The downsides of the new Economy

Sometimes a stroll on the Promenade in Davos to recognize that what moves the world of business currently is enough. Many of the pavilions and Chalets in the centre of technology and data companies, such as Huawei, Palantir or Facebook rented.

"Not more capital, but data the economic power it is today," said Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in his address to the WEF. Japan presides currently the G-20, the Club of the 20 most important economies. One of the main themes of the G-20, "that data can freely cross the borders," said Abe.

However, the Facebook scandal, in which millions of unauthorized users of the data to the analysis company Cambridge Analytica, outflows, has just moved in Europe, the euphoria in the digital economy a blow. In discussions with representatives of the digital economy, such as Ex-Google Manager, Sebastian Thrun, and the Swiss Start-up-Investor Klaus Hommels, it is striking how differently Europeans and Americans, the risks and the need for Regulation in the business with data. There is agreement on only one question: The Chinese are here already makes a super and could soon be pretending to be in the world the clock.

transparency and growth

The German computer scientist and Robotics expert, Thrun became known, because he helped to develop at Google, among other things, the first Autonomous car. In 2012, he founded the continuing education platform Udacity, developed in collaboration with Tech-company practice-oriented online courses.

Thrun was a guest at a Breakfast of the Initiative "digital Switzerland". In the interview, the fast speaker, as a pure representative of the Silicon Valley thinking: progress is positive. The data scandal at Facebook, he referred to as "growth pain", because "Google and Facebook have a vested interest in your user data falling into the wrong hands".

Thrun believes that the increased use of data to improve transparency. "There is a connection between transparency and economic growth." Say: The more transparent and freely accessible data in a company, the richer they would. "Thanks to transparency there is less crime and corruption." As evidence for his Thesis, he cites North Korea, probably the intra-test state of the world, is also the beggar to save.

And China? The government uses all the possibilities of technology, to control the population. Who will be running in some cities a Red light and filmed, thanks to a perfect face detection hang. The buses will automatically be debited from the account. Citizens are not the glasses, the government is. Thrun believes that this will not be durable. "Also, China will need to be transparent."

Europeans are more critical

European Manager of a Tech company see the critical. "It shows more and more that social media exert enormous political Power," says a top Manager of a large data analysis provider that does not want to read his name in the newspaper. As evidence, he cites about the yellow West movement in France, which was thanks to Facebook to a national phenomenon. "We know nothing about how the algorithm of Facebook spread messages of the yellow West, and such phenomena creates," said the Manager. "When we talk about transparency, we need transparency about how this algorithm works."

This is the opinion of Klaus Hommels, a Swiss company, lake star, one of the leading venture capitalists in Europe and with early investments in Facebook and Spotify, a good nose proved. "We have long since lost the sovereignty over our information," he warns. The regulation or Monitoring of Algorithms which distribute messages in social media, is therefore legitimate.

so Far, the policy is not to care but that. "This is because politicians can score points with such issues in the electorate, because the users awareness of the problem is missing," says Hommels.

"The less restrictions, the better,"

More restrictions and regulation of the business make it difficult, its also Hommels is aware of. But China, with the unlimited use of customer data could be for Europe, not a role model, despite the successes of the network giants such as Alibaba or Tecent. "It's not worth it," the Tech Investor.

Marissa Mayer, Ex-CEO of Yahoo, sees it quite differently. "The less restrictions there are, the better," she says. "Because the development of artificial intelligence depends on the quantity and the quality of the underlying data." The only way the systems could learn fast and much. Here, China will soon have an unassailable lead. "In order to compete, would have to Europe and North America put their data together," says Mayer.

(editing Tamedia)

Created: 23.01.2019, 21:00 clock