Social Factors
Work Methods Statement
This field of endevour and related objectives have led to many very difficult challenges and hardships of an impactful nature.
From 2000, when considering the future of 'online data storage', whilst young and surviving through difficult circumstances, I wanted to ensure people were the primary custodians of the works that they've produced for the purpose of seeking to have some sort of beneficial socioeconomic future outcome related to the consequence of a person doing work that is sought to be used by others for economically gainful purposes. The designs were also highly influenced by the stories of a somewhat distant relatives (grandfathers cousin) nobel prize winning work on how synapses work (john carew eccles) and in-turn also, my interest in psychology. In-effect, there was a series of moral concepts inextricably linked to the intended purpose of the works, from the beginnings.
Whilst it is usually always the idea of work activities that they're done with a view to providing something that someone else can make use of; and that the time involved in producing that work, has consequential benefits that are of greater value than could otherwise be gained if that time was spent by a person, doing any other type of work activity - whether it be working as a cleaner or flipping burgers, etc.
Yet, the problem that has always existed, is that whilst work can be very valuable, the relationship between the person who did the work, and thereby also funded the creation of whatever work derivaties were produced as a consequence of their employing their time and talents to do that work; there are so many social factors that seek to encourage persons doing useful work, particularly in relation to 'knowledge work' activities - that they simply 'gift' their life, to others without consideration, without acknowledgement and often also - in a manner that is in-turn also bonded to the persons exploiting that work engaging either alone or socially in various forms of SocialAttackVectors. Overtime, i've seen the ramifications of these behaviours closely linked to the deaths of persons whove been targeted by others, for some reason; but almost always, #linkedto or #Motivatedby an intention to obtain or protect financial gains by those engaged and/or involved. Indeed also, often its not simply the consequence of a bad actor who commits an act that results in injury, but rather the far broader consequences across both social and temporal networks. I've seen the use of well-intended principals, such as the concept of privacy; be used to cause severe harms to people, and whilst its not necessarily the fault of the person who commits further harms upon the subject/target, the consequences of harmful behaviour is still harmful.
In anycase, BestEfforts have been made to consider deeply, various complex factors across an array of different fields over a very long period of time. Part of the objectives have always been to protect FreedomOfThought and produce software that can have a significant impact on EndingDigitalSlavery and otherwise protecting / supporting the human rights of persons, and other related values. Yet, the available means to do this properly in Australia, has led to difficulties.
In the Commonwealth of Australia, the guiding instument for the governance of most incorporated entities is the Corporations Act 2001. Within this document, are the laws relating to the obligations and directions for directors of an incorporated entity subject to that act. Therein, the structure of those obligations do not easily relate to the human rights of anyone; rather, the structure of obligations are to shareholders and if the organisation is set-up as a for-profit entity, then the obligations of directors is to maximise profits for shareholders as the overriding priority.
So, the implication in relation to these traditional behaviours when applied to the management of information; has been that organisations have focused on producing solutions where they harvest or collect the information from end-users ('consumers') and then sell that information to others ('customers'), whilst defining a business system that defines the information about the lives of other people who depend upon them, to be part of their companies assets as to support valuation.
Then there are issues relating to shareholdings (dilusion) and other mechanisms used to effectively exploit people.
So - that's not something i've ever wanted to do, ever.
The other issue that's been hard, is that most employment contracts in related fields have historically sought to obtain the intellectual property of the worker, in very broad terms. Whilst the claim may in-fact be invalid, this doesn't prevent others involved in whatever company making claims; and often, they're done under the protection of confidentiality agreements, which has the effect of enabling wrongs - without much that can be done about it later.
So; for various reasons, the way i've sought to do this work is as an individual who therefore innately has an ability to seek to be protected by human rights related principals. Then, in-terms of intellectual property management - the mechanism has been to have an ABN and then also trading names that have in-turn been used to define the names for different types of activities.
As no-one is able to own shares in a person, and that a person is entitled to engage in work activities that have the intended purpose of protecting human rights; and that the useful derivatives may only be lawfully obtained from that person by way of a compensatory agreement (payment & contract); that has in-turn provided some of the mechanisms required to do some of the underlying work, over many years, with others - although - as noted, its been very difficult.
So, the intellectual property or 'data ownership' considerations that evolved from 2000 to become more complex; have not impacted companies in the same way as it has natural persons who are now often called 'consumers'. Companies regularly work with other companies and retain beneficial ownership over the use of the information provided by the owner of those records, even if the agreement and works require them to provide it to a 3rd party for some commercial purpose. Yet when 'consumers' (natural persons in their private capacity) use online services or share information for some reason with others, that information is often considered 'owned' or 'licensed' by the recipient; and often also, the legal construct for which it is obtained is in-turn also a foreign juristiction, which has the effect of invoking various #TradeLaw related considerations.
The primary reason for describing these historical factors, is to support some of the considerations now therefore made about elements of the #HumanCentric methods, as they apply to the Work Methods Statement for the Webizen and Web Civics projects in particular; but also, more broadly.
Human Centric - Implications...
Whereas most persons are employed by an incorporated entity through which they are defined as an #Agent of that incorporated entity; and therefore obligated to focus their attentions on a 'frame of mind' that relates more specifically to the interests of that entity, which inately sets aside human rights related considerations; the Human Centric methods and related economic apparatus that is sought to be formally defined prior to handing the project over to an incorporated entity structure, is to - first - focus on the needs of human beings, and through that lens; then also, the needs of 'things', including group entities (ie: companies / corporations) and their shareholders.
Whilst for many years it was sugggested to me that this was a foolish 'business model', over 22 years its increasingly being found to be important; yet not established, and not easy to migrate an existing corporation to meaningfully support. There is in-effect a very significant business systems difference between systems that are designed to be 'human centric' vs. those that are designed to be 'agent' or 'organisational' centric business ecosystems. These differences doesn't necessarily mean that they're more valuable and/or profitable, or less succeptable to risk; indeed often the opposite is the case; and to confuse matters further, often whilst the company or corporation may develop to be considered valuable, that does not necessarily translate to the meaningful benefits obtained by those who were instrumentally involved in creating that #thing.
So the implication from a mindset point of view of seeking to do work that is done in such a way that the designs of how it is done, what tools are used and therefore what the outcome is able to be - as to support the human rights of others; is very different to historical industrial era related practices that were designed for manufacturing cars or other physical things. Cars and other goods aren't shared with the manufacturer, factory or sales agent once the #thing is 'sold' to a customer. Once it is #Sold (which implicitly also means that it was purchased / paid for) the customer owns it. This has not been the way it works with software, particularly 'cloud' software and increasingly also things that rely upon software.
So, the greatest implication that i have found many struggle to do or understand easily; is that, the works produced in this field of endevour, aren't about creating relationships of dependence upon 'consumers' rather, its about seeking to produce work derivatives that beneficially support the human beings who make use of those work derivatives and depend upon the use of it to support both; their human rights and the human rights of their dependants (ie: their children).
Human Centric - Consequences.
The consequences of this human centric approach creates a different series of information management patterns than is otherwise illustrated to exist today. The methods are not about seeking to devoid people of responsibility, rather, it seeks to do the opposite; and in doing so, also provides persons the benefits that are gained in relation to the use of an environment that provides supports for themselves and others in ways that are aligned with old values, but all too often lost in translation from the use of print era tools (contracts, public libraries, local courts, etc.) as societies have migrated to electronic mediums (media). These tools also provide features and functionality that was simply not possible earlier.
Human Centric - Considerations
It is difficult for me to believe, that the sorts of problems that i've experienced, witnessed and/or become aware of; are unknown by others either now, or indeed also way back in 2000... Yet for whatever reason, these sorts of values is not what they've spent their time working on; so, solutions to address many fundamental problems do not currently exist. Whilst there are others that support different ideologies in ways that are very widespread and in-effect well supported globally, the point of this project is to create an alternative - a market-based alternative, that provides supports in ways that the other solutions may not do at all, or may not do well.
Amongst the greatest of implications; is that which relates to 'human identity', #personhood and human agency. Both, as a consequence of having done the work; and hopefully also, as a consequence of the body of that work - ending up being exhibited by online systems that support the fundamental values outlined by the body of that work and its express purpose, as defined over the many, many years. Part of this in-turn relates to the concept of #RealityCheckTech In that; if these systems work, then people will be able to gain the benefit of truth telling infrastructure; so that, if they've done useful work and it does indeed end-up being useful, they'll be able to prove it.
Equally, if they're subjected to harms committed upon them by others; they'll be able to demonstrate those problems in a court of law where a determination about what should be done about it can be made. This is in-turn, critically important #PeaceInfrastructure and i find it very difficult to comprehend why so many others have decided that its not important enough to make.
The Greatest of all assets any person has, is #Time. When people, groups, societies employ, use and consume resources (including #time) to harm other people, to engage in and/or support #Wrongs it has a variety of fairly significant #energy related implications. These sorts of things will be able to be better assessed and managed via the SocioSphereOntologies, BiosphereOntologies and other related #Webizen infrastructure pieces that fit into the broader ecosystem.
The ramifications of the design paradigms, such as Centricity and Currencies being integrated with VerifiableClaims&Credentials, impacts the HistoricalInformation to support a CommunityOfPractice supported by some form of WebizenAlliance structure, that has intended purpose.
The consequences should be an uplift in productivity and general wellbeing of those using it; which will in-turn translate to other outcomes such as,
Sustainability (rejuvinative) factors ie: carbon metrics as a derivatives of energy lifecycle calcs inc. ESG
Economic Growth (inc. profitability) and related rejuvinative qualities ie: applicability of tax payments derived from incomes from citizens, linked with inter-national systems that in-turn support GDP Growth.
Support for Democracies ie: support for rule of law (juristictions,access to justice, electronic evidence, etc) and the ability to curtail the cost of wrongs / crimes - particularly those involving more than one person.
PLEASE NOTE: The Centricity document seeks to deliniate the concepts of #EntityCentric #AgentCentric and #HumanCentric as is an important series of considerations; and as is noted elsewhere otherwise, these documents are presently in draft-format; whilst being actively updated.