When Corporations Rule

Doom at Hand

Just started Korten's book, "When Corporations Rule the World," 2nd Edition, having bought it at the local meeting of the Patrick Henry club - young Democrats, which featured Mark Tabbert ([email protected]) doing a PowerPoint presentation on the subject of the corporation - the artificial person. So far the book appears to be totally on target, although I haven't gotten anywhere close to his "solutions," which is where "progressives" tend to revert to what caused the problems to begin with.

(As in subsidies to farmers by progressive FDR, which is now killing millions of people in the 3rd world, and supporting the New Farm Order of corporate plundering of the gene pool, as the film I'm about to discuss related.)

I'm scheduled to give a talk on the very subject at an upcoming Anarchist Conference at Pitzer College in April, so this was timely.

So, then, at Mark's invitation, I attended a showing of "The Future of Food," which I highly recommend. Unlike so many of the "progressive" documentaries out there - 9/11 for example - TFF gives a solid factual account of what is really happening. I expected to see the material on the impact of corporate farm subsidies on 3rd World indigenous farming, but the direct tie-ins between companies such as Monsanto and the top political elite of the U.S. was quite startling.

The discussion that followed the movie, shown at Tabbert's Unitarian Church in Costa Mesa was also illuminating. While I attempted to bring up global issues and relate the TFF message to a more general corporate takeover, I was instantly opposed by a woman who felt that "everyone should have a chance to talk."

I had no disagreement, altho it seemed to be implied that I did. What it really meant, as I observed shortly, was that those people who came from the PC end of things should talk, and anyone with a different perspective should shut up. The woman who wanted to impose the censorship was herself opposed, however, by the majority of attendees, I was gratified to observe.

Based on the ensuing discussion, in which everyone did get plenty of chance to talk, of the attendees, the women almost invariably took a position that they "felt comfortable" about changing their own lives and setting an example for others, and didn't feel that "focusing on the negative" was of particular value.

(To which I pointed out that that tactic would not have helped if they had happened to be living in Hiroshima at the wrong time. They could have been the utter paragon of a Bodi Satva and they would still be dead. This did not win me any popularity contests with the women, BTW, a couple of whom left at that point.)

The men, on the other hand, almost invariably focused on the systemic, philosophical and institutional aspects of the problem, generally indicating that they were exceptionally well-read on the subject. It turns out that they have a discussion group on Thursdays at the church on the subject of the corporation and what can be done about it.

One issue that I brought up in the discussion, which I think deserves special mention, and which I was quite surprised NOT to hear on Digital Village yesterday, is that there is a parallel move on the part of the corporate elite to take over all aspects of communication, and that things appear to be coming to a head rather quickly and with very little public awareness.

Here's the link, and if it doesn't scare the you-know-what out of you, then you aren't up to speed on this at all:

http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=180206472&cid=RSSfeed_IWK_News

Basically, this means that - assuming the patent in question is not successfully challenged, which could happen - ALL future internet pages that go significantly beyond what we could do in 1998, say, will be forced to pay whatever royalties this guy wants.

It looks like it could be easilly challenged, but the fact is that many large corporate entities LIKE having a key aspect of their operation patented. Then - having huge resources and every indication of more in the future - THEY can use special deals with the patent-holder to force out their less well-heeled (as in Indimedia, for one example) competition.

So far, the actual design of web pages - which is what I do for a living - has been largely anarchistic, with very few patents of note. Now, however, literally millions of web sites are in jeapardy and may find a large bill in the mail. And there is no reason to think that this will be the end of the problems, by a long shot.

Now that this guy has successfully patented the technology that drives all the major cutting edge rich-media content - such as Google - everyone who ever did anything that hasn't already been patented will be clambering at the doors of the patent office to nail down their special privileges.

Naturally, again the big corporate money will be there as a major player, especially behind the scenes, buying patents and signing contracts that cost them millions, but cost their competition and potential competition a lot more - enough to ensure their monopolistic position and to force out of sight any critiques of the prevailing order.

This is DOOM! folks. If it succeeds, it locks every serious dissident faction - especially those who might actually have a point and a plausible agenda - out of the mainstream internet media, returning us to the day of total control of information by a few broadcast channels. The nut cases will doubtless be paraded as examples that "the net is still free!" Meanwhile, anyone with a real challenge will be marginalized or coopted.

I predicted in the late '70's that there would eventually be a huge backlash by the centralized corporate power centers against the looming personal-computer based information revolution. In fact, I predicted then that sometime around the turn of the Millenium we would see some kind of major terrorist incident in the U.S., probably staged - or simply "allowed" by the current adminstration - which would become the excuse for a new police-state regime, whose powers would be then used to go after opposition of any kind.

Here it is.

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Corporations RULE! San Dimas High School football RULES!
Oh, sorry... I thought, well... ummm...

I'm scheduled to give a talk on the very subject at an upcoming Anarchist Conference at Pitzer College in April, so this was timely.

How far in advance do you have to register for the Anarchy Conference? Seems kinda ironic that they'd have an organized event, that's all.

Unlike so many of the "progressive" documentaries out there - 9/11 for example - TFF gives a solid factual account of what is really happening.

So Michael Moore's fictional non-documentary is "progressive"? In what way? In that he "progresses" the plot along by fabricating his interviews and lies through his teeth? Or that he selectively edits out... oh, don't get me started. He set documentary filmmaking back 50 years.

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