The virtual world is a 'public square' much more vast than Tiananmen Square. And you can't send in the tanks to crush the netizens.
Interpretation
The virtual world is an expansive platform for public discourse that cannot be easily controlled or suppressed.
Jared Cohen's quote highlights the difference between physical control over a space, like Tiananmen Square, and the challenges of governing the vast and dynamic nature of the internet. In the digital age, the internet serves as a public square for free expression, where attempts to suppress voices are met with resistance, making it difficult for authorities to impose control as they might in real-life protests.
In practice
This quote can be used in a debate about internet censorship policies.
Technology is a tool, and it's a platform. Nobody gets arrested for being a blogger; people get arrested for dissent. Nobody gets arrested for putting information about themselves online; they get arrested for being an activist. I'm a strong believer in the fact that you should not blame the tools; you should blame the circumstances.
Name any issue in the world, I can tell you how technology is intertwined with it. I can tell you how technology will make it better. How it can make it worse. It needs to be part of everything that we do, whether you are a government or a company or a citizen.
When Paul Allen and I started Microsoft over 30 years ago, we had big dreams about software. We had dreams about the impact it could have.
For the last 10 years, I've felt increasing pressure to stop shooting film and start shooting video, but I've never understood why. It's cheaper to work on film, it's far better looking, it's the technology that's been known and understood for a hundred years, and it's extremely reliable.
I've been very passionate about renewable energy for many years, particularly solar energy and its capacity to bring abundant clean, sustainable energy to millions around the globe.
There have been people that suggest that we should have a back door. But the reality is if you put a back door in, that back door's for everybody - for good guys and bad guys.
If we can put a man on the moon and sequence the human genome, we should be able to devise something close to a universal digital public library.
Tomorrow there will be no division to Europe and Asia. These are old concepts that would remain only on maps. Everything will be united. Companies will be united. It is a process of structures growing due to the technological progress.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.