Sylvain Le Bon from Startin'blox about Data Spaces, Democracy and Interoperability

Welcome to another episode of the Democracy Innovator podcast.

My name is Alessandro Appu and our guest of today is Silveon Leborn.

So welcome Silveon and thank you for your time.

Thanks.

Thanks for having me.

you're working at Starkey Block, right?

um Something that you co-founded.

Absolutely, yes, we we are a uh technical solution for data spaces so um I guess we're gonna We're gonna get deeper into that ah soon, but We we deploy technical solutions for

people who try to build or join data spaces

And I mean basic question what are data spaces?

because

So, Data Space is an ecosystem of organizations who want to share data with each other without relying on a third-party platform.

So, basically, today, when we interact uh digitally with people or with organizations, like we do right now, we all depend on platforms, meaning we have to use the same app,

store the data in that app, and...

uh

If you want to leave the app because you found another app that's better, um then you basically lose all your contacts.

so um that means you're dependent on the platform.

That means the platform has a strong control over all the interactions of people uh in that ecosystem, in the digital ecosystem.

um And so the idea of a data space.

um Is to get rid of the platform the same way we do with emails like when you send me an email You don't have to ask me what app I use or what I do with my data or what's a

company, you know, there's no mandatory uh Intermediary in the email and so the idea of the disk basis is to do is to do the same thing with all kind of uh digital interactions

with all kind of data so that means uh You can have your app

You can store the data wherever you want.

I can have my own app and store my data wherever I want and choose my algorithms and choose whatever is going to be done with my data.

But through my app, I will be able to interact with you using your own app because the apps become interoperable, which means that they can plug on the same data space.

So the data space is just like the internet, if you want, uh like the internet of data.

Data becomes available.

securely uh under the control of users in a decentralized way.

So today it's mostly applied to industries.

um It's uh because the idea is that uh for a company being dependent on a third party platform is critical because if another company, especially an American or a Chinese or

like a huge company,

decides who you can interact with under which condition at which price then it becomes really critical for your business.

So a lot of companies are actually uh getting together to start this kind of commons where people can share data with each other and in a decentralized way.

And from a technical point of view, how it can work?

Like I can imagine it's a quite new thing, Data Space is a quite new thing, or is it, let's say, proven concept?

Like from a technical point of view, uh how this can be done?

uh

So basically what it means technically is that the software you're using needs to be adapted to support a certain protocol.

Same thing with emails, same thing like with emails.

The email software you're using respects the email protocol.

um So in this case, in a data space case, um there's a set of protocols that define how an app can access data remotely.

And so if your app becomes compatible with this protocol, basically you join the data space.

To simplify, there are three layers of interoperability in the data space.

The first one, the topmost one, is the identity layer that help define in a standardized way the identity of people, of organizations, and uh also the characteristics of

organizations.

For example, if I say...

I'm Sylvain, I'm a CEO in Starting Blocks and Starting Blocks is a French company registered by the French authorities.

Then I can have digital certificates that prove all that so that when I, as a user, uh try to access data in uh your data source, then I'm recognized as a French entity.

And so if you want to share data only with

European entities, for example, then I can be granted access because I can prove that.

So that's the identity layer.

Then you have the access control layer where we can have um very dedicated uh contracts with policies, with access policies.

So for example, I can say, yeah, this thing, I want only data to be accessed by European entities or I want only people who pay for my data or I want this data to be only

accessible.

under a certain contract that we need to have and this layer has a standardized way to verify that so that you can prove that you have the right to access data and then you have

the uh interoperability at the data level where um basically it uh states how an app can actually connect to the data itself and access it.

Okay, and I was thinking so on a practical level let's say that I don't know municipality in Italy decide to implement this system and the same happens I don't know in municipality

in France then uh the data will be passed I mean completely or like every time there is when it's needed

The idea is to stay decentralized and that means the data should stay where it should be.

Like your data should stay under your control and I might have a technical copy if I need for technical reasons, but the um official version of the data is still in your data

store.

So my app...

needs to access your data every time it needs to have an up-to-date version.

today, basically, uh your name, your email address, all your information is scattered all around the internet because everyone has copies of your data.

So for example, if you had 10 different email addresses during your life, then there's lots of copies.

And when I access your profile on certain platform, I don't know if this

this is still your email address or if it has changed.

ah The idea here is to have all the data at one place and when I want to access a certain information like your email address, then I will always access it in the official place

and so I know I have the latest version.

And so that enables you to control who accesses it and when you don't want me to access your email address anymore, you can stop the access control policy towards me and then I

will not be able to access the data anymore.

And at the moment you are also working on some data spaces, right?

Absolutely, yes.

So we work in different industries.

We're working on a big project that's called Temps.

It's the European media data space.

It gathers um dozens of uh companies from the media industry in Europe, including television broadcasters, press agencies, and people in the podcast industries or in the

book industry as well.

And uh there's a lot of different use cases around that.

It's a project co-funded by the European Commission.

um And uh the idea is to enable um easier collaboration um in the data space industry.

So for example, um you have fact checking.

So from the press agencies and the news companies who are doing this.

fact-checking which is very highly relevant and highly valuable information because it's been verified by journalists and uh one of the use cases is to make this data available to

AI companies uh so that these AI companies can make better text generation because it's based on real verified information and at the same time uh

value the monetize this work of fact checking by news corporations.

There's also work on the audience data because for media audience is key, you know, basically.

so audience data is kind of hard to get because, you know, when you make a movie, it goes on TV, it goes in the cinema, it goes on platforms in many different countries.

So you have

audience data scattered all over the place and being able to access all the audience data in a unified way is very important for the media industry.

We also work with in the agriculture space where there's a lot of challenges, for example, in terms of traceability.

You have products made with lots of different uh

methods like uh organic or regenerative agriculture and the ability to trace uh how some products have been made and to make them easily available to the consumers uh is a key

issue that can be solved for the data space.

we have other use cases as well.

We work in the mobility industry.

We work in the energy space as well.

And so we also have this democracy data space that we've been working on.

Yeah, and exactly this was the question about the data space for democracy.

yeah, how do you think it can be done or like, ah yeah, at which level of, I mean, you're working on that.

And so how it is working.

oh

Yes, so the idea behind that is to see that there's a lot of um online democracy today.

Well, online democracy, what I call online democracy is a very broad thing.

I include basically all social media because I think that today that's where democracy happens.

That's where people ah debate, ah argue and make ideas.

So I think we need to include social media in what we call social online democracy.

But there's a lot of very interesting uh democracy tools online today uh where people can uh argue, where people can build IDs, where they can do petitions, where institutions can

do consultations.

uh But all these tools are completely scattered.

They're isolated from one another.

And basically, uh we have these tools where almost no one

interacts and then we have all these media, the social media where people, know, everybody wants to be heard but no one listens to anyone.

the idea of the democracy data space is to create links between all of that so that oh people can more easily have a dialogue at a higher level.

So basically we've started the project last year.

um with several partners.

The main ones were uh the metropolis of Bordeaux, the city in France, and uh Open Source Politics, a company that works with Desidim, the consultation software.

And the first prototype we made was an ability for the platform, the consultations platform of the different cities inside the metropolis of Bordeaux.

You know, there's a

probably 20 something, 28 maybe uh cities in the metropolis of Bordeaux.

uh And they all have their own consultations platform.

And so um the metropolis didn't want to add up another platform on top of that where the citizen would have to choose if the question they want to answer is for the city or the

metropolis.

uh And so what they wanted is to be able to share consultations between

uh cities so that as a citizen I can see a consultation.

I don't really care who asked it first, I just see the questions that are interesting to me.

And then on top of that we built another tool that's a prototype at the moment but uh where uh people can see all the consultations uh inside the data space.

that are relevant to them depending on the subjects they're interested in, depending on the location they are.

So uh if we extend that and we add to that um different levels of institutions, but also civil society actors, maybe some lobbyists uh as well, then it enables uh a new system

where uh you can have a tool where you can see everything that's...

being set on a certain subject uh at a given time.

And you can imagine having AI tools, we experimented that as well on our prototype, where an AI tool that will give you um the consensus that exists already on the debate or the

dissensus, the ideas that uh make people agree or disagree, um but also give you synthesis of what uh debates are going on.

And that can also be used by institutions.

So you can imagine having civil society actors talking to their members to create debate and create ideas, create those synthesis and make these ideas directly available to

institutions like policy officer of the European Commission.

So um the idea is to make all this discussion more fluid and connected so that uh anyone can see what debates are going on and create.

uh

uh decision good decision based on that

I was wondering what are the differences at the technical level between a data space, let's say for media or for democracy?

Like are there differences or not?

Yeah, that's a very good question.

I would say the general overview architecture is basically the same.

It's still the idea that every actor keeps uh their data.

We make sure that when you claim to be someone, well, you are that person.

uh And we make sure that only people who can access data.

access this data and we keep everything decentralized.

But then there are specificities on everyday space that make it uh different from others.

Obviously when we talk about democracy, there's a lot of personal data and a lot of individual involved.

um Actors in the democracy space are very concerned by GDPR for a reason we can understand.

um So that means that access control

should be linked to that.

For example, um some institutions have said, I agree that the consultations that making could be used by someone else, but only I want to be sure that these people that will

access the data have the same GDPR processes as we have on personal data.

And so we can imagine having a kind of auditing system where you can be certified a certain level of GDPR uh processes.

and you can share your data only with people who have this GDPR certification or something like that.

And then another difference is that as opposed to many data spaces, most data is public in a democracy data space when it's debate, when it's consultations.

But at the same time, um there are cases where it's important to have private data as well.

Because, for example,

you could have a private conversation inside a civil society actor before a synthesis is pushed to the institutions and it's important that this private data stays private.

You also have some institutional uh conditions under which sometimes a consultation stays uh undisclosed until a given date where everything becomes public.

So the type of data and the conditions under which things stay um private are not the same, are kind of specific in the democracy data space.

I was thinking about this GDPR issue and also related to identity.

um Because data spaces, it could mean that different municipalities share their data, but at the same time could be also, let's say, an organization um that uh also has uh its own

data space.

ah but then it has to follow the same regulations um and so I'm thinking that it will not be easy like for someone let's say a small organization maybe ah to be able to respect the

same

So I'm wondering if this...

Because the question that I had is if data spaces should be something at the, let's say, institutional level or like more bottom-up.

uh

I guess the ideal would be that it should be both.

um I think we need to have the bottom-up approach.

If we don't have civil society organizations or citizens using anything that's democratic, data space or something else, then I guess there is no democracy.

Democracy is first the citizens, I think.

um So obviously we need to have...

uh

both organizations and applications, things that make that democracy, data space accessible to people.

But eventually we also need institutional support.

So the obvious reason in the first stage is that we need investment.

We need to invest in this infrastructure because it's not made of thin air.

so, well.

The question is who should invest in democracy?

guess it's a, it can be subject for another debate we can have for a very long time.

But yeah, my feeling is that public institutions should be investing in democracy and so they should be supporting this.

But of course, there's also then the question of once this democracy space exists and is made of lots of contributions, then how do we

uh integrate that with the work of institutions.

So um I think eventually the European Commission should be using um this data space.

uh It would save a lot of time, I think, for the policy officers who today do a lot of effort connecting to stakeholders, who today are mostly what we call the Brussels bubble,

which means

the European Association of NaNaNa and the European Federation of NaNaNa.

But these federations actually have a lot of people on the ground and these people is kind of far from Brussels.

So this data space could enable, create this link between institutions and the real people.

And so I think the institutions would have a lot to gain from such a data space.

And so, yeah, I guess we need both eventually.

Yeah, absolutely.

Do you have an idea about...

Let's say that in the next future institutions will use data spaces and also citizens, I don't know, different kinds of data spaces, but maybe all related to democracy.

um How do you imagine the future?

How the society could work?

I think it's kind of easy to do this exercise because, I mean, there's a lot of amazing digital tools today.

We do a lot of amazing things.

You have tools that enable you to analyze lots of data to tell you these are the best ideas that everyone supports.

These are the ideas that not everyone supports.

And so you can very easily build

um create policies out of data.

uh You have collaborative tools where people can build together a new uh regulation text or something.

The diversity of what exists as tools is amazing.

The problem is that these tools are not connecting to

are not connected to the real data.

So they're basically very small tools that no one uses or few people uses, depending on the tools.

uh And it's kind of disconnected from the actual uh legislative work.

And so what I would imagine is a world where we just connect the two, we connect the dots.

And uh that uh creates a world where you can have

on a certain subject.

um You know, what I feel when I look at the state of our current democracies is that whatever the very complex subject you take, if you dig deep enough, people have the

answers.

mean, there are experts who work on the thing and they have solutions.

The solutions are in the table.

The problem is not that we don't have the solution.

The problem is how to make those solutions

become a decision, a collective decision.

And I think that's something we can create with the data space because we can create the link between the discussions you have on social media and the reports and the complex

solutions that are out there and the political decision.

We need to connect all of this.

And I think the tools exist.

What we need is to connect these tools to the data, to the discussions, to the debate, to the reports, to...

the institution and so on.

I'm also very excited about data spaces.

I was thinking, um because data spaces, we said the three layers, you mentioned also interoperability, and I see it very connected with standards and finding, let's say, a

common language between...

uh

as you say, access control layer or interoperability.

yeah, I was thinking also like about the Fediverse, that I mean, it's different, it's not a space, but at the same time, I think it shares some similarities.

uh

mean, probably some people can get pissed if I say that, but to me, the Fediverse is a data space.

I consider the Fediverse a data space because I have a very broad definition of what a data space is.

thing, you will hear lots of definitions of a data space, to me, is a data space.

We send email, the emails are shared, there's a common protocol, I call that a data space.

So the Fediverse is a data space.

It's a very interesting way to...

create social media in a data space way and to actually see what it means when it's not one big uh multinational corporation that controls all the interactions between everybody

on social media.

So I guess the data space is just applying the same logic to all digital interactions on the

And I mean, I was thinking also about the access control layer.

So let's say that we consider email as a data space.

So basically with email, I'm able to send you an email or to receive an email.

I'm not able, let's say, to see your activity.

I don't know, like, if you sent email about Dataspaces today or you sent email about, I don't know, something else.

uh So this access control layer could be also this, being able to share some data also.

I'm thinking that with AI it would be possible maybe to share something about the context without sharing everything.

Absolutely, yeah, yeah.

So email actually is not a good example in this case because in emails you only push data, you never pull the data.

Where in the real world a lot of apps access the data where it is.

Anyway, um but yeah, the...

The idea of access control is really to be able to say in a very precise way the conditions under which you accept that your data can be accessed.

So there's a lot of variety in how this should be done.

I can say this data is only for Alessandro and you have to prove that you're Alessandro.

And if you do, then you access the data.

uh I can always also say, like I said, it's only for European companies.

Or it's only if you can prove or if you can certify that you will destroy all copy of the data after 24 hours.

There's a lot of different um conditions that you can define.

And these conditions can be under certain condition uh enforced so that you can trust that they will be respected.

Regarding identity, I'm thinking, if we think about uh also email addresses, I I don't have to uplisher my identity.

mean, sometimes there is with the phone number or something else, you're proving your identity or connecting it with your phone identity.

But also the third-everse at this moment doesn't have an I mean, you have an identity because you create an identity on a certain server, but you can also have, let's say,

thousands of different identities.

And so I wonder, like...

Because it's a very sensible topic, the things...

And so I was thinking also, let's say...

Because from a...

Institutional point of view like data spaces.

I mean, it's easy to uh connect identity with citizens uh But in a sort of let's say bottom up data space how this can be done

mean, there's no data spaces don't, you there's just a framework and which can do a lot of different things.

And both are possible.

If an institution wants to say, can participate in my, uh in my consultation, but you have to state your identity because we don't want people to just come randomly, which, which,

you know, is legitimate, then it's possible to require to have

proven identity before uh participating in a consultation.

But at the same time, if uh you want to have an open consultation where people can be anonymous or with pseudonym, it's also possible.

I guess it's the sovereignty of people who organize the debate to decide what are the rules in that debate.

And all of that can be connected.

um

You can have a civil society organization organizing an anonymous debate for reasons we can totally understand, where people don't want to be able to speak freely without fearing

uh consequences.

And then this civil society can make a synthesis of it and then participate in public debate with a uh certification of who they are.

So, you know, both are compatible, guess, and complementary.

I just realized this is starting blocks.

What does it blocks?

um Okay, that's a total different subject, but basically at Starting Blocks, what we do in the data space ecosystem is to work on what I call the last mile interaction.

We really focus not on the infrastructure of the data space, but really on how you as a user will be able to join the data space.

So we work on apps, we work on AI, we work on...

how to make this data space, I mean, you don't even need to know what a data space is as a user.

You should not know what a data space is as a user.

You should have an app on your phone with buttons, and you want to click on the button, and whatever you want to happen happens.

um So that's what we focus on.

And we do that with modularity, uh because one consequence of data spaces is that we can have lots of different apps.

Your app can be different from mine.

And so we...

of interest in reusing in an open source way.

ah If I build an app and you want an app that's slightly different, you can reuse my app.

And so the modular approach makes sense because you can remove a module uh from my app and add another module that fits your needs better.

um so we have a technology that enables to build interfaces this way.

uh those modules are what we call blocks.

Okay, because I taught block and I taught about blockchains.

Okay, it's not related.

Because also that was...

um I remember there are some projects related to, let's say, where data is shared, I don't know, in a blockchain, and then, I don't know, you give access to, um let's say, to a

certain doctor.

So the doctor has all the documentation about yourself, but the documentation is encrypted and so on.

Yeah, I mean, you know, the whole idea of blockchain is to have a public ledger of data.

So I'm always, you know, I always find weird to use blockchain for sensitive data.

In another, in very similar use case, you had interrupt.

I don't know if you heard of solid.

Solid was a W3C initiative led by uh Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the web.

and he started this company with John Bruce named Interrupt.

And one of the projects that they've been working on that was very interesting was this Manchester project where basically they deployed what they called uh pods, I think now

they call it data wallets for citizens, where you have basically all your health data under your control.

And instead of having your health data scattered uh all over the place, um you have...

your health data and you share your health data with whatever practitioner you work with.

And that doesn't require a very um complex and energy intensive um infrastructure such as blockchain.

It's a basic web server somewhere, but I guess it covers the same needs.

And that's very, I call that a data space as well.

And I was thinking, um let's say that a democratic data space, a data space about democracy will be created and interoperability will uh work.

That I think that is something absolutely possible and useful.

um

and then I forgot the question.

So, it happens.

But by the way, I'll ask you something about your background and then the question will come back.

m Yeah, if you'd like to share something about your background.

Personal, yeah.

sorry.

um So, me personally, Sylvain, who I am.

That's what you want to know.

No, like, where you...

I mean, what you study, what you worked on before Dataspaces...

So I grew up in France.

I'm French.

That hasn't been said.

And StartingBlox is in Paris, actually.

um Yeah.

I've been an entrepreneur for uh 15 years now.

And I've started quite a few different businesses.

With Alex, who is also the co-founder of StartingBlox, we've funded Happy Dev.

which has been the biggest network of freelancers um in Europe, I think, as far as I know, at the time.

I've always worked on...

how digitalization can bring collective intelligence.

That's really what uh I want to work with.

So that has taken a lot of different aspects over time.

um gathering freelancers in a new kind of organization was one of them.

I've also worked on corporatism, I've also worked on horizontal management or open source business models.

These are lot of different things, but the idea is always the same, how the web actually transforms our organizations.

And when we were at Happy Dev, we grew the network and at some point, the digital tools, we reached something like 700 people at some point.

At that stage, the digital tools were obviously key in the interactions in the network.

And so we were facing a point where we were becoming a Uber of freelancers, if you want, which is not what we wanted.

So we decided to decentralize the thing.

And so we needed decentralized tools at the same time.

And so that's why we started to work on these technologies.

And that's what led to the creation of starting blocks afterwards.

Okay, I have my question back.

So, data space is something that is needed and then what else is needed?

Let's say...

Yeah, the technology is never magic, know, putting a technology is never enough.

I think that the absence of technology can be a blocker and I think the absence of interoperability in digital tools today is a blocker for a digital democracy.

So that's why I'm working on this.

But obviously, if we have the technology, then we need people to use it.

And I think it requires...

I'm going to say new kinds of organizations, um which, I mean, you know, it's what we can call civil society organizations, I guess, but uh more digitalized.

I guess, you know, there's already a lot of networks online that organize, uh but their organization online is often disconnected from the rest of online democracy.

So we need to have these kinds of organizations that actually uh

take over this data space and use it and use it to, you know, with a certain, with a clear political goal.

um The data space should be neutral politically, but uh organizations using this data space, well, should not, I mean, they're, have, they should be defending whatever they

want to defend.

And I think, I guess democracy is about having the discussions between

you people who disagree and I guess that's what democracy is about.

Yes, sometimes we are not used to disagree.

Yes, I guess we kind of lost this with social media.

And I guess, you know, I really feel like we think that ah people who don't think like us are assholes or dumb people.

You know, how can they not understand that I'm right, you basically.

But I think if we want, if we care about democracy, you know, I guess it's a uh very deep question we have at the moment at the geopolitical level.

Do we think democracy is important?

Do we think it's an efficient system?

Because if it's not, it's going to disappear.

That's basically what it is about today.

And if we think it's efficient and if we think it's good and we should take care of it, then we should learn to listen to people who disagree with us and apprehend the fact that

from their point of view, there's some rightfulness in what they say.

uh

And the true, ah the good decision is not what you think.

The good decision is a compromise between what you think and what I think.

And I think it's very hard today.

ah We have social media where we like to yell.

We feel so much uh touched by when we see someone who claims something.

A lot of situations are very hard.

So we feel a lot of emotion for that.

people for those people.

So we hang on to an idea very strongly, not necessarily seeing that there's another face to the problem.

And we need to see all the faces together.

It's complex.

We need to talk.

We need to listen.

And we need to build solutions little by little.

And I think that we have institutions that used to do that quite well.

kind of like, I think online democracy kind of end in just that.

threatens that behavior at the moment.

And that's why we need to find a way to recreate that in the digital world as well so that we can become a digital democracy ah for good.

Yeah, absolutely.

But I was also thinking, on one side...

um I mean, many times I ask this question to guess, why do you think that people do not participate in the political life?

Because I see technology as something very useful and I...

I'm very excited about data space and interoperability and everything that can also because I think it can be useful also to let's say avoid geopolitical issues.

But yeah, on some way we could have had like an

I mean, also without technology, I mean, people could participate and so on, that it would be way more complex than with technology.

em I mean, the question is, why do you think that some people are interested in the political life and some people are not?

uh And also why some people are sensible to horizontality and like...

uh

while other people do not care.

Like I have some friends that say, if I have a person that decide for me, I'm happy.

And I'm like, okay.

Yeah, well, I guess these people won't be happy when that person decides something they disagree with.

You you're happy when someone decides as long as they decide what you want.

um And I think it's not true that people are not involved politically.

I think if you go on TikTok and Instagram, you will see that people are very much involved.

people, there's a lot of people saying things on social media.

um What they, you know...

what they're not engaged in is the institutions.

And I think, yeah, I think that sums up the problem.

We need to create the link between my social media way.

I want to be heard.

I want to express my life is hard.

I want to say it and I want people to listen to it.

And on the other side, you have an institution that feels completely disconnected from this problem with all this political.

actions where, you know, these political mechanisms where people have strategies and so they build their strategies on how to get power in the next elections, which is completely

disconnected from my problems, my daily problems.

And so we, guess we need to somehow disconnect the political decision and decision making from elections and connect it more with social media or wherever the people can express

themselves.

I think that's one of the ways to improve that.

once again, I think that's why we need a data space.

And I really like the idea of considering also big tech uh social networks as something where debate happen.

Then, okay, debate happen but with some logics that are not maybe healthy to the debate.

also because of the nature of them.

you can have, mean, a social media is one thing, an algorithm designed by a company for the profit is something else, and having a social media doesn't mean having these

algorithms.

So there's also a question of regulating those algorithms, decentralizing the social network.

that's a, you can see.

It's of the democracy space if you want.

guess it's another work.

We're not working on this right now.

yeah, I I don't think you can talk about democracy if you don't care about social media.

That doesn't make sense to me.

Absolutely.

And I have some sort of specific question.

Do you think that it would be possible also to connect, let's say, mainstream social network also to a data space because people are on Facebook, X and so on?

And so I totally agree about the fact that about going where the people are because the civic tech software otherwise are mostly empty.

I think there's two aspects.

It's kind of easy to connect in a one-way direction, because they have APIs.

They allow you to post things.

So we can create a sudden link.

But of course, that doesn't change their algorithms and their control over the social network.

And I think there's another problem, which is the same problem that Data Space are trying to solve.

And that's what you said about the Fediverse.

Another problem, which is the total control of a few companies over all the social interactions online between people.

So I think the only answer to that is regulation.

The European Union has started to put on some regulation uh going towards this.

My personal feeling is that...

uh

If people cannot choose the algorithms uh of the media they're then the media should be considered as editor and not uh hosting providers.

And they should be responsible of all the content.

If you don't want to be responsible of the content that's published on your platform, then you should open your algorithms and let people decide on the algorithms.

Because otherwise, you're making a decision of who sees what.

And I think that makes you responsible of the content.

Well, that's a personal opinion and I guess, you know, we, but maybe if we had a uh more fluid democracy, these kind of ideas could be discussed better and maybe, you know, it's

being implemented.

Yeah, let's hope.

And as a last question, like if you have a message for the people that are working in the civic tech space, political tech, whatever like...

Yeah, well, I guess uh thank you because, I mean, it's amazing all the diversity of tools and the richness of everything that exists in the civic tech world.

um And it's so frustrating to see that we spend so much time on Instagram and so little on those tools.

And I understand why we do that.

ah so, yeah, your tools have a lot of value.

You know, start competing for audience between each other.

Come together, join a data space, put your tools in common so that we can build something bigger together.

Thank you a lot, Sylvain.

If you have anything else to add.

No, yeah, I mean, if people are interested, they can reach out.

We're trying to build things, build different use cases.

We're looking for organizations who want to experiment.

We're looking for uh funding to move on with these experiments.

So yeah, please reach out if you're interested, you want to experiment as well.

Thank you again and...

Thank you.