Category: Information

Algorithm and Blues: The Tyranny of the Coming Smart-Tech Utopia. Why optimizing the world for efficiency, productivity and happiness is bad for humanity.

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Brett Frischmann is the Charles Widger Endowed University Professor in Law, Business and Economics, Villanova University. His most relevant book to his thoughts below is Re-Engineering Humanity (Cambridge University Press 2018).

This post is based on an article that appeared in Scientific American (July 2018).

Imagine a world governed by smart technologies engineered to achieve three distinct yet interrelated normative ends: optimized transactional efficiency, resource productivity and human happiness. We could have congestion-free roads—no stop and go, no road rage! Instantaneous, personalized entertainment—no need to search or browse! Successful social interactions—no misunderstanding or missed cues! No surprise ailments, no failures, no missed opportunities! Heck, no surprises of any kind! There are so many imperfections in our world that smart technology could fix.

We do not live in such a world, but the technologies required for it to exist are already being rapidly developed and deployed. Take, for example, the Internet of Things (IoT)—big data, sensors, algorithms, artificial intelligence and various other related technologies. Their promoters make seductive promises. Supposedly, smart phones, grids, cars, homes, clothing and so on will make our lives easier, better, happier.

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I Do Not Want Mark’s Metaverse

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[WE WILL PUBLISH YOUR MOST THOUGHTFUL RESPONSES. Send to ronbaecker@gmail.com, 300-1000 words, include hyperlinks.] 

In a blog posted two days ago, I highlighted phrases and sentences from Mark Zuckerberg’s recent keynote speech sketching his vision of Meta’s intended metaverse. Here are thoughts triggered by his words: 

1. “ you’re going to be able to do almost anything you can imagine … “This isn’t about spending more time on screens … [include] communities whose perspectives have often been overlooked … consider everyone …” 

No, Mark, be honest. This is about getting more people into Meta, and about getting them to spend more time in the metaverse, because that’s the only way you can sustain the growth your shareholders expect, and the only way you can withstand the onslaught of firms like Tiktok that now have greater appeal to the next generation of users. 

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What is Zuckerberg’s Metaverse, and Do We Want It?

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In a recent blog, I suggested that we have finally lost patience with Facebook after new revelations by whistleblower Frances Haugen and the Wall Street Journal. Leaked documents show that FB knows that almost six million VIPs are given special dispensation to violate their content standards; criminals use FB to recruit women, incite violence against ethnic minorities, and support government action against political dissent; Instagram is toxic to many young girls, contributing to poor self-image, mental health, and suicidal thoughts; the firm relaxed its safeguards too soon after the U.S. election, contributing to the January 6 riot; and FB is incapable of suppressing election and vaccine misinformation. 

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A Review of: ‘Digital Dreams Have Become Nightmares: What We Must Do’

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C. Dianne Martin is Emeritus Professor of Computer Science at George Washington University, and Adjunct Professor in the School of Information, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She has been teaching Computers and Society since 1983.

I was delighted to receive email early this year from Prof. Ron Baecker, whose Computers and Society class at the University of Maryland in 1972 made me see that I could productively combine my previous studies in the social sciences and humanities with my new career in information technology. I was therefore eager to read his latest book, Digital Dreams Have Become Nightmares: What We Must Do.

In documenting his personal journey from dreams and exuberant optimism about computer technology to pessimism, nightmares, and fear caused by the emerging consequences of the tech explosion of the past 75 years. Ron has provided a comprehensive historical sweep of the computer revolution. In Part I he chronicles the high hopes of early developers to create technological solutions to disparities in healthcare and education, to increase creativity, collaboration, and community, and to provide greater power and convenience to all.

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A Review of: ‘People Count: Contact-Tracing Apps and Public Health’

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Cybersecurity expert Prof. Susan Landau’s valuable and insightful recent book, People Count: Contact-Tracing Apps and Public Health, stresses that trust in government is essential to making contact tracing work for everyone. 

Contact tracing is a process for identifying, informing, and monitoring people who might have come into contact with a person who has been diagnosed with an infectious disease such as COVID-19.  It starts with a positive test. Public health officials then need to know who that person might have inadvertently infected. This requires tracking down anyone that person had contacted (was “close enough” for “long enough”) recently (14 days in the case of COVID). They can then be informed that they might have been infected and take measures to quarantine and monitor for symptoms. For example, restaurants initiate tracing by recording the name and phone number of one person in each party taking a table in the restaurant. 

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Physically separated, socially connected

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Contributed by Ron Baecker, an Emeritus Professor of Computer Science at the University of Toronto, co-author of The COVID-19 Solutions Guide and author of Computers and Society: Modern Perspectives (OUP, 2019).

My family is widely separated. I live in Canada. My brother-in-law, niece, nephew, and their families are in New Jersey and Pennsylvania; my cousins, their children, and their families are in Argentina, Spain, England, and on both coasts of the USA. Typically, I visit my niece and nephew once or twice a year; I manage a trip to Buenos Aires or Bilbao, Spain, about every 3 years. But not recently. I therefore Facetime with either my nephew or my niece almost every week. We also are about to have our fourth global family Zoom. This started out to celebrate individual birthdays, with great spirit and feeling of bringing the family closer together. The next event will celebrate 3 birthdays — ages 78, 41, and 9 — and a recent birth in the family in London. The 9-year-old birthday event will see us participating in a day-long scavenger hunt. What fun!

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K-12 Education Pods: Problems, Fears and Options

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Contributed Judith A. Langer, who is a Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Education, a researcher who has specialized in language, literacy, and learning, and one of the co-authors of The COVID-19 Solutions Guide.

August and early September of 2020 were extremely difficult times for everyone who had a stake in education: parents, teachers, school administrators and local officials. In June and July, most people hoped school could resume in the ways it always had and this, I think, may have held them back from creating a fully planned “new normal.” Many early scenarios contained some online teaching in the event that in the future schools might need to be shuttered for periods of time, but they were hoping an overall easing of cases would permit in-class instruction. Most models contained scenarios for all in-class, hybrid and fully on-line to cover the unknown range of needs, but many did not. Unexpected spikes in Covid-19 in heretofore low-case regions escalated uncertainty about what the future might hold. Sizable ranges in the intensity of new cases within states and communities pointed to the need for more locally determined options. 

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COVID-19: Computer scientists and CS students can act proactively for good

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Contributed by Ronald Baecker, who is an Emeritus Professor of Computer Science at the University of Toronto, co-author of The COVID-19 Solutions Guide and author of Computers and Society: Modern Perspectives (OUP, 2019).

Readers of my blog will recall what I describe as digital dreams and digital nightmares.

Our world has been enriched by digital technologies used for collaboration, learning, health, politics, and commerce. Digital pioneers imagined giving humanity greater control over the universe; augmenting knowledge and creativity; replacing difficult and dangerous physical labour with robot efforts; improving our life span with computationally supported medicine; supporting free speech with enhanced internet reason and dialogue; and developing innovative, convenient, and ideally safe products and services.  Online apps and resources are proving very valuable, even essential, in the era of COVID-19.

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