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Rohan Seth
About the AuthorRohan Seth
The writer is a policy analyst at the technology and policy programme of The Takshashila Institution. The views expressed here are personal.
    There is a strong tendency within the Government to view data as a national asset, akin to say, the Indian Railways. This has been an inherent line of reasoning in multiple draft and actual policies. (Photo | Pixabay - Gerd Altmann)Technology
    Tech This Week | Data is not national wealth, must not be regulated in...

    Value is derived from data is because it is shared. That's a key reason why technology evolved into a multi-trillion...

    11 July 2020 9:33 PM IST

    The state has superseded internet exceptionalism and instead used it as a weapon. (Photo | Pixabay - Gerd Altmann)Technology
    Tech This Week | Banning TikTok is another nail on coffin of internet...

    The action against Chinese Apps is not about data protection but is a political manoeuvre.

    4 July 2020 10:44 PM IST

    A small grocery store (Photo | Wikimedia Commons - Naman Bhagat)Technology
    Tech This Week | Encouraging small sellers to get online must be a...

    One of the best ways to make that happen is to provide the right incentives to MSME sellers to go online

    21 Jun 2020 4:59 PM IST

    We are still not yet sure what does and does not belong on the internet when it comes to coronavirus.Technology
    Tech This Week | Now is the time for misinformation reform

    Because of liberal laws based on principles of free speech on most dominant online platforms, misinformation is often...

    13 Jun 2020 7:31 PM IST

    One of the fastest-growing apps on the Play Store was called Remove China Apps and did exactly what the name suggested. While the App has since then been removed from the Play Store for violating Googles policies, its existence and function hurt Indias best interests in the name of helping it. Eliminating or banning a competitor is inherently bad for competition and does Indian consumers a disservice.Technology
    Removing Chinese apps from your phone is the opposite of self-reliance

    Several Indian startups such as Paytm, Swiggy, Zomato, Ola and BigBasket have Chinese investors. Shunning the apps hurts...

    8 Jun 2020 4:07 PM IST

    There is an inherent bias against Tiktok because it is Chinese. There are suspicions that TikToks parent ByteDance is connected to the Communist Party. There is also the data sovereignty argument, where Indian data is shared with Chinese companies.Technology
    Tech This Week | #BanTikTok Solves Nothing

    Indians spent over 5.5 billion hours on TikTok, which is more than the next eleven countries combined

    30 May 2020 4:02 PM IST

    , the majority of people in the informal sector who do not have a job anymore, suddenly have a lot more time and attention to spare. Inevitably, more than a significant part of this goes to streaming content.Technology
    Tech This Week | Advertising a tax on the poor, pandemic going to...

    Many don't have jobs now but the book Poor Economics says they could trade off a little food for entertainment. So...

    25 May 2020 7:52 PM IST

    Facebook and other online platforms have been trying to minimise hate speech on social media, by getting content moderated.Technology
    Why India needs to be the centre for content moderation reform

    A significant number of moderators for most platforms are contracted through companies such as Cognizant, Genpact, and...

    16 May 2020 3:10 PM IST

    Content moderation at Facebook is going to be a long fraught battle, led by the board. (Photo | AFP)Technology
    Tech This Week | Will Facebook's Supreme Court' make the internet a...

    Best case scenario: The body achieves incremental progress by laying out key principles that guide Facebook's content...

    11 May 2020 5:11 PM IST

    Kirana stores are an unexplored market and there is an opportunity to be tapped. But a first mover advantage does not directly mean victory.Technology
    Tech this week | Jio-Facebook's e-commerce monopoly is not a foregone...

    Amazon has also made a move to get kirana shops on its platform, and in the coming months it's likely that Flipkart and...

    2 May 2020 11:32 PM IST

    it does not make any sense to attack doctors during a pandemic. Until you read Indian Express report that fake WhatsApp videos were circulated in localities claiming that healthy Muslims are being taken away and injected with the virus were doing the rounds of Tatpatti Bakhal and adjoining localities.Technology
    Stay safe and go back to the newspaper this pandemic

    We did not need a global pandemic to realise how big a challenge misinformation is, but it helps.

    27 April 2020 3:07 PM IST

    If you download the Aarogya Setu app, your phone will take note of your location every 15 minutes and only share the information with the Government server if you test positive.Technology
    Should you download Aarogya Setu?

    Yes. Its updated privacy policy is a marked improvement on the previous one. But the app needs an end date so it does...

    17 April 2020 12:49 PM IST

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