 |
| David Gelernter in his office at Yale. |
David Gelernter, the man who survived the Unabomber, published "The Second Coming – A Manifesto" in 1999. The manifesto listed 58 points of his predictions and thoughts about the future of technology in the 21st century.
Two points under the subtitle, From the Prim Pristine Net To the Omnipresent Swarm, stood out to me:
9. The computing future is based on "cyberbodies" – self-contained, neatly-orders, beautifully laid-out collections of information, like immaculate giant gardens. 10. You will walk up to any "tuner" (a computer at home, work, or the supermarket, or a TV, a telephone, any electronic device) and slip in a "calling card," which identifies a cyberbody. The tuner tunes it in. The cyberbody arrives and settles in like a bluebird perching on a branch.
Gelernter's "cyberbodies" and "tuners" have come to fruition as Big Data and our phones.
The field of Data Science is exploding, and data collection has become a major ethical, political, and social issue; however, our data is not an "immaculate giant garden" as Gelernter theorized. Our data is essentially kept in a shady warehouse in the middle of nowhere.
 |
| "Helpful" Apps |
Our phones have become the means of connecting ourselves to the digital world. The "calling card" is the act of installing and using numerous apps for different brands, games, social media, and other uses.
Once they're on our phone, they can store data useful and easy to access for us, but the data is, in turn, used by them to sell all the data we have voluntarily handed over.
Moreover, our phones, even more so than Big Data, have reached what James Moor would call the "power stage," where the technology has become intertwined into our lives so much, and it can be used to build upon other technology.
Despite the technology reaching this stage, consumers rarely consider the issues arising from data collection because of the convenience it provides. I don't think of it all that much despite being fully aware I'm the product being sold.
What is there to do? Governments move too slowly, and the process of removing my digital footprint is by far too tedious.
It's just easier not to care – they know more about me than I do.
This is a well-written post, and I think you engaged with the reading thoughtfully. One suggestion I have is you keep mentioning "Big Data," but it's unclear what this term really means. Not everyone in your audience may understand what "Big Data" is so I think it would help if you defined this term! This could help eliminate any ambiguity and strengthen your argument.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed your thoughts on how our data is owned by companies and stored in stacks in some server room. I believe it would be interesting to provide examples of apps that collect our data and in which ways they use the data when you referred to how we download multitude of apps that collect our data. This post is insightful and well written. I find myself thinking about what specific data is collected and how do companies trade and sell our digital footprint.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your post. When I read that quote by Gelernter, I also thought that we were living in that prediction. I was associating our Google/Apple/Facebook accounts as the calling card, since they allow us to have the same online identity no matter what device your on. I did not think about Big Data, however, and I think that it is a scary fact of our reality. Your last sentence is spot on- I don't think that enough people care enough about it.
ReplyDeleteInteresting post. I like your use of the first person point of view. It makes it really easy to loop me in as the reader and also as a participant in this type of future. I thought your analysis of the "immaculate giant garden" could use a bit more thought and explanation. Do you think the Gelenter was literally referring to the storing of the data?
ReplyDelete