Freedom In The Cloud

I found your discussion of the structure of the web very interesting –that there’s no technological reason the paradigm shouldn’t be peer to peer and instead internet service companies, media companies, tech companies etc. have pushed the server-client paradigm.

In a perfect world if peer to peer on the web were the rule rather than the exception would you still see any place for consumer internet products/services that rely on the server-client paradigm? As you said a major source of friction in pushing people away from these services is convenience. It seems there are certain consumer services that can be delivered on the web that individuals simply cannot provide for themselves, no matter their technical wherewithal that are incredibly useful. If there were in fact strict consumer privacy regulations that prohibited retention of server logs and other methods of tracking users is it possible to deliver these types of consumer services/products on the web at all?

If not, do the concerns with freedom mean that there simply isn't a place in the world for these types of products/services?

-- JohnStewart - 06 Nov 2012