SEPTEMBER 2018

#Opencoop: The Open 2018 conference
Delegates gathered in London at the end of July for the Open 2018 conference on platform co-operatives, organised by the Open
Co-op. The two-day event discussed ways technology could allow co-ops to rival the power of the tech giants which have come to
dominate the 21st century economy – and could even allow them to create their own currencies ...
Online uprising: How the
grassroots is taking on the
global tech monopolies
There has been growing unease around the world
about the rising power of the 21st century tech
monopolies. Efforts to constrain them include
measures by the European Union, which has
levied fines against some companies, while other
countries have made attempts at nationalisation.
As well as these top-down counter measures,
there are grassroots innovations being attempted,
as tech innovators develop rival models to offer
consumers and workers a fairer alternative.
Duncan McCann, researcher at the New
Economics Foundation, told the Open 2018
conference that many tech platforms fail to engage
the workers providing the service – and, while
regulation exists in several countries to protect
these workers, it is not sufficiently enforced.
One way to help start-ups and social enterprises
as they try to compete is to open up their access
to data, he said.
Another alternative is to design infrastructure
that is resilient to monopolies. Jaya Klara Brekke,
researcher on decentralised systems and
architectures, said regulation could be a tricky
solution, because customers sometimes benefit
from using these platforms and support them.
But she is optimistic about Blockchain, a
peer-to-peer technology created to tackle issues
around power. “A lot of developers are considering
questions of empowerment, transparency and
privacy,” she said.
Nathan Schneider, assistant professor of media
studies at the University of Boulder Colorado,
insisted that platform co-ops need self-regulatory
mechanisms – such as common standards, and
checks and balances of power. “It’s interesting to
see how new political theories are finally entering
the space that has been so dominated by other
approaches,” he said. “Protocols are power.”
THE CAPITAL CONUNDRUM
Fledgling platform co-ops face the challenge of
getting upfront investment in a project that might
not work. Co-ops, which put members’ interests
above profit, cannot take the same risks as
organisations like Amazon, which consistently
lost money in its early years before hitting profit.
“This is not a new problem,” said Vivian
Woodell, from the Phone Co-op’s Foundation for
Co-operative Innovation. “In the 19th century,
when co-ops were getting started, railways were
the equivalent of today’s tech businesses. They
were high-risk and many of them failed. Co-ops
stayed away from railways and stuck to more
predictable things like retail. Our competitors do
things we can’t, taking huge risks – sometimes on
the basis that one in 100 succeeds.”
Private providers of capital for tech start-ups
generally look to get a return through “exit” –
selling their stake in the business, often long
before the business enters profit. This is not an
option for co-ops. Mr Woodell suggested new
mechanisms, such selling the right to future
streams of income such as royalties or a share of
profit. But he said the movement would have to
decide if this fitted its values and principles.
Mr Woodell said the Fairphone had shown it was
possible to innovate new ways of raising capital.
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