Should Tech industries be regulated?

MayCaesar

Giving these companies your data is a choice. You do not have to use Google if you dislike their privacy policies; you can use DuckDuckGo instead. You do not have to use Windows or MacOS; you can use one of the myriad of Linux versions. You do not have to use Facebook; you can use Diaspora, or not use any social networks at all (thank me later; it will change your life for the better). You do not have to use Steam; you can buy games online directly from the developers in most cases.

Using the resources of the most powerful data-collecting entity in the country - the government - in order to prevent private competing companies from collecting data seems to be an illogical approach. Rather, encouraging free market competition, so privacy-friendly alternatives to large data-collecting giant platforms arise, is the best way to go.

I also do not see the data collection as that big of an issue in itself. The companies cannot use the data in any obvious way to harm you. Sure, they can use it to offer targeted ads for you that, over time, may change your consumer preferences in favor of these companies' or their partners' products, but that is not something you cannot easily mitigate by just ignoring those ads. You also always sign consent forms that describe clearly what data and how will be collected, and if the company collects something that you have not consented to sharing, then you can sue that company for a solid compensation. I do not see the need for any additional mechanisms here.

Tyranny of the government is far more dangerous than tyranny of free market players, in all cases, and if you have to choose between the potential for either of these tyrannies, you should always make the choice in favor of the latter.

Happy_Killbot

@MayCaesar This only applies to individuals though, sure anyone can do choose to go completely off the grid and take steps to maximize their own privacy, but it goes beyond that, because if enough people (technically even a minority of all people) don't use these services, enough information can be collected in the form of meta data and indirectly to track people and get a rough idea of who they are. (i.e, you don't know who someone is, but you know their IP address and track them via sites they visit, or sites people they know visit)

It's not that they want to harm anyone, obviously they don't want that, they mostly want to profit from you. A lot of these companies collect your data without your knowing, for example if you ever take out a loan, get a new credit card, or even just look up the weather this data can be tracked and is shared with 50 other companies. No, you can not sue these companies for collecting that data, because you implied consent to it more or less just by doing what is necessary to survive in this modern world.

The reason this is dangerous is because although they can not predict the actions of any one person, they can predict the actions of large groups of people. Imagine if you will, knowing exactly what kind of propaganda to create to get your targets to behave how you want them to. From this perspective, people are hardly individuals and more like puppets who read punch cards, show them an image or headline and they will do exactly what you want. This technology is being heavily applied to politics, which is why there is such a sharp divide between democrats and republicans in the US today.

Another argument, that is not by any means new, is that there is no difference between tyranny of big companies and tyranny of big government. The rich own the politicians, which is why there is no correlation whatsoever between what the average citizen wants and what congress approves, unless you take wealth into account. In a world where almost all of the wealth is in the hands of just a few people, the overwhelming majority effectively do not get a say in what goes on, and data collections and subsequent derivative works will be more effective.

MayCaesar

@Happy_Killbot

Well, first, it is not really true: you can absolutely live without interacting with all these companies. You can, for example, only use cash or store-issued credit cards, not giving away any vital information about you - even some millionaires do that, suggesting that you are not severely impairing yourself if you do so. I myself have not used social networks in over 10 years, and my life has only been better for it.

Second, I see nothing wrong with predicting actions of large groups of people; in a way, we all do that in order to be able to operate in the society. Each and every one of us tries to predict how the society will change over the next, say, several years, so we can plan our own actions accordingly. The only difference here is that we do not have as much data and as refined statistical models as these companies to make projections based on; that is a quantitative difference, not a qualitative one. In fact, some individuals have managed to build their own effective predictor models; I recently talked to a professor in mathematics who has built a sophisticated model that manages to consistently, even though marginally, beat the stock market. 
This is just how the game is going to be played now: more and more of our decisions are going to be based on products of sophisticated data analysis algorithms. We better adapt to this reality, rather than trying to deny/suppress it.

Third, these companies are the ones that built their platforms. It is only just that, if you are to use the product of their hard work, you are going to have to abide by their rules. If you want to have access to modern services, then you have to pay the dues to those who have created them. Or you can create your own service and treat your clients the way you want to.

The difference between the tyranny of the government and that of free market players is that there are many players, but there is only one government. If the government gets out of line, there is nothing stopping it from going further and further in that direction - while, if one company gets out of line, then other companies will win the customers over and outcompete it. There is a potential possibility of all companies uniting in some way and essentially becoming a single entity, but that is extremely unlikely, and should it somehow happen, it will not be worse than the tyranny of the government, so we might as well give it a chance.

Happy_Killbot

@MayCaesar An absence of information is still a data point.

It's not the predictions that are concerning, it is the actions that can result from those predictions. It is the fact that human behavior can be understood and manipulated. All the arguments for regulation focus primarily on this factor, if you know more about people then they know about themselves, they are putty in your hands.

Suppression is not the goal of regulation, the goal is either to make these tools widely available or ensure that they are not used to abuse people. If 1 in 10 people has access to these tools and data, then that is more likely to be good for everyone if only 10 people have access to them, because it gives them an insane financial advantage. The problem is that the majority of us will not get access to these platforms, and the people who do will undoubtedly use them for personal gain.

The problem is that this kind of data can give you ridiculous power over people, to the point that many of the founding principals on which this nation was built must be brought into question- Do we really have free will if who we vote for is determined not by who has the best policies or has the best character, but by who paid the most to a company like Cambridge Analytica?

There is a paradox of freedom and of anarchy, if there are no rules and everyone is completely free to do as they please then surely the strong will take what they please and the weak will suffer what they must, but by limiting everyone freedom, you maximize everyone's freedom by preventing the strong from taking advantage of those who are inadequately equipped to fend for themselves. This is the foundation of liberalism, that you must seek to minimize freedoms only where necessary to prevent abuse. In this case, the obvious potential for abuse is quite startling.

MayCaesar

@Happy_Killbot

But we are already manipulating each other; have been for millennia. The difference is that soon we will be able to do it with much greater efficiency, but it will not really change the nature of human interaction. Humans always need something from each other and are going to play various games using their knowledge and experience to get that something.

These tools are mostly available for public use already. The difference is that big tech companies have more computational power, so they can collect more data quickly and perform faster analysis of it. Independent individuals also have access to a lot of computational power via decentralized computation systems, cloud storage systems, etc. and will soon be able to do the same thing big tech companies do at a similar efficiency.

I think people overestimate how much practical knowledge can be extracted from abstract data collected from millions individuals, as well as underestimate the individuals' ability to resist the resulting manipulation. Governments have been playing the data collection game for centuries, yet they still struggle to make the most basic predictions, and people routinely break out of their control. Controlling a large decentralized system which is society is very difficult without explicit violent means, and private companies simply do not have those means.

I disagree with your last paragraph; lack of legislated rules does not imply lack of practical rules. There is no law in the US against cursing, for example, yet people generally avoid cursing at each other, as getting along on some level benefits everyone. Free market self-regulates in many different ways, and it is not clear if this regulation is not sufficient and an involvement from some centralized agency is ever mandatory. Considering problems such involvement necessarily creates, I would consider it only in the most extreme cases, when all else has failed and the society is on the brink of destruction. This obviously is not the case when it comes to tech industries nowadays. It might be that day, but until then I would refrain from drastic action, lest it backfires in unforeseen ways.

Happy_Killbot

@MayCaesar The difference between the interpersonal manipulation of ages past and today is the asymmetry of it, it is much easier for a large company to get all the data on a large number of  individuals than it is for those individuals to get the same data on the creators of the program.

While it is true that people can mostly get all kinds of data on anyone, the computation as you rightly point out is the problem, and besides, the average Joe isn't going to be able to do the same thing as someone with a PhD in physics, who taught himself how to code. The fact that these algorithms are currently only marginally effective at doing so doesn't mean that they will not ever be, and it is very probable given the amount of research that goes into these technologies that they will be capable of doing so in the near future.

If you don't notice how much people curse, it is probably because you are hanging out with the wrong crowd. If there was no rule against it, I don't think we can rely on people to not do something that is harmful to society just because it isn't morally right to do so, there are tons of people who would harvest organs if it were legal just because they could. Thus there is the problem of trust and how you know who you can trust, and it would be best to not trust anyone. Without this trust, society can not function and will have to turn to other means for stability, such as manipulation or slavery.

If a society doesn't regulate itself, after some time it will be regulated just the same. It is for this reason that I tend to disagree with a completely free market, and instead would rather one that has only the bare minimum regulation necessary to maintain the freedoms of the people. I think that big data has potential to violate these freedoms, in particular the right to privacy.

MayCaesar

@Happy_Killbot

In the world of decentralized computation we are living in now, this asymmetry is going to be short-lived. Neural networks already do a fair share of all the data analysis we perform, and they are getting more and more diffused and sophisticated. In combination with the fact that the predictive power of this data is not that great to begin with, I do not think it is something to worry about. This data is mostly useful in the inter-company competition, and has a very small effect on the end user.

Yet people in general tend to cooperate in peaceful and mutually beneficial manner. You can probably count on fingers of one hand the number of people who have seriously wronged you over the last several months, yet you will need hundreds hands to list all the people the interaction with whom was peaceful and satisfactory. You do not have to blindly trust everyone, but placing "reasonable trust" that the person you are interacting with generally does not bear ill will to you is a pretty effective strategy in life. This is not something you need regulations for, and I would argue that regulations are not going to be effective anyway.

The society does regulate itself in a similar fashion to the free market. You do not need a legislation to prohibit people from selling bananas at $10/lb in order to get people to sell bananas at reasonable prices; market competition takes care of that. Similarly, various social mechanisms take care of most social problems you can think of. Perhaps not of all of them, but my point is that the assumption that the society by default does not regulate itself is wrong. In most cases, I would argue, it regulates itself a little too much; think of the Japanese society, where the government is fairly liberal, yet the social norms are quite authoritarian.

Happy_Killbot

@MayCaesar If you think that decentralized computing will be the solution to this problem of privacy, then please demonstrate how a given individual would not be taken advantage of by big tech companies.

Here is the person I have randomly selected by typing in random letters, someone I do not know and predict that you do not know (at least it is very unlikely) is Cody Hepburn.
https://www.facebook.com/cody.hepburn.7
https://www.linkedin.com/in/cody-hepburn-325938106/?originalSubdomain=uk
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayr_Academy

Keep in mind I have picked this individual completely at random and know nothing about them, so we will only have to speculate based on available data.
Cody is a female between the ages of  40-45 lives in Glasgow UK and has graduated from Ayr Academy in 2000. According to her LinkedIn, she is unemployed.

My argument is that Cody will have her data collected in much the same way I have in just a few minutes, and will then be targeted with ads, political messages, and directed content to attempt to change her worldview by those who pay top dollar. So the question is, what is Cody likely to do to either stop this from happening or break free from it, without the need for regulations?

What natural social regulations(not government enforced) would even be present to prohibit violations of her privacy, which I have so nonchalantly and legally done here?

MayCaesar

@Happy_Killbot

I do not see any problem with people knowing some basic facts about Cody; they would likely know all these facts even if she had no Internet connection. When you look for jobs, you are automatically put on multiple lists; the government tracks your age and location; every institution you have graduated has records on you. It is not like these companies have learned some secret information about her they could not learn by conventional means.

I do not see privacy as a major problem. Confidentiality is, and that generally is respected by the free market, given the repercussions of not doing so. People's lives are not supposed to be private, but are supposed to be confidential, where the essential information is available on strictly consensual basis.

Obviously blatantly selling your information to everyone is going to be a bad market practice that will repel customers from the company partaking in it. Hence why companies only collect the most basic information about you. Nobody is going to send the scan of your Driver's License to all public document upload websites indiscriminatorily. All the market mechanisms are already in place and are working just fine. The last we need is the government coming over and monopolizing the whole process, so if it decides to sell this data to someone or use it for nefarious purposes, you cannot sue it and use its competitors as a leverage.

Happy_Killbot

@MayCaesar Consider the difficulty involved in doing data harvesting via conventional means. This is much more laborious and time consuming than the automated means via primarily internet interaction.

Confidentiality and privacy are largely the same thing, the major difference being semantic. For all intents and purposes, confidentiality is maintained through privacy rights.

I don't think someone's drivers licence is really a necessary thing for anyone to know, unless they are trying to steal your identity, which is a completely different can of worms, and is already regulated heavily, and for good reason that should be obvious.

The types of data they are most interested in would be stuff that can be used to advertise to you, effectively suppressing the individual via materialistic comfort, and political means. Cody lives in a relatively small town, and might have conservative biases that may, for example, be used to make her a Brexit supporter. If data collection is not regulated, then it implies that sending her targeted ads, and more importantly, changing the environment of her online interactions (for example, only showing new contacts she will already agree with) is going to put her in an echo chamber. Without new ideas to challenge her beliefs she will become quite comfortable with these beliefs. The end result is that she will move slowly but surely to have the ideas and beliefs that the corporations want her to have, effectively controlling her political and social life. Don't you think that doing this is a little bit to far?

MayCaesar

@Happy_Killbot

Privacy is your ability to make some information about you a secret for everyone but those you trust deeply. Confidentiality is your ability to make sure that the information you have shared with someone is not used in a manner you have not consented to. You do not have right to guaranteed privacy, but your basic human rights do give you right to confidentiality. If someone uses the information you have shared with them in the manner that violates the agreement you have signed with them, then you have grounds for a lawsuit. But your privacy only exists for as long as you keep a low profile yourself.

It is Cody's choice though what information to consume and how. If she is okay with blindly swallowing targeted ads and not going outside their shell, then it is all on her. Anyone has the power to expand the space of the information they receive, and any responsible individual will do so. For example, when shopping on Amazon, I completely ignore all suggestions and go purely after the independent search results - I know how Amazon operates and use it in the manner that works best for me.

The idea that humans are powerless zombies controlled by those who know their basic character traits is not something I can get behind. Every belief is a choice, and no conditioning is absolute. There are people in countries with completely monopolized informational space like North Korea who break out of conditioning and think about the world independently; there is no excuse for not doing so in the free world with free access to virtually all information humanity has accumulated over the millennia.

Happy_Killbot

@MayCaesar Big data companies violate both privacy and confidentiality then.

The rights to privacy of course comes implicitly from the 14th amendment.

Cody might not be aware of what will happen when she gives up her data online, she might write something somewhere and as soon as it is linked back to her the indoctrination can begin. She might not even be aware that she isn't moving outside of her comfort zone and is only getting specific content provided to her. You can see just from so many on the internet that most of them will not consider the other's point of view for any reason, believing they are all "evil" or something of the like.

What I am most concerned about is that tech companies may enable people to think less critically and become more like "powerless zombies" controlled by entities within their awareness but outside their comprehension. Of course, these entities themselves would be controlled by another "powerless zombie" effectively making all other individuals an extension of this person, even if just in a statistical way. Regulation, if done right would limit these transgressions by making it so that more individuals are in control of their lives instead of being pawns in a game they are marginally aware exists.

MayCaesar

@Happy_Killbot

I fail to see in the text of the 14th amendment any reference about privacy guarantees, but perhaps I am just not familiar with the common interpretation of it. Regardless, there is no way I can see to introduce something resembling the right for privacy, since such a right would infringe on an untold number of other people's rights. Since virtually any information about you can be considered private by you, people would be penalized for things like telling someone your first name without your explicit approval... That would be a nightmare.

That Cody is not aware of her predicament does not mean someone must be compelled to alleviate it. Life at large is about learning how you are affected about the world around you, so you can use it to your advantage, rather than being taken advantage of by it. Those who fail to do so are going to be impaired in many different ways, and it is their duty to figure out how to change that. Rigidity of thinking is a serious handicap in life.

I do not think regulation can be done right in this regard, considering that the regulatory entity is the supreme monopolist on information and has a very strong incentive to abuse its powers in this regard. Nor do I think it needed; do not underestimate people's independence. Critical thinking is not that easy to suppress even by the most totalitarian means, let alone by free market players needing to compete with countless other players sending the potential consumers different information. As much Coca-Cola ads as you are going to get, Pepsi will be right there competing for your attention. As will countless cheaper sodas with a similar taste that will win you over by their price alone, without any ads whatsoever. I love Coca-Cola, but recently I switched to a generic substitute sold at the local grocery store, simply because I could get two bottles for the price of one Coca-Cola bottle with a very similar taste. All the billions Coca-Cola has invested in ads at the end of the day were nullified by just one walk through a new store section.

Happy_Killbot

@MayCaesar
They explain how the constitution grants privacy better than I can
https://injury.findlaw.com/torts-and-personal-injuries/is-there-a-right-to-privacy-amendment.html

Lets say that a terrible person who is a  private citizen wanted to do something terrible to Cody. If the access her information without her knowing, (as we have done) then they can use that against her in various ways.

The real problem is more statistical, even if you can not manage to suppress all critical thinkers, just doing so to a lot of them is going to have huge effects on society, besides making the people using this tech rich beyond all comprehension (as it already has) it is going to give the tangible power they can use to do as they please. They are effectively making it so that they have millions of votes and that ensures that the few critical thinkers who do escape the system will be powerless to do anything about it.

If politics and companies were not entangled through lobbyists, special interest groups, and campaign finance, then maybe it wouldn't be such a big deal. But the reality is that these things are intimately familiar, and that implies that we have no democracy, and the wealthy hold all the power. That makes the US an oligarchy rather than a democracy.

MayCaesar

@Happy_Killbot

It seems that the Constitution only covers very specific types of privacy, that form a small subset of what is in general considered a privacy. Some things, such as zone of privacy of the home, do not even relate to privacy as such and derive directly from basic property rights.
There do not seem to be any protections of private information in place.

I would venture that if someone bears ill will to Cody, they will have much more information on her than basic search provides. Otherwise, if they do not know anything about her other than her name, age, location and employment, why would they have anything against her?

I do not see any problem with statistical effects like this. Part of success on a free market is being able to sell your product to as many people as possible, and it is only reasonable that major players will try to play the market as a whole by using the most powerful tools available to them. That a single company can have a strong effect on the market though is unlikely, and a conglomerate of companies does express the will of people in a way, as those companies, in turn, have become powerful exactly because a lot of people voluntarily chose to buy their products/services.

The problem with lobbying is not solved by empowering the government even more though; it is solved by the opposite means. If the government is weak and does not have the power to introduce sweeping regulations, then lobbying becomes useless, as there is nothing to lobby for left. Growing the government in order to solve a problem arising from existence of a big government is not very logical, is it?

Happy_Killbot

@MayCaesar let's take this to it's logical extreme- Lets assume that in the future all data mining and processing technologies are concentrated to just one person, meaning this individual is gaining power and wealth by utilizing this technology, and maybe has a team of say, 100 people to run day to day operations, but everything else is largely automated. This person will be able to absolutely dominate politics. If government is small and doesn't tax or regulate them, they will be able to control the politics of that nation effectively by manipulating voters. In this way, that 1 owner will effectively be an autocrat having near complete control over so many people, who believe they are acting of their own free will.

If the government is big and they can lobby the government, then they can effectively control the government in this way and by campaign finance. The way to solve that is by separating the businesses from politics. Without those regulations, we open ourselves up to abuses from companies, which can be just as bad (if not worse) than a tyrannical government. For example, there were the company mining towns I believe we have discussed before or all the abuses of the gilded age.

You have to realize that at this point, the people are not really buying their products and services anymore, they are selling their information to these companies. In these types of systems, the tech companies are purchasing the data of the citizens, and they are all getting ripped off. In these cases, "selling your product to as many people as possible" means "selling your data to as many people as possible" But then where is the competition? You don't compete with your neighbor to sell you data to Facebook because Facebook's payment is that you can use their products. Thus there is a virtually free way to extract the information commodity from everyone.

In order to turn this into tangible products, they have to use that information to achieve something and then sell it back to the people, which they do in the form of news and advertisements. Of course they need to keep people engaged, so they have every incentive to keep people boxed in and to exploit them to the max extent which is legal and feasibly possible.

Consider this scenario: Lets say there are three towns right next to each other, one has lots of oil, one has lots of people, and the other has nothing. If I told you that the third town would end up being the economically dominant power, you might not believe me, but it is both possible and likely. If for example, the third town builds banks and power stations, they can turn that oil into power and sell it to the second and first towns at a premium, and make a lot of profit from it, effectively concentrating the resources in their hands. This is what happens in the free market, the people who play the game the best end up getting all the resources. The way you do that is by buying stuff from people, and then selling it back to them at a markup, either as a higher quality product or something more desirable. This hardly seems fair to me.

JGXdebatePRO

Happy_Killbot said:

@MayCaesar let's take this to it's logical extreme- Lets assume that in the future all data mining and processing technologies are concentrated to just one person, meaning this individual is gaining power and wealth by utilizing this technology, and maybe has a team of say, 100 people to run day to day operations, but everything else is largely automated. This person will be able to absolutely dominate politics. If government is small and doesn't tax or regulate them, they will be able to control the politics of that nation effectively by manipulating voters. In this way, that 1 owner will effectively be an autocrat having near complete control over so many people, who believe they are acting of their own free will.

If the government is big and they can lobby the government, then they can effectively control the government in this way and by campaign finance. The way to solve that is by separating the businesses from politics. Without those regulations, we open ourselves up to abuses from companies, which can be just as bad (if not worse) than a tyrannical government. For example, there were the company mining towns I believe we have discussed before or all the abuses of the gilded age.

You have to realize that at this point, the people are not really buying their products and services anymore, they are selling their information to these companies. In these types of systems, the tech companies are purchasing the data of the citizens, and they are all getting ripped off. In these cases, "selling your product to as many people as possible" means "selling your data to as many people as possible" But then where is the competition? You don't compete with your neighbor to sell you data to Facebook because Facebook's payment is that you can use their products. Thus there is a virtually free way to extract the information commodity from everyone.

In order to turn this into tangible products, they have to use that information to achieve something and then sell it back to the people, which they do in the form of news and advertisements. Of course they need to keep people engaged, so they have every incentive to keep people boxed in and to exploit them to the max extent which is legal and feasibly possible.

Consider this scenario: Lets say there are three towns right next to each other, one has lots of oil, one has lots of people, and the other has nothing. If I told you that the third town would end up being the economically dominant power, you might not believe me, but it is both possible and likely. If for example, the third town builds banks and power stations, they can turn that oil into power and sell it to the second and first towns at a premium, and make a lot of profit from it, effectively concentrating the resources in their hands. This is what happens in the free market, the people who play the game the best end up getting all the resources. The way you do that is by buying stuff from people, and then selling it back to them at a markup, either as a higher quality product or something more desirable. This hardly seems fair to me.

@Happy_Killbot i'm afraid we do NOT live in a dystopian dictatorship and our world is NOT three towns so this is an irrelevant point.

MayCaesar

@Happy_Killbot

This is too fantastic a scenario. Should it happen, I suppose there will be some serious problems that arise (and you already know my suggestion on preventing those problems - taking as much power away from the government as possible, so manipulating the voters does not have any significant impact on anything), but while they will have a lot of power, there also will likely be a lot of competitors, as people will not like the situation and want to diversify their partners.

How does someone purchasing the data on me ripping me off? Suppose someone knows my shopping habits or my sleeping schedule. So what? I know myself well enough to ignore all the clever marketing and take a proactive approach in securing my financial and personal independence.
What the data mining is actually used for is not to target individual customers, but to employ patterns that work statistically on a large customer base. And there is nothing wrong with that; we all are trying to optimise our strategies based on our knowledge. For that matter, you can see data mining as the way of learning what the customers as a whole really want, and the subsequent changes in the business plan to provide them with what they want. How is that a bad thing?

I do not see what is unfair in your last scenario, unless I have misread something; all three towns are profiting from partnership and are dependant on each other. Where is the concentration of resources? When someone invests in you, resources are not concentrated anywhere, as you owe them the interest and the ultimate return from the investment.
If someone is so good at multiplying wealth, it only makes sense to temporarily hand them over your resources and get more resources back later on. That is something to celebrate, not to be afraid of.

Happy_Killbot

@MayCaesar You realize this scenario is almost a reality, the largest hurdle is not the claim, it is the technological capability, namely the inability to automate most day to day tasks. (actually, remove the one part about only 100 employees and it is true)

Has it occurred to you that if any public office becomes a commodity, then it would be in the best interest of the company to make that product (the public office) as good as possible for the consumer (some filthy plutocrat who wants power) as therefore to extract the most wealth?

If your world view is based around the idea that everything that can be a commodity is sold in no short supply, then power and control must be on the list of things to sell, and if that means mass manipulation of the public, then it means the privatization of authoritarianism.

The concentration of wealth in the example depends on the scenario, however wealth must concentrate somewhere because the resources in the system are finite.

The town which does the investing will gain effective ownership of the resources for which they have invested, the same way banks gain effective ownership in homes that they neither built nor owned directly by providing loans to pay for the property.

MayCaesar

@Happy_Killbot

I see the opposite: the mining power is becoming decentralised and open, with cloud technology allowing anyone with a smartphone run heavy calculations involving gigantic datasets remotely. If anything, this market sector is democratising, not monopolising.

Perhaps, but what is wrong with it? People already want the public office to be as good as possible, which is why they cast their votes the way they do.

Power and control are not exempts from competition; whether they are commodity or not, it is very difficult to establish a powerful position on the market, and, in many ways, it is even more difficult to maintain it. Remember the times when everybody thought that MySpace would never be unseated, with countless proposals to artificially split it into multiple companies? At this point, I genuinely do not know if MySpace is still around; will need to google it.

The resources are hardly finite in practical terms, and even if they were finite, they do not have to concentrate anywhere; they can instead freely flow in a decentralised manner, as they do in practice.

Investing does not grant one ownership of anything but the document guaranteeing some sort of return in the future. There are secured investments that work a bit differently, but the bulk of large scale investments is actually unsecured, as far as I know.
Note that there is a large difference between private loans and business investments. Private loans are given to people with no expectations of any additional return barring the full amount + interest rate, while business investments target a share of the company's profit, in one way or another. It is fairly rare for business investments to be secured by attachment to some hard asset.