2A/ The Principles of User Sovereignty and A Unified Theory of Decentralization
The Principles of User Sovereignty and A Unified Theory of Decentralization
Tuesday 2A
Convener: David Huseby
Notes-taker(s): Dave Huseby
Discussion notes, key understandings, outstanding questions, observations, and, if appropriate to this discussion: action items, next steps:
This was a reprise of my sessions from April, 2020 to set the table for follow on sessions about the authentic data economy. I wrote two articles about these topics a year ago:
Before setting out on solving the authentic data solution for global scale I wanted to best understand the problem of decentralization and then declare the principles that I bound myself while solving it. There was very little discussion other than some clarifications on what I mean by "absolute" privacy by default and how that may make users reluctant to use any software like that.
Zoom Chat:
10:04:52 From Phil Strong to Everyone : can you record this?
10:05:37 From Catherine Nabbala (Finema) to Everyone : Yes pls. A recording will be highly appreciated
10:06:25 From dsearls to Everyone : to record, please become the host. By clicking "Participants" and then "Claim Host". Then enter 232323 as the claim-host-key.
10:14:31 From windley to Everyone : I thought Dave was *trying* to scare people :)
10:14:47 From dsearls to Everyone : privacy is personal. that doesn't mean it isn't also social, political, technical, legal or anything else. But we know, feel and experience it personally. We (projectVRM, Customer Commons, the spirit of Linux Journal) have a Privacy Manifesto on a wiki here: improvements welcome. https://cyber.harvard.edu/projectvrm/Privacy_Manifesto
10:16:20 From dsearls to Everyone : We are at Square 0.x for making privacy work in the digital world. We are at Square 9000.x in the physical world, where Square 1 was clothing and Square 2 was shelter—our first two privacy technologies.
10:16:36 From camparra to Everyone : So surprised to be hearing about equity here
10:16:45 From camparra to Everyone : Really good improvement guys :D
10:16:49 From Bill Wendel1 to Everyone : Adrian, your feedback echoes a real estate use case. Asked a vendor who has government money to distribute rental assistance to tenants who are being protected from eviction. Asked if their system is using any kind of digital identity to verify the tenant’s eligibility. He said, as Dave just did, we’re still using paper based applications because many people at risk of eviction do not have access to tech tools or know how to use them
10:17:04 From Scott David to Everyone : So. . . What is the value proposition?
10:17:20 From dsearls to Everyone : What is the value of privacy?
10:18:05 From Scott David to Everyone : So. . . what is the value proposition specifically here vis a vis privacy, etc.
10:18:24 From Robert to Everyone : for those who do not have OCR nearby: https://uxdesign.cc/the-principles-of-user-sovereignty-515ac83401f6 ;)
10:18:40 From Scott David to Everyone : We stopped Dave early in the presentation. Please go on!
10:18:53 From Scott David to Everyone : Super-duper privacy by default.
10:19:06 From Grace to Everyone : ultra-super-duper
10:19:09 From Kimberly Linson to Everyone : +1 Scott
10:20:22 From matthewhall78 to Everyone : When you say “Paper-based” is this just a printed QR code, or is this some kind of a smart paper that has a finger print scanner on it? How do I confirm that I’m the correct holder of the credential?
10:20:44 From Nader Helmy to Everyone : Are these principles of user sovereignty a north star to aspire to or a forcing function?
10:21:01 From Michael Lodder to Everyone : I believe its something to aspire to
10:21:07 From Mark Lizar1 to Everyone : A Consent Receipt - is a physical and digital receipt.
10:21:09 From sankarshan to Everyone : Notes from Adrian’s session are at https://docs.google.com/document/d/18ZGPKu4e46zeCm88Xzj74ggzulRI24WFoSiIDnHO6mE/ includes the link to the document which has Adrian’s proposal
10:21:50 From Jeffrey Aresty to Everyone : I work extensively in the mediator space - it's a possible solution; but the training of mediators is a challenge - we are working on it; they know nothing about SSI
10:22:06 From Scott David to Everyone : Step up attributes in control of individual?
10:23:03 From Scott David to Everyone : “Knowing” in the eye of the beholder. Bank doesn’t “know” their customer “in the biblical sense.”
10:23:49 From Robert to Everyone : In case of Amazon they don't know they own customer :P
10:23:51 From Adrian Gropper to Everyone : This is the role of a notary as presented in many SSI contexts
10:23:52 From Scott David to Everyone : Metrics of identity as consumed by perceiver. Decoding of identity. How set up the encoding and decoding from a signal theory perspective?
10:23:53 From joehsy to Everyone : It is not clear if this satisfies the “know you’re customer” regulations as they are written now.
10:24:32 From Michael Lodder to Everyone : Legal has yet to take a look at this
10:24:54 From Michael Lodder to Everyone : I haven’t heard of many lawyers in this space and pushing it to law makers, I would love to see that
10:24:57 From Jeffrey Aresty to Everyone : we have thought about notaries - the differences between the civil and common law systems matter - and local regulations will be significant - it's a path to follow
10:24:58 From Scott David to Everyone : Have we again sidetracked Dave from revealing the value proposition or is this moving toward it?
10:25:43 From Scott David to Everyone : Lawyers are rhetorical engineers. They work in intangibles.
10:25:52 From Mark Lizar1 to Everyone : LoL
10:25:52 From Scott David to Everyone : +1 Phil.
10:25:55 From Jeffrey Aresty to Everyone : The law maker space is problematic; as an attorney working in private international law for 40 years, we need to focus on best practices from the ground up to drive a solution through adoption
10:26:06 From Mark Lizar1 to Everyone : +1
10:26:19 From RickC to Everyone : Guys and gals, could I suggest we get through this quick pitch and hammer Dave with questions then.
10:26:22 From Scott David to Everyone : I have a question about Doc presenting as a human.
10:26:47 From dsearls to Everyone : These days I try to present as a glowing rectangle.
10:26:52 From Andre Boysen to Everyone : If it is not taking us off track I would like to suggest another principle for user sov
10:27:02 From joehsy to Everyone : Agree with Phil that online Pseudonimity has unique characteristics not found in the physical world.
10:27:12 From camparra to Everyone : A lot of these principles would scare governments … so is it adoptable?
10:27:48 From Scott David to Everyone : +1 Doc. You can tell it is Doc because he always “glowing” whatever the vehicle.
10:28:46 From Grace to Everyone : Almost everything scares government these days.
10:29:31 From Scott David to Everyone : User sovereignty associated with what subset of all user actions?
10:29:45 From camparra to Everyone : Well they are central authorities of identity so we need them on board
10:30:15 From Scott David to Everyone : User sovereignty increases by living off the grid, but lack of electricity means that you cannot even be on the “user subjugated” end of the slider.
10:30:38 From Cam Geer1 to Everyone : @ camparra or replace them
10:30:41 From dsearls to Everyone : Are users easier to subjugate than persons?
10:30:41 From Grace to Everyone : Depends on which way you are approaching the problem. Some people are trying to make change from within, and some are trying to create alternatives. Both approaches are legit.
10:30:49 From Scott David to Everyone : Does a red traffic light “subjugate
10:30:57 From Scott David to Everyone : Subjugate drivers?
10:31:24 From Scott David to Everyone : Does a red traffic light “liberate” or “subjugate” drivers? Answer=yes.
10:31:48 From Trevor Butterworth to Everyone : It liberates pedestrians!
10:31:58 From Scott David to Everyone : Lock in is a valid test of subjugation
10:31:59 From Frederico Schardong to Everyone : So user-sovereignty = portability?
10:32:15 From Grace to Everyone : I think he's saying it's one component of sovereignty
10:32:36 From Scott David to Everyone : Is “presentation of self” always subjugated, in that each platform “encodes” users similarly for interoperability?
10:32:42 From dsearls to Everyone : I see a continuum from minimized to maximized freedom or agency, with a social media feudal system on one end and whatever Dave's talking about at the other.
10:32:46 From Mark Lizar1 to Everyone : +1 - proposing principles - e.g - human identity and trust - vs. Digital identity and trust semantics for trustworthiness. Notice Control Semantics - so important. - Centralize transparency (sousveillance) and decentrlalize suveillance - and reference the human controller
10:34:34 From dsearls to Everyone : I think the next session, on making the intention economy happen, will be about what Dave is moving toward here.
10:35:02 From windley to Everyone : +1
10:36:17 From Scott David to Everyone : Suggest attention to ownership of “data rights” rather than ownership of “data” per se. You will not need as many antacids in the future if you stick to asserting ownership over rights/
10:37:00 From Cam Geer1 to Everyone : great point Scott David!
10:37:03 From Scott David to Everyone : Clarification of “distributed” versus “decentralized” is critical. See Paul Baran paper for RAND corporation for graphics.
10:37:07 From dsearls to Everyone : You doing a session on that, Scott? Would be good.
10:37:33 From windley to Everyone : Scott, cars are more decentralized than, say, mass transit (more autonomy, substitutability, agency). But it requires people to follow rules, which should be mostly analogous to protocol. Decentralized systems need more *explicit* rules than centralized systems.
10:37:47 From Scott David to Everyone : Need to clarify what actions the platform leverages and derricks and what it demands in return.
10:38:22 From windley to Everyone : I’d quibble with the use of the word “platform” and say “system” but yes, that’s the point of protocol, right?
10:38:45 From dsearls to Everyone : I visit Paul Baran and his graphics in Escaping the Black Holes of Centralization: https://blogs.harvard.edu/doc/2014/03/21/escaping-the-black-holes-of-centralization/
10:39:06 From Alan Karp to Everyone : @Scott: I think Dave means something different than Baran for “distributed” and “decentralized”. Dave means distributed computation and decentralized control.
10:39:10 From dsearls to Everyone : Twitter is the example of a hole there, and why it goes at the far left end of Dave
10:39:15 From dsearls to Everyone : 's graphi.
10:39:17 From Scott David to Everyone : I define sovereigns as any entity that “does not need to ask for permission or forgiveness”. That raises a Godel “incompletenesss theory” problem: Every system has statements and questions within it that cannot be answered from within. This is why identity of “subjects” by a “sovereign” is always ticklish.
10:39:23 From camparra to Everyone : Where are the majority of the bitcoin nodes located?
10:40:08 From Cam Geer1 to Everyone : +1 Doc re: Twitter
10:40:38 From Scott David to Everyone : Identity is ONLY useful in interactions. Interactions take two to tango. Two means that there is an externality. Externality cannot be directly controlled. We are all frustrated sovereigns, some of us get over it as adults!
10:41:09 From Andreas Freitag to Everyone : Usability in decentralized systems or SSI, very interesting topic
10:41:13 From Mark Lizar1 to Everyone : +1 semantics are so important — - user sovereignty is semantically referencing a state of system permission - aka - in this conversation an enslaved digital citizen.
10:41:29 From windley to Everyone : Yes, we build identity systems to manage relationships
10:41:43 From Scott David to Everyone : +1 Mark. We self-bind to rhetoric of governance in order to be free!
10:41:53 From dsearls to Everyone : baron's "distributed" drawing shows everything as connected, which on the Net we actually are not all the time. There is optionality about being connected, and what we do when connected. Which is why I call the fourth (beyond "distributed") network "independent."
10:42:11 From dsearls to Everyone : Baran. Not baron. Got auto-corrected there.
10:42:16 From Scott David to Everyone : Free from the risk of harms from P2P parties with others that are similarly bound to the sovereign.
10:44:30 From Scott David to Everyone : Sovereign (and the property concept) are ALL teleologies. All narratives created by humans to which we can self bind to deal with complex societies. ALL deities, nations, royalty, companies are projections (with apologies for the blasphemy). New sovereignties are “computational” - AI, crypto, blockchain, etc. have sufficient computational authority that it invites consideration of human self-binding. HOWEVER, like all sovereigns, we bind in way “X” in order to liberate ourselves in ways “A, B, AND C”
10:46:08 From Mark Lizar1 to Everyone : +1 Scott - A bundle of data control / privacy rights can = property rights with the right bindings
10:46:20 From Andreas Freitag to Everyone : A well designed PoS consensus
10:46:40 From Luke Ledet to Everyone : I’m sold, how do we use it? What’s the most decentralized technology available now with a wallet I can have my users install and use?
10:46:49 From Scott David to Everyone : Like NEWPORT RI, railway millionaires: Decentralized systems generate wealth for gate keepers.
10:46:59 From Robert to Everyone : Decentralization is not about increasing power of user but equal distribution of that power
10:47:11 From Scott David to Everyone : Being a gatekeeper takes many forms: rhetorical, financial, regulatory, etc.
10:47:31 From Charles E. Lehner to Everyone : This project addresses the concern about value distribution between early and later users in cryptocurrency issuance: https://duniter.org/en/introduction/
10:47:32 From Grace to Everyone : I think that is a good topic for a separate conversation. It's not just about the protocols.
10:47:37 From Jordan McKinney to Everyone : Maximizing agency/freedom will always produce unequal outcomes in terms of wealth etc
10:47:38 From Frederico Schardong to Everyone : +1 Andreas, Proof of personhood seems like a viable consensus in this sense
10:48:02 From Scott David to Everyone : What is purpose of money is left unsaid
10:48:05 From Stewart Whitman to Everyone : +1 Scott David, how do you regulate the gatekeepers?
10:48:17 From Grace to Everyone : +1 Scott. Money is an antiquated protocol.
10:48:24 From Scott David to Everyone : Money as a risk consolidator (Hannessman) put it in line with nation states.
10:48:33 From Mark Lizar1 to Everyone : We need standardized transparency and accountability
10:48:51 From dsearls to Everyone : My old business partner said "Trust breaks down first around money." I'm not sure that applies only to fiat currency.
10:48:58 From Stewart Whitman to Everyone : Not true, money (and bitcoin) is subject to supply and demand, re: gatekeepers
10:50:04 From Scott David to Everyone : Nation states have the monopoly of legitimated violence in society (Mills). So government can take your life, imprison you, etc. Change of status of physical human instantly changes status of digital representation. Like “entanglement” in quantum! If I die now, I lose legal capacity instantly. Legal capacity is determined by the nation states as operating system.
10:50:32 From Scott David to Everyone : Nation states issue currency as power exertion. They will not relieve themselves of that power easily. This will be interesting.
10:50:57 From windley to Everyone : +1 Constitutional orders are based on legitimacy and almost always change through war (violence). A fork is a crypto war.
10:51:08 From Kevin Dean to Everyone : We clearly had mothers who went to different schools of child-rearing.
10:51:14 From Kevin Dean to Everyone : 😎
10:51:42 From camparra to Everyone : Thanks, Phil! You cleared up my concern
10:51:48 From Scott David to Everyone : I, nation state, issue currency. I, nation state, demand taxes. You must pay taxes in the currency that I issue as sovereign. I, the sovereign, therefore include myself in every interaction in which wealth changes hands. This is my regulatory reach.
10:52:19 From dsearls to Everyone : <apologies/promo>Again, my following session, on making The Intention Economy happen, should leverage some of what's being said here. </apologies/promo>
10:52:45 From windley to Everyone : +1 Scott. This is going to be really interesting.
10:53:08 From dsearls to Everyone : https://www.amazon.com/Scale-Free-Networks-Complex-Technology-Finance/dp/0199211515
10:53:43 From dsearls to Everyone : https://trustframe.com/
10:54:05 From Scott David to Everyone : Active Inference provides a potential statistical/mathematical structure for SSI aspirations. See Karl Friston, etc.
10:55:03 From Scott David to Everyone : Scale independent solutions are a good sign of actually achieving complexity friendly governance.
10:55:17 From dsearls to Everyone : Serious question: What is the "data economy?" Also, is there just one? Is it different from the economy itself?
10:56:24 From Scott David to Everyone : Fractals display scale-independent variables. Fractal governance sounds crazy, but is pretty predictable when humans are getting creative about all the challenges. The human mind is the constant at all scales, so
10:56:24 From Robert to Everyone : HCF definition: It is economy which is driven (fuel) by data, current economy to some extend it is already
10:57:08 From Robert to Everyone : If you get to the authenticity and privacy we call it Dynamic Data Economy which introduce security (authentic data flows) into "data"
10:57:17 From Scott David to Everyone : Perhaps sometimes people perceive SSI and its cousins as too much of a bundled set of products.
10:57:25 From dsearls to Everyone : When a lot of people talk about "the data economy," they mean the advertising one, aka "surveillance capitalism" that thrives off of data gathered about personal activities
10:57:37 From Scott David to Everyone : What if want to do some of it, but don’t want to buy into all of the aspirations?
10:57:49 From Scott David to Everyone : +1 to Doc.
10:57:52 From dsearls to Everyone : I think it's bigger and other than that, but I do want to flag it as a common assumption.
10:57:58 From Robert to Everyone : I would argue that "surveillance capitalism" is based on data but not data flow.
10:58:26 From Scott David to Everyone : I guarantee it will not be more sophisticated, but it may be nuanced.
10:58:34 From Robert to Everyone : by data flow I mean that I am free to steer my data whenever it serves me
