Video - Cory Doctorow: The coming war against the general purpose computer

The copyright war was just the beginning. The last 20 years of Internet policy have been dominated by the copyright war, but the war turns out only to have been a skirmish. The coming century will be dominated by war against the general purpose computer, and the stakes are the freedom, fortune and privacy of the entire human race. The problem is twofold: first, there is no known general-purpose computer that can execute all the programs we can think of except the naughty ones; second, general-purpose computers have replaced every other device in our world. There are no airplanes, only computers that fly. There are no cars, only computers we sit in. There are no hearing aids, only computers we put in our ears. There are no 3D printers, only computers that drive peripherals. There are no radios, only computers with fast ADCs and DACs and phased-array antennas. Consequently anything you do to 'secure' anything with a computer in it ends up undermining the capabilities and security of every other corner of modern human society. And general purpose computers can cause harm - whether it's printing out AR15 components, causing mid-air collisions, or snarling traffic. So the number of parties with legitimate grievances against computers are going to continue to multiply, as will the cries to regulate PCs.

• Cory Doctorow: The coming war against the general purpose computer

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Author: Ruth Lorraine, for AZ10.com ~ 15 Jan 2012

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