Big Tech is a virus that drains us of our rights, freedoms, and agency. It has the same success criteria as Covid: exponential growth. While we must fight it directly via legislation, we can also vaccinate ourselves against it by funding and building Small Tech.
Big Tech and Covid have the same success criteria: exponential growth. [Fueled by venture capital and right-libertarian Silicon Valley ideology](https://ind.ie/excuse-me/), Big Tech is a virus that [drains us of our rights, freedoms, and agency](https://ar.al/2019/05/02/slavery-2.0-and-how-to-avoid-it-a-practical-guide-for-cyborgs/). While we must [fight Big Tech directly with legislation](https://ar.al/2019/11/29/the-future-of-internet-regulation-at-the-european-parliament/), we can also vaccinate ourselves against Big Tech [by funding and building Small Tech](https://ar.al/2020/01/01/in-2020-and-beyond-the-battle-to-save-personhood-and-democracy-requires-a-radical-overhaul-of-mainstream-technology/). [What is Small Tech?](https://small-tech.org/about/#small-technology) It is the exact opposite of Big Tech. In this talk, Aral Balkan will introduce [the concept of Small Tech](https://small-tech.org/about/#small-technology) as [easy to use](https://small-tech.org/videos/ux-talk/) personal technologies that are non-colonial and non-commerical by nature, private by default, zero knowledge, peer-to-peer, interoperable, and inclusive by design, and share alike in licensing. He will also give a sneak peek at [the current state of development](https://small-tech.org/videos/small-is-beautiful-11/) of the [Small Web](https://small-tech.org/research-and-development).
Speakers: Aral Balkan