Surveilled — Issue 28
Surveilled
Issue 28
A weekly summary of what I’ve found interesting at the intersection of economics, finance and technology.
Headlines
Emerging economies are skipping traditional, branch-based retail banking in favour of digital payments and other fintech firms, in a classic example of leapfrogging. I won’t shed tears if the traditional banks miss out on market share in developing markets, but it could be problematic that the payments and fintech firms, that work with a surveillance capitalism mindset, are arriving in a society that is not yet ready to cope with the regulatory and economic implications. Read
On a related note, food and financial services are now the most important revenue streams for Southeast Asian superapp Grab. Interesting implications for the economics of the different streams, particularly ride-sharing. Read
The FTC seems to be explicitly targeting Facebook’s proposed integration of its main platforms (Facebook, Whatsapp and Instagram) out of competition concerns. I’m still not convinced antitrust action is the most effective way to address the externalities produced by the likes of Facebook and Google, but this approach seems a bit more rooted in the technological reality at least. Read
Speaking of Facebook, it announced a $130m budget for its content oversight board, which seems like a huge sum. Leads one to wonder whether this isn’t primarily a PR exercise. Read
Context
This article does a good job highlighting some of the unease we might feel at mega-philanthropy, very relevant at a time when we’re focusing more on inequality. Read
Not only are advances in machine learning slowing down, the approach itself is not fit for purpose to solve some of the problems that remain in the quest to arrive at a general artificial intelligence. Read
GPS devices in Shanghai are being spoofed in a novel way, which is particularly disruptive for shipping, and no one is sure how or why. This feels like a story from the future. Read
How your house looks predicts how prone you are to a car accident. This is a good example of why indiscriminate data collection is dangerous, it may sound innocuous today, but with the ever-increasing ability to mine huge data sets for correlations, you can never know how you may be affected. Read
Most Chinese would prefer traditional methods of identification, as opposed to facial recognition. Interesting finding from the country where it is arguably most widespread. Read ($)
Op-ed by Mariana Mazzucato summarising the EU’s Green New Deal, significantly inspired by her work. She highlights some Interesting points on industrial policy and inequality, in what can hopefully form somewhat of a blueprint for others to follow. Read ($)
Wide-angle
Fascinating profile of William Gibson, whose writing inspired not only much of the seminal works of fiction in the last 20 years, but probably also the reality we live in today. Read
That’s it for this week’s edition. As always, thanks for reading and please forward this to anyone who you think might be interested, it would be much appreciated.