Re:Security in 2020
by swombat on Thursday December 16, 2010 @08:58AM
(#2012013)
You're right that the word is slightly misleading, because it could be seen both ways, but it is also clearly decentralisation.
In the previous model, all your data, email, media, etc is on your computer, your hard drive, a single point that you are in control of. In the new model, your photos are on Facebook, your emails are on Gmail, your tweets are on Twitter, your bookmarks are on Delicious, your data is on Dropbox, your music is on Spotify, your movies are on Netflix, etc... It's not centralised to one location, it's split up from one location (your computer) into potentially hundreds of locations owned by a variety of paymasters with different agendas. So, it is decentralised.
From the point of view of the collective, it's centralisation (data goes from many entities into a single entity) but from the point of view of the individual, it's decentralisation (data goes from a single entity to many entities).
In the previous model, all your data, email, media, etc is on your computer, your hard drive, a single point that you are in control of. In the new model, your photos are on Facebook, your emails are on Gmail, your tweets are on Twitter, your bookmarks are on Delicious, your data is on Dropbox, your music is on Spotify, your movies are on Netflix, etc... It's not centralised to one location, it's split up from one location (your computer) into potentially hundreds of locations owned by a variety of paymasters with different agendas. So, it is decentralised.
From the point of view of the collective, it's centralisation (data goes from many entities into a single entity) but from the point of view of the individual, it's decentralisation (data goes from a single entity to many entities).