Today, thanks to political gridlock in the U.S., lawmakers respond to innovations with all the speed of continental drift. As government gets slower, tech is going the opposite way. New technologies spread instantly by cloud-based apps and social networks, and take hold with almost no legal oversight. Then, by the time government can act, it's usually too late to wind things back to the way they were.
And this, as it turns out, is terrific for tech startups, especially those aimed at demolishing creaky old norms—like taxis, or flight paths over crowded airspace, or money. Lately, the law vs. tech gap is making headlines as it upends the rules around sports gambling. The daily fantasy sports sites FanDuel and DraftKings are showing how fast technology can exploit the gap and put government on its heels.
This problem is as old as law itself. From thrown rocks to spears, bow and arrow to guns, agricultural to industrial economies, government has always had this problem.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 03 2015, @03:53AM
Uber and Lyft are societal leeches, replacing some problems of the old creaky taxi companies, but bringing far more inequality and harm due to lack of insurance and immature business practices. "The Cloud" doesn't know what it is supposed to be, or what problem it's supposed to solve; only that it's supposed to be as disruptive as possible to existing infrastructure, forgetting almost all of the lessons learned about running infrastructure. Remember the huge AWS outage on October 23rd? Here's a detailed analysis [systemswatch.com].
FanDuel and DraftKings are a scourge on the sports scene, in an entertainment ecosystem already partially crippled by "fantasy sports", where taking an MLB-esque obsession with statistics and injecting it with steroids saps all of the fun out of watching the actual event. Someone somewhere thought that the situation wasn't dire enough, and decided to come up with a way to sap money out of millions of more gullible Joe Sixpacks who can't turn away from "get-rich-quick schemes". We already had something like this: it was called Vegas and Atlantic City sports bookies. This flies in the face of the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act of 1992 [wikipedia.org].
Techno-libertarians and acolytes of Clayton Christensen are completely oblivious to the negative affects of an almost complete lack of regulation due to an almost completely techno-incompetent (and tech-lobbyist-captive) Congress. It is a disgusting country right now, which is silently choking on its own tongue. And yet we're about to ramp up into a full year of politics that will completely ignore all of it.
I will now read from a passage of a James Fallows article from The Atlantic, which was published in summer 2005, of a "Master Strategy Memo" for the future president-elect, dated January 20, 2016. (It is from an editorial column called "Countdown To A Meltdown", here [theatlantic.com].
(The scenario in Fallows' article was far more dire, including an oil shock triggered by Fidel Castro's death, a democratic President called "the Preacher", and the first black President being a republican former soldier... and not Colin Powell.)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 03 2015, @04:28AM
FanDuel and DraftKings are a scourge on the sports scene
The sports scene is a scourge on the sports scene. It's all simply trash.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 03 2015, @04:32AM
It is, but it's the least fake thing on television, with at least some semblance of an outcome not pre-determined by Hollywood producers (unless of course you count game-throwing, point-shaving, and other things we'll probably hear about in 4 years or so. But at least it's better than "reality" television or watching that three ring circus called Hollywood).
(Score: 4, Touché) by quadrox on Tuesday November 03 2015, @06:23AM
Watching sports on TV is better than reality TV in the same way that shooting yourself in the foot is better than shooting yourself in the head. One might be preferable to the other, but I wouldn't want to do either.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Tuesday November 03 2015, @06:44AM
FanDuel and DraftKings are a scourge on the sports scene, in an entertainment ecosystem already partially crippled by "fantasy sports"
You over state your case. In fact, I don't think you have a case. Partially crippled? Scourge? seriously?
This is merely an temporary aberration, a simple instance of fraud. It gets taken care of by the usual means.
There is no reason to go all maudlin and drag government into every new development in the tech world just to prevent the fleecing of a few gullible early adopters.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 03 2015, @06:45PM
The implementation of rules and regulations? Which proves that the point of the article is completely wrong, government not understanding technology is not a good thing at all. The government's failure to understand technology is why the DEA and NSA are allowed to do what they're doing, despite their unconstitutionality and illegality.