21 Nov Where is the “Freedom” in Tech Today?
by John Barker
In a free society, one would expect Technology to be built agnostic, focused on creating efficiency, serving people and enabling businesses to perform better.
How did we arrive at this place in history where we categorize technology as ‘Woke or non-Woke’, ‘Left or Right’, ‘Blue or Red’, ’Liberal or Conservative’? Freedom Tech, what is that? Does it exist? Should it?
Americans used to receive information via newspapers, tv, and radio. Entities had bias, however, content was delivered in a neutral fashion and opinion was left to the viewer. Slanted viewpoints were labeled as “opinions” and not as general reporting.
In 2023, it’s drastically different. Content delivery is instant and constant. Providers are also different, many are unregulated and unmoderated and objectivity has taken a backseat. Worse, affiliates of power are able to amplify and augment this instantly, resulting in information distributed based on narrative and resulting technology that is asked to support that delivery.
Power controls narratives and money fuels power. BigTech has both, and taken liberties none of us expected. BigTech succumbed to a mix of politics and agenda, and used data to censor opinions, people and organizations they disagreed with. BigTech came alongside BigMedia, BigGovernment and BigBanks to create a super Oligarchy that forced content delivery into their corner. Consumers trusted BigTech to provide good products, yet a large portion experienced a violation of that trust…and consumers have retaliated with resourcefulness.
While we cannot undo what occurred, we can use technological advancement to find solutions that re-establish trust regardless of political bent. How do we create a better tech-ecosystem? We build tools that incorporate the main attribute that gives everyone liberty, regardless of opinion. That attribute is Freedom.
For starters, freedom of speech is a right for everyone. Content rules which support lawfulness and order are needed to protect our rights in a free society. Technology providers can help lead the way, and while unscrupulous actors and actions will always occur, the result should reduce de-platforming, de-monetization, de-banking, and tech stack vulnerability by those with opposing opinions.
At Centric3, we build, launch and grow custom, resilient and scalable web platform and mobile app businesses for anyone and provide clients with large company expertise at competitive pricing.
As a provider building a better tech-tomorrow, we value our Constitutional freedom. We have been fortunate to have worked with both early stage and enterprise clients including Apple, Facebook, OpenStack, Oculus, Disney, NBA, Kodak and Hewlett Packard. This experience enabled us to “sit at the dinner table of everyone on the block” to obtain a first-hand view of processes that succeed and those that get halted by repeated challenges. As technology development and the content delivery climate has become more complex and opinion based, many clients have shared their frustration from overpaying for platforms that were incomplete, inoperative, not to their agreed specifications or their product held as ransom for differences of opinion.
We strive for better results for our clients and provide perspective on how much time and investment is required to build, launch and grow, not just a tech product, but a technology business. Our development model ensures that clients receive an onshore product with a user experience based on modern user behavior. To improve outcomes, we provide recommendations and integration with industry-leading vendors including website domain and data hosts, email and cybersecurity providers, merchant processors, banking resources, IP and compliance specialists.
The quest to find caliber technology that aligns with one’s values and performs is challenging. To complicate this, there is a ‘tech’ gold rush occurring to provide products to Freedom miners. Unfortunately, many products are built cheaply and solution providers are not living up to what was ‘advertised’. This leads to questions such as: “What tech solutions are safe?”, “Who can we trust?” and “Why can’t we do better?”.
There is a saying in the tech dev industry: Half Price, Do IT Twice. The double entendre is intentional because you can end up doing ‘IT or Information Technology’ twice. When you hire a firm, you may not know that they are an offshore company, or worse, a US company which outsources all the product design, decision and development offshore. The primary firm hired not only charges exorbitant rates but the quality of the work is subpar. This is another violation of trust and what harms the client and the industry.
Where is Freedom in Tech Today? Look no further. At Centric3, we lead with excellence and believe in building technology and businesses that support everyone’s right to freedom. We are doing our part and ask you to join us in making a better tech-tomorrow.
John Barker, CEO of Centric3, is a techpreneur, a guest and speaker on topics of Freedom, Technology, Business and Faith, and serves on both for-profit and non-profit boards that impact culture.