California Governor Gavin Newsom called for a “Digital Dividend” in his State of the State address this past week. He didn’t offer specifics, saying only that he is instructing his staff to study the idea. But the point was as clear as the Silicon Valley sky – he wants California citizens to participate in the trillions of dollars of wealth being created by companies from their personal data.
I was caught by surprise by the proposal and Newsom’s use of the term Digital Dividend, but not by the idea itself. I’ve been working on this concept for a decade, and have been recently calling it Universal Basic Data Income – the part of UBI derived from one’s own data. I’m currently working on a startup called UBDI that is trying to prove that people can ethically and sustainably earn hundreds and then thousands of dollars a year from their data (built on the digi.me Private Sharing platform).
I love the concept of a Digital Dividend, and the precedents it evokes such as the oil dividend in Alaska. Gov. Newsom’s proposal is a critical development in this movement. No US political leader of his magnitude, much less the leader of the state with the most wealth creation from personal data, has made such a bold declaration.
I spoke to AdWeek about his proposal this week and why this is different from all the other calls for better privacy laws. The idea was so unexpected that the usual industry advocates like the US Chamber of Commerce and the Internet Association haven’t even responded. I’m not sure they know what to make of the idea. Maybe that’s a good thing. I’d hate to have to explain why people should keep being cut out of their fair share of the mega profits derived from the data they produce.
Shane Green 