I, for one, welcome our new robot overlords.

I guess what I'm suggesting there is that technology is changing, and the world is changing with it, very rapidly. There is some tremendous good coming from the change and also plenty to be concerned about. To your primary point, about power and the centralization of it, yes humans can be very greedy and self-interested. People with power tend to want to keep it, and not share. It's a delicate balance, whether you're Marie Antoinette or Mark Zuckerburg, because ultimately the power comes from large groups of people being willing to accept your authority and live under the system you run.

Through that lens, decentralization is a very scary thing for some people in power. Look at the Arab Spring, or the internet in China, and you see the fear that governments have over letting people loose on Twitter. That kind of centralized power, of governments controlling (or not) whole populations, is super difficult to get right.

Digital Feudalism, as it pertains to more localized systems, may have more of a chance at being closer to equitable over time. I believe that one of the reasons for that is that digital mobility can be greater than with traditional geographic politics. That makes the power structure of the fiefdom much more sensitive to negative sentiment. Witness Facebook. For all of the "power" they have, it is completely derived by people's willingness to use the system. The network effect lock-in is very real, but also much easier to escape than it is to move to Canada, given some viable alternative.

You could look at that hyper-sensitivity to negative sentiment and say, well, people in power within the fiefdom will quash dissent. In many cases, that will happen. If it is done strictly to control people and hold onto power, it is a strategy which is likely to eventually fail. Openness and accountability are critical to success on the platforms which are being built out today. That which is done in secret will be exposed. It's just a matter of time and a question of by whom.

The thing we have going for us is that (at least currently) we all have a voice. Some are louder, sure, but ideas are powerful. At least until the robots take over. Then we will all be happy, whether we like it or not.

Enjoy the sunshine :)