The End of the Internet Dream?

John Walker[1] was right.

The digital imprimatur was initially created with a lot of feet-dragging when it came to implementing IPv6. so the ability to publish was de facto lost behind NAT. Software authors then helped finish the imprimatur when they tried to work around the limitations of NAT by centralizing tools until network effects (Metcalfe's Law) took over.

Promises of an "open API" increased this centralization, as people made the mistake of interpreting "open" to mean the commons (Free Software), when it really meant "open access to our proprietary service that we can revoke at any time".

So now we are in a bad place. The free and open internet is almost completely controlled. So what are you going to do about it? Are you going to continue support this centralization by supporting things like WebAssembly, so the people centralizing power can get their "cable tv set-top box" that they always wanted (by rendering their own text)? Are you going to let even more DRM be placed in the browser? Expanding EME is just a matter of time; the video-only limitation will last until someone from another industry start suing about being left out.

Are you going to continue to let people distract you with shiny features, regardless of the long-term implications? Are you going to let your boss or "the market" dictate what you do, even when you know it is going to hurt the internet? Are you going to put personal profit over the long-term viability the free and open internet?

Fighting an entrenched power isn't free, and combat often has casualties. Some of us have been suggesting for over 20 years that it would be a good idea to fight the creation of the digital imprimatur early, when it was easier to fight. Nobody listened, so now we have a much harder battle to fight, which will require a larger sacrifice to fight. Maybe you should start paying that cost now, instead of kicking this problem down the road even more when it will be even harder to fight and require and even larger sacrifice.

Fix this problem now, by taking a hard-line against anything enabling the digital imprimatur. You're making a choice every day when you implement and use the internet.

[1] author of AutoCAD