Timothy Lee’s article and the Zittrain chapters discuss the line separating the importance of generativity in the architecture of distributing and making programs, and the importance of security from viruses and malware. According to Zittrain, the freedom in generativity should not be compromised for security. Indeed it is dangerous for computers to be exposed and privacy to be compromised, but our current structure was built upon a generative design. If it was not for that design, Google would not have risen to become one of the most notable and necessary companies in the world. And through that open design, programmers are able to openly make innovative programs without encountering restrictions from a large company, like Apple. Lee sides with the AppStore in advocating for a tightened security and a panel of judges to evaluate whether an app should be allowed to be sold or downloaded. His statistic shows that though most people side with the idea of a generative format, apps still get sold from the appstore. There are half a million apps and 15 billion downloads. All of which have no great concerns of invasion of privacy or malware. On the alternate system, Android’s market still has requirements before an app is allowed to surface, it is more lenient. But through this leniency, malwares were not filtered out and has infected many phones. Lee quotes Steve Jobs saying how nobody wants a PC for a phone. A PC already has the stigma and truth of being open, and consequently vulnerable. And that fear would be multiplied when applied to compromising the privacy in phones.
Zittrain writes about the threat to generativity that surge of malware and viruses has instituted. The internet was created through the freedoms of programmers and to their discretion of what is appropriate. And those were the only restraints to creations in the cyberworld. But in the advent of a wider population using broadband, and an influx of people purchasing powerful computers that do not understand its capacity, there is a higher risk of computers being infected. When there was a lower population of computer users, those users were usually well learned in the technology. There were less people that would attempt to compromise the security of a computer. And also, because most of the owners of computers were experts with the technology, they would not need to rely on others to create their programs. So there would be no unexpected malware included in those programs. But in the current state of the internet, consumers rely on limited trusted companies who have the money to be publicized, and to have the processing power to supply to the masses, but consumers may be blinded by them to see the ingenuity of lesser known companies. Zittrain gives the example video game consoles. The company loses money for each console that they sell. These things are a technological powerhouse. They are in every way a computer. They can access the internet, they can process information, use many different applications. But the way these companies make money is by selling exclusive software. Only certain applications can be used in these consoles and they must be bought. And in the case of the XBOX, yes, it can connect to the internet, but a membership must be bought to be able to use the premium services. The XBOX itself as a hardware has all the capabilities of a computer, but due to restrictions of not being open, it does not allow unapproved programs to fly past the company. This is done mainly to prevent their main source of profit from being accessed for free. The XBOX is restricted insofar as the software implementing these restrictions are intact, but remove them, games and other apps else paid for, would be available for free. For walled gardens, in addition to being safe(r) from malware and viruses, they are a tool to control the flow of buying and selling software.
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