I found the quote below in the Washington Post* about last week's software outage and see it as emblematic of many other systems, including the power grid, transportation, telecommunications, etc. You can also extend this to municipal services like garbage collection, policing, etc. Everyone wants reliable services, but how do we get people to pay for them?
"This is global capitalism at work, and it's a fundamental economic effect of the internet we've built," said Bruce Schneier, a security technologist and fellow at Harvard University's Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society. "We have a very brittle system where companies are rewarded for maximum profitability. And how do you do that? With monopolization, with having no inefficiencies, with running lean - and the thing about that is that it's really great as long as it works. But when it fails, it fails badly."
*) Largest IT outage in history expected to barely register in the economy by By Abha Bhattarai and Rachel Siegel
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Mitch Winkler P.E.(inactive), M.ASCE
Houston, TX
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