At this point I'm very pessimistic about the future of the open World Wide Web, and see little in the works in terms of securely replacing it when it does come apart.

We, its users, are all to blame. We've stood idly by as the concept itself went from a largely decentralized protocol for sharing information via hyperlinks, to a bastardized, immensely centralized platform for stealing people's attention, even creating addictions, mine their data while they stare on and use the two to sell them more shit they don't need.

At best we passively supported this, but most of us actively partook in it. We use Google products, buy Apple products, share our data on instagram/facebook/etc., click shitty clickbait links and more. In doing so, we made some companies incredibly rich, enabling them to buy out or use their money to fund lawsuits against emerging competition, further centralizing their power.

Not satisfied with simply supporting these actions, we're on a platform right here that actively encourages companies to spin up attention/data harvesting platforms with the goal of "going public" or being bought out by one of these giants. You could be easily justified in saying those of us in the tech industry are the most culpable.

The governments, rightly so, have recognized the threat that power bears. Some chose to work with them, and use FISA or other means to secure backdoors to all the data they hoover up on us, and then work around pesky laws by sharing it with buddies such as those in Five Eyes to give eachother mutual access to one another's data. We know this. We did nothing about it. Others chose to work against them, such as China.

Instead of taking a stand, the big, powerful tech companies we all revere bent over and did what they were told in order to access the markets of those working against them to steal more attention and make more money.

And we stood idly by. At the micro level, we're now in a phase where if a vocal enough internet group takes offense to some sort of content within our sphere of influence, or against something someone posted 10 years ago, that they can pressure providers to deplatform their targets. Some stand idly by, others applaud it as progress.

And so it will continue to crumble. Wise countries, recognizing both the threat of the internet giants and the opportunity of getting access within them, will apply the necessary pressure to have those giants make the internet "their way". "Wise" internet groups, recognizing both the threat of wrongthink and the opportunity to deplatform those who think wrong will apply pressure on the same giants to make the internet "their way".

The only possible saviour is some sort of international body, comprised of representatives of all nations, cultures and subcultures, coming together to agree on keeping things open and clear. Given that we can't even make the UN effective, such a group would never agree on anything and would merely continue to justify its own take on censorship and thus wouldn't be viable from the start.

And so the Web many of us came up on here, which provoked our interest in computers, networks, software and hardware, is doomed, and it's all because we are weak, and the giants we've allowed emerge are ultimately weak also.

And none of that has anything to do with nationalism.