The word “disruptive” has become
commonplace during the first 15%
of the 21st century.
This burgeoning usage is directly a
function of scientific and technological
innovation, mostly in computing,
communication and transport. The private
and public sectors latched onto these
innovations and are still running hard,
transforming many aspects of ordinary and
extraordinary life.
The mobile phone you have today is a
supercomputer compared to the one you
had in 2000. The way governments deliver
services and gather information to and
from their citizens has been radically
transformed. The demise of the advertising
base for newspapers – and thus of the
commercial survival of newspapers and
other print media – is well underway. War is
increasingly waged by remote controllers
guiding pilotless weapons platforms in the
air, with proto-platforms rapidly emerging
for sea and land.
The prime targets of the new military
technologies are also avid developers of
new technologies to fight ancient feuds.
The terror practitioners of the first 15% of
this century – from 9/11 on – have been
deft in their use of mobile communications
as an organisational tool and social media
as a recruitment tool. Much of their
innovation has been in the zone broadly
defined as “peer-to-peer”.
Like Airbnb and Uber.
Airbnb claims that in 2014 more than
25 million guests stayed in a property in
one of 34,000 cities in 190 countries via its
facilitation of guest–landlord deals. Uber
has been operating in Australia since 2012
and now facilitates ride-sharing in all
Australian cities. Even mainstream taxi
drivers use it to find fares in quiet times.
These are exemplars of the “sharing
economy”, a concept keenly colonised as a
policy opportunity by hyperactive Shadow
Assistant Treasurer Andrew Leigh. A
discussion paper he issued early in 2015
canvassed issues like how to tax them and
regulate them to ensure public safety,
workers’ rights and access for people with
disability.
This is a sign of the success of high-
profile peer-to-peer sharing outfits, but
they don’t like it. Uber is particularly
waging a legal battle to avoid paying GST,
even though its mainstream competitors do.
When it comes to regulating peer-to-
peer interactions for the purpose of justice
and national security, the government and
Labor are united in requiring telcos to
retain metadata for use by investigativeagencies. The Greens and user groups like
the Internet Society reject this, citing
privacy and cost concerns.
The more successful a disruptive
technology, the more it is likely to be
tamed.JAN/FEB 2016|| 5EDITOR/PUBLISHER:Guy Nolch
COLUMNISTS:Simon Grose, David Reneke,
Ian Lowe, Peter Bowditch, Michael Cook,
John Long, Tim Olds, Tim Hannan
PATRONS:Australasian Scienceis supported
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Williams, representing excellence in science
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SIMON SAYS Simon Grose
Cover Story
This special edition of Australasian Science
focuses on fertility, with articles exploring
assisted reproductive technologies, the
health consequences of male infertility,
factors affecting a woman’s fertile life -
span, how parental obesity can affect the
health of future generations, pregnancy
complications, triggers of preterm birth,
fertility management of the dairy herd,
and how endocrine disruptors are affecting
marsupial fertility.Simon Grose is Editor of Canberra IQ (canberraiq.com.au)Terrorism and the Sharing Economy
Whether new technologies are applied for good or ill, they
encounter evolutionary pressure to fit in to the environments
they inhabit.
@AustScience