[mentalgear]

'who controls technology' should be the result of 'what do [they] want to use it for', e.g the motivation.

It should be put in the hands of the most trustworthy, transparent institution that can validate it works for all of us, not just the few.

I don't think private companies or specific leaders want the best for the common good, so it would make the most sense to give control to a supra-nation entity like the UN - at least that would be the most democratic as we all have the chance to influence it (via voting from national to international level).

[xp84]

I do not feel that I have a voice at the U.N.

But I also feel that it has been a particularly toothless organization. If a member state decides it is in their interest to flout some safeguard they were to mandate, that state will do so, and the U.N. won’t do anything about it unless there’s broad agreement between the US, China, and probably Russia. And the chances are that whoever is in need of enforcement is one of those, or a closely allied country of one.

[jandrewrogers]

> so it would make the most sense to give control to a supra-nation entity like the UN

This is a very naive and idealistic imagining of what international NGOs such as the UN are actually like and how they operate. I can't think of anything worse.

The median country is a corrupt authoritarian state.

[amanaplanacanal]

That's not what the UN is for. The whole purpose of the UN was as a place for nations to talk things out so they didn't go to war with each other. Trying to do other things usually either doesn't work very well, or distracts from what it was built for.

[merelydev]

Would you agree that to some extend, the ability to control technology is an incentive for companies to develop/innovate, and the more control they have the more profitable it is?

[HappMacDonald]

I would not. Especially not in the current climate when virtually every company is dropping all pretense of development and innovation (or creation of any kind) in favor of value extraction and rent-seeking.

We are in this constant cycle of bubbles — the last ones I can recall bursting in 2000 and 2008 — where someone invents some new financial shell game that allows them to trade on some form of non-existent capital and then half the stock market follows along like rats after the piper until it all collapses as soon as enough people realize that everyone else also realizes the Emperor is wearing no clothes. And incidentally no, I have no idea how this particular trainwreck of fairy tail lessons all became pertinent simultaneously, but here we are.

Control over things makes a lousy incentive anyway, since having said control always better empowers the appointed to just cheat the incentive instead.

If the big bad wolf is at your door, "letting him in" isn't a bargaining chip you can trust to incentivize any sort of behavior other than "eating you".