Designers and corporate managers will soon join, once the technology demonstrates its effectiveness and first product ideas prove viable. Only after the maturing technology’s impression has turn out to be tangible, will regulators, residents, and politicians enter the discussion. I argue that –in the case of emerging and potentially disruptive technologies– these final interventions come too late. While the promise of social media is compelling, we made two cardinal mistakes. First, we accepted proprietary platforms operated by business enterprises. Second, we forgot that the aim of business is profit, not philanthropy.

Leaders representing a quantity of French government ministries participated …