changing balance of power in the financial sector

Advice for aspiring fintech lawyers

Thoughts: When I attended this, I was over halfway through the online Fintech course I was taking and on the regulation section, so it was very well timed. Most of the background information about fintech I already knew from the course, but still found it interesting to hear what Peter and Andre chose to highlight. I thought they were very generous with the information they shared about both the business and legal issues, and the entire session was extremely well structured, so that made for easy (and good!) note taking haha.

Notes

Andre

TMT partner, 18 years

started career hoping to be a programmer, really interested in all things tech when younger (video games, programming on side), then reality struck

started law career when internet was about to take off

there’s always been change, but it’s the pace of change today that’s astounding, and it’s all driven by technology = challenges to firm + client

fast pace of change that allows a firm with all these resources to stay ahead of the curve + spot risks/opps before clients

what is fintech? means different things for different people

banks, insurance companies have over their whole lives relied heavily on tech

bank = stack of tech with product on top, reg all around, customers on side

signifies the rise of startups, challenges that historic institutions are now facing.

opp + sheer pace of change

operates in financial services space

significant (reg) barriers to entry: challengers

reg to comply with

capital requirements

broken down by accommodating regulator in UK that allows startups to try new things (sand box?)

what does the future hold?

exciting time, lots of opportunities, new ways to gain advantage with tech + repurpose what they already have

2 things equally interesting

rise of fintech startups, how they look at verticals, how they can be better/challenge institutions (new entrants,, new business models)

big institutional relationships = how it changes everything for them. new discussions, challenged fundamentally on what they provide + how they do that.

Peter

senior associate on reg team [more: https://www.legalcheek.com/lc-careers-posts/how-i-became-a-fintech-lawyer/]

how institutes are impacted

how reg provides framework for institutions to deal with tech challenge

there isn’t a specialist fintech lawyer, we are all fintech lawyers with specialisms (technology lawyer, regulatory lawyer, litigators, tax) = different angles

multi faceted aspect to any tech used by financial institutions (contractual arrangements for outsourcing, etc)

tackle from different directions

Perception that fintech means start up? more broad than that, it’s all pervading. it affects all verticals within financial services industry.

Data, P2P lending/crowdfunding, payments/FX, cryptocurrency, infrastructure, asset/wealth management, investment services, regtech, banking, e-conomy

what are the drivers from a financial institution perspective in engaging in this story?

keeping up, staying competitive

improvement to existing product/service - front end, drive new revenue (client coverage, experience, reduce costs)

more efficient operating model - balance sheet perspective, cost side  (simplify regulatory compliance, reduce operational and compliance cost, increase resources for profitable business)

breaking new ground

new product/service (crowdfunding/P2P

main tech trends driving changes: 4 deployed in different ways + overlapping

1) p2p transactions: marketplace lending, crowdfunding = disintermediation of financial institutions in middle of transaction

one of the most mature

2) big data / AI: will become a great driver, determine who survives in this market - who can leverage + profit from the vast amounts of data in their books

3) mobile payments + cashless world:

cash transactions in UK actually went up this year, anomaly

usually decline year on year

internet banking - electrically using web browser

evolution of how it’s provided - not in person/branch, internet browser/computer, mobile phone

developed + distributed in that way

purely mobile only banks - continuing trend

4) blockchain + DLT

way of storing data in a decentralised way - lots of different people all hold the same/copy of database

lots of work in this space - institutions find that this tech can facilitate some financial services they are providing

main effects: don’t need a central body to tell you who owns a security/how much money, everybody on that network can see who owns what

so when you want to make those transactions, don’t need to instruct a body, can do it directly/P2P and everyone on that system will trust it is a genuine transaction

underpinning many different projects - settling securities transactions, payments, trading loans

ICO’s = tokenised crowd funding

lending P2P, buying securities P2P, tokenises this process

one big problem with crowdfunding is liquidity - you can enter in loan, fund company, but then you’re stuck with it and it’s difficult to transfer + get someone to buy it

ICO turns it into some kind of token = easier to transfer, sell

solved problem in p2p, marketplace lending

Questions

How do you regulate automated decision making?

Do you have a right to monetise the data you’re collecting?

is that your data or the bank’s?

If you partner with a start-up, who owns the new IP?

joint venture produces new things - startup, joint venture, bank - how to structure that

Will ML trigger material outsourcing requirements?

How many regulators will oversee a single Blockchain product?

How will this affect banks?

currently at bank, core service: deposit taking service (accept your money, use it to make loans/invest it)

specialist profitable services: allow you to make payments/securities, issue cards, FX, lending, research, look at assets

plug into the infrastructure/payments systems (central security depositories, central banks) - so expensive to have to maintain this

chipping into specific parts (unbundling) - don’t care about bank of england access, banks you can do that its the expensive part —> disintermediation

why banks will continue to provide those profitable services:

1) Capital

raise VC funding, rounds of funding to get it off the ground

banks are sitting on money, can deploy cash to do those services

2) Compliance

difficult hurdle - barrier to entry

regulators can see that potentially if that’s unaddressed —> stranglehold

EU: PSD2: allows fintech startups to get bank accounts, access to payment systems, TPPs - third party payment service providers (make no payments themselves, never touch your money, but are a set of payment things licensed to provide services across europe. have to let these guys into bank systems’ data, and initiate payments on your behalf, if bank consents - account infrastructure, deposit taking, data dragging out. can’t put in contract)

value competition

monopoly on initiating payments

UK: Bank of England (Blueprint for Access), HMT (Open banking standard), FCA (FS on regulatory barriers to innovation in digital/mobile solutions, regulatory sandbox)

this data doesn’t belong to banks, belongs to consumers

what a bank has to do to get regulated - report to regulators, liquid, hold on to certain capital, license

becoming a bank isn’t something you can do overnight. you can produce subsets of services, but deposit taking + consumer lending + payment services + trading + asset management = need to get properly regulated

what about big techs?

could go down that route of compliance, putting in place necessary regulatory framework

amazon = SME loans, moving into that space around the edges

3) Customers

startups start with 0, have to build over time

customer data (tailored knowledge?), loads of customers already  

Andre

Work together in a seamless way

Meeting the challenge of a startup

do it themselves

acquire or invest in fintech

collaborate with - joint venture, white label, outsource

require different lawyers with different specialisms to come together

big challenges to big institutions

organic growth

speed to market: layers of approval to get something done, and thats two years later

fostering innovation culture throughout firm: separate teams

acquisition

what are you actually getting - you want what’s inside that company, not the shares

real battleground is for the customer - who gets the customer?

why do fintech companies want to collaborate = instant access to customer base

as soon as we get into negotiations and talking about who owns the customer, the shutters go up. (tech want to be the providers, not the plumbing at the back)

collaboration

most tricky

who owns the IP in what’s being developed? etc only true IP lawyers can make sense of this, need true expertise

contract lawyers, M&A

good understanding of risk

gone are the days we practiced law, excellent lawyer —> helping clients make decisions, giving commercial business advice

By and large, most banks say they’ll go all three, but mostly collaboration

from financial institution to tech powerhouse

back office considerations becoming key revenue generators

they’ve never thought of exploiting this data

how we take data/IP + commercialise it

blackrock have developed a tool to manage risk, advise traders about what decisions to make—> helps people make decisions. made available on commoditised basis to other asset managers. (black rock financial services ?) = commoditised platform, very successful

tech that can be used by other people in the industry —> software house

data, IP, tech licensing

1) AI: prediction, in next 5-8 years we will see a real change, real impact, really displacing jobs, helping people do jobs in a different/better way

lawyers get to understand tech when helping clients deal with it, but also apply knowledge of the law/risks/understanding of regulation

only if you understand financial reg is that as senior manager you have to understand how services are being run

2) Tech renewal

infrastructure - legacy systems, to outsource/not (contracts - how to transform existing environ to future + what happens when it goes wrong), sysc requirements, data flows, legal resourcing

3) Cybersecurity + GDPR

big data, big problems

EU’s GDPR + NIS directive

new changes: right to be forgotten, rights as owner of that data, obligations on those who act as agent/processor

Fines up to 4% of global turnover for a serious breach

significantly increased compliance burden

action required now

Q&A

contract: who owns vs who controls, ability to use it, control it, can exclude others from it??

products geared toward empowering customers + their control/owner over data

recognising value in data = letting us monetise it, giving better IR

enough data points —> analyse to acquire + target (potential) customers

upselling

how much value does some of your data really have? (google knows a lot about you —> more generically usable. while uber knows a few places you’ve been)

massive role to play for lawyers in cybersecurity (outsourcing)

not a question of if, but when, you will suffer a breach

lawyers drive cybersecurity plans within companies - need to come up with a product + plan

not in technical evaluation, but policy prevention  

regulators don’t expect you to have impregnable walls, you need to have planned for it with, informed in the right time

GDPR impact on blockchain

classic problem

compatibility with right to be forgotten

you’ll just have to be told as a data subject, that though you have a right, if you’re on the blockchain there is no technical way to remove it

give customers as much info as you can about the fact that it’ll always be there

play with exceptions of GDPR?

pretty sure there will be a case that comes up

CME - making bitcoin tradeable —> become a commodity

thank god not a securities lawyer lol

underlying tech is there to stay

potential monopoly law around data because they have such a competitive advantage?

possibly, yes

if they affect customer outcomes

not sure if we’ll ever get to that stage

competition law - watch this space

EU regulators pretty receptive to fintech ATM

ICO phenomenon

AMF in France, consultation paper

forward thinking ideas on how to regulate

london has a very vibrant fintech space - banks, creatives, tech

currently are focusing on core financial services space

fintech with no single space in europe

very mobile community anyway

why haven’t banks launched something in the space of monzo, starling (apps)?

uh they have

esp with PSD2/open banking

[nchyinotes]

Charlie Craggs - Nails Transphobia / Internal Presentation at Privacy International

May 30 2018

Thoughts: I’ve been interested in trans issues for a while, and have had discussions about various aspects of it with different friends. Listening to Charlie speak, and being able to ask her questions later during the manicure (!!), was very eye opening for me, as I don’t know any trans people. I was especially interested about her experience with the NHS, the terms “trans broken leg syndrome” (lol) and “stealth”, how important surgery is, how the community feels toward the police, how she knew she was trans, bad experience with Tinder, and her concern about which platforms she goes on because of their audience. She really hammered home the idea that as a trans person, just being alive and existing is an act of activism, and trans people are forced into the role of activists when they simply defend themselves. Really glad that I was at PI when she came to speak here!

Links: https://www.instagram.com/charlie_craggs/ and https://www.amazon.co.uk/My-Trans-Sisters-Charlie-Craggs/dp/1785923439

Notes

GRA - board of men who decide if you’ve been living as a woman long enough?

being able to self identify (decide your own gender / identity)?

ireland has a law you can self identify? but you can’t stay married if you want to transition (family life)?

allows a less binary approach

need both messaging - about male and female health issues (breasts, testicles, cervical scans, etc)

malta is apparently the best for trans right? but abortion is illegal?

UK is now lower on the LGBT friendly scale because of the dated GRA / trans

roseanne cox on OITNB, janet mok released her book, carmen c came out on drag race

collective conversations helped change the overall conversation

hate crimes have increased (170%), and she/none of her friends have reported being attacked because they don’t have trust in police - there’s no point going through it, nothings going to come of it, victim blaming, being made to feel like its your fault, being laughed at

power holders are often perpetrators of what you’re reporting

feels affirmed when being called “she”

from 2013, only got referred for surgery in 2018 (NHS i think)

3x to get referred

psychosexual counsellor person - asking about sex, a lot of random questions (do you stand up or sit down when you go to the toilet) [privacy issue]

wait two years for the gender identity clinic

after passing all the tests to prove your trans-ness —> referred to surgery?

have to be diagnosed by transgenderism (scrapped by DSA)

spreadsheets online of trans friendly GP to get referrals

finds it amazing that NHS provides downstairs surgery

trans broken leg syndrome

going to any medical thing - you get asked about if its because you’re trans

at bereavement counselling

having a cold

And people in general ask very invasive questions and think that’s ok

Like homeless people: every professional they come into contact with wants to know their story (conditioned - have to tell them up front)

“stealth” they identify as trans but no one knows (in the closet)

abuse on social media from broadly piece/podcast that has been shared with all of vice’s audiences - wouldn’t have done it if she knew vice was sharing it

brands have DoC not to put her in a position like that

you tailor your conversation to who’s listening

instagram/IG: they’ll find your nipples ASAP but their priorities are clearly skewed

power holders don’t recognise it as a problem?

guys feeling entitled to your time - guy at meet and greet saying that he’s been following her on IG and said he added her on FB 2 years ago and she didn’t accept and he showed it up on his phone

part and parcel of putting your life online

they can see where i’m going to be next and come and beat me up

christina grimmie

social media is dangerous

she never attacks, just defends

feminists who believe trans women aren’t women

channel 4 gender quake - paid anti trans people to heckle

suspended from tinder every couple of weeks - take down her profile + read all her messages because of guys that report her (her profile says it)

are algorithms transphobic?

court cases?

never been taken down on bumble or grindr

old tactic: syrian free army report human rights reporters

feels like crap when you got suspended, nasty/dirty/embarrassing

public figure - can leak them if they’re nasty messages

hypocritical: all swipes for everyone etc, trans inclusive

Q from lucy: many trans people have been unfairly denied by Facebook’s draconian identity policies. http://transadvocate.com/trans-people-have-99-problems-and-facebook-is-just-one_n_14727.htm

drag queens have been affected?

boys who watch her story everyday and post on her wall that “you’re a man” - generally its because they want her

https://www.instagram.com/p/BlBMeq7lN6r/?taken-by=charlie_craggs

“it stinks of tokenism/just trying to make money” - they have trans people in front of the camera, but not behind the scenes — need more diversity BTS

even if gender terms are all removed, if advertising/society still genders living / smooth legs — thats still gendered. taking away language, bodies are still gendered - physically its still a label.

most people just want to be able to identify for themselves - not just eradicate gender, trying to impose a genderless future on people

Facial feminisation is a thing

a need to change your sex - “transexual” (medical + surgical intervention)

Really depends on the individual

None of her trans friends want surgery

But she is getting surgery because its integral to her identity - she can’t even get into a long term relationship because she can’t get intimate with her partner in this body

how did she know she was trans?

never felt like a gay man

growing up - feminine, put on girls clothes, liked guys. —> very textbook transexual

when she was younger said she wished she was a girl - strong sense of dysphoria on her body (when she had to start shaving, she wanted to hide the razor, was embarrassed of it and thought her parents would be too which makes no sense as a teenage boy)

[nchyinotes]

'Deport, Deprive, Extradite - 21st Century State Extremism' Book Launch

April 13 2018

increasing authoritarianism + normalisation of it in UK/US - defining feature of war on terror

9 muslim men who were extradited to US, under a USUK treaty arranged in 2003 (US can request individual for extradition without prima facie evidence - lowered threshold significantly)

a process of doing justice with these individuals that didn’t require them going through the CJS / formal prosecution - broad issue in counterterrorism, way of experimenting criminalising people through immigration system (deporting, or depriving of their citizenship)

extradition in terms of transfer of individuals from UK to US to evade the CJ process —> alternative way of criminalising / prosecuting, and conveying to the public that there’s a problem with terrorism without actually having to scrutinise the evidence behind these particular cases

extradition: mimicking extraordinary rendition (condemned by ECHR) ???

importance of the law itself for legitimating these measures. parallels between transfer and individuals who have been rendered.

these occur within the human rights framework.

years in prison / solitary confinement = not torture.

when terrorism gets invoked - one sided, who gets named a terrorism suspect, how terrorism is read through the law (much higher sentencing + draconian punishments).

some of these things could be protected under FoE - posting things on social media, etc. which in other contexts would be political expression

how the law works together in racialisation - powerful in mobilising popular consensus in support of particular measures.

growth of secret justice + courts

SIAC - allows for evidence to be heard in secret. isn’t allow to see some of the evidence against them, given a special advocate (who once they see the evidence can’t communicate with client)

operation capability for doing this has expanded into other courts - civil courts, regular immigration courts, tribunals. attempt in criminal. non terrorism cases too (gang drug related case).

ways in which multiple authoritarian measures have been cultivated, sustained, advanced and normalised through pathologisation of these men (terrorism suspects)

lots of young activists didn’t feel like they could speak about these things, will we be implicated in the process. - explicit targeting of activist students

last week university of westminster - jihadi john case - we have to prove ourselves that we’re not turning out terrorists, surely you agree with PR campaigns we have to enforce (stripping of your rights, cancelling of events - justice for kashmir/syria, islamic society, societies that take a stance against imperialist ??). activists are dehumanised.

Home office never gave her passport back said she didn’t deserve one (confiscated at airport) - stuck here in the UK. Feels like a prison. No holidays, no bank account, can’t rent property

They create that fear in you to stop you doing things

granted yes it is a very small number of people, but their families, the communities they live in, the wider communities they’re part of - all get affected by this fear

wind rush generation being a target now, being racially profiled - premeditated attempt to start spreading the fear amongst a lot of communities

misogyny within system of violence that can be overlooked - way women are targeted and dealing with collateral (HHUGS)

eyes of Aaliyah - Usually because they’re surveilling their husbands or partners

common social services (sanction) practice against working women who are high risk??, been extended to counter terrorism cases (ie. taking away unborn child)

family courts are to women as criminal courts are to black men (new yorker article family courts and US, racialisation of family experience

reflects a change in pattern of who’s arrested)

attack on welfare state - legal aid bill, housing provisions

conditional citizenship broadens out to make welfare state conditional and select

contradictions, hypocrisies - to keep you safe - is a distraction and derail from real problem of state terrorism (different forms of violence been churned out)

even anti racist orgs are scared to get into anti terrorism bc scared to be implicated, but you will be implicated whether or not.

racialisation of the “terrorist” - but expanding the idea of terrorism just expands the power the term has. even successes can be failure if we don’t understand how the system works and can be perpetuated

Solution should not be to expand the definition of terrorism, but to prosecute people under murder instead - the whole point of creating a separate category for so called terrorist acts is because you give special permissions (legal category with draconian punishments) and to create an idea of fear around being associated with being a terrorist. PoC are not collateral damage of this system, it is intended. when you’re advocating for bringing more people under this umbrella, its just giving more power to the term, its just expanding the system of oppression?? (bad wording?)

how racism / terrorism impacts you emotionally and socially - you think that everyone relates to you in one way, and then suddenly it’s another way and you’re being stopped and searched constantly

terrorism act was first enacted in 2000 against kurds and tamils (schedule 7) - it neither started or ends with muslims

one of the things that’s so punitive about the system, is that once you’re on the system you’re there

we gave up too much of our civil liberties, there are cameras everywhere / we’re safe. nothing bad will happen to majority of population.

white entitlement to safety

therese johnson for wild cat (after manchester attack) http://wildcatdispatches.org/2017/06/08/shattering-the-white-supremacist-myth-of-safety/

when actually all these attacks of violence are common for POC all around the world — the cost of keeping us “safe”, our safety comes at huge costs (offsetting violence elsewhere)

historical (links) are quite important - right to go and slaughter, colonialism/imperialism - not taught to the youth

everyone is just trying to get by - we can’t continue to live in peace if other people can’t

liberals posting memes about police losing their jobs/cuts, but they aren’t acknowledging that police are the problem and are an institution of oppression

[nchyinotes]

UCL Innovation and Enterprise Classes on Entrepreneurship & Marketing - 2017

[nchyinotes]

Businesses as Gatekeepers of Online Content: a Human Rights Approach

April 11 2018

Who bears the human rights obligation, what type of grip does human rights have over platforms? State may have to exercise their power against platforms to uphold their obligation to protect (citizens from very powerful third parties) ?

Helpful language in describing and distinguishing between the nature/design of platforms –

1) Conduit approach - sees as a neutral value, just a conduit through which info passes.

so long as the platform stays in the background and is relatively passive and doesn’t get involved in the content, can preserve a role of neutrality and liability.

if it becomes active + shapes priorities, begins to lose privilege of not being pursued for responsibilities engaged by its users

miller principles of internet viability - best for circulation of speech

2) Instrumental approach - play the role of an instrument to deal with a problem/concern society has. not worried about platform being neutral, but more worried about how it’s dealing with the social/political problem.

demand the platform actually get involved to proactively weed out abusive things said or motivated - on the whole is resisted by conduit approach

growing in importance, we increasingly need these platforms to help us deal with crises - terrorism, child abuse, etc

Taking into account constitutive nature, we should be looking at systems in place, not about individual items of content that haven’t been taken down (where traditionally art 10 has cropped up – in porn, defamation). Need to decouple workings of business from individual content.

rather than telecoms vs broadcaster binary, look at different business categories

health and safety at work

youtube algorithm that pushes extremist content toward you is not that responsible, and that is fuelled by the desire to keep people clicking through without thought of consequences

Thinking about (application of) duty of care – look at Chandler v Cape plc?

In the online world things can be taken down easily and removal is the default, but sometimes stuff just never gets taken down at all (revenge porn) [and what type of content gets quickly removed vs never removed can probably be quite political]

Everyone generally felt like there was a problem with hate speech as a label, which has little legal value as is too vague and could lead to expanded powers of censorship. But argument that psychiatric illness harm is often underestimated (as an effect of hate speech)

Cases mentioned: Ahmet Yildirim v Turkey, Delfi AS v. Estonia, L’Oreal v eBay, MTE and Index.hu v Hungary, K.U. V. Finland, Appleby and others v UK, Chandler v Cape plc

[nchyinotes]

Understanding Curating - June 29 2017