The Truman Show Online
Or: Digital Lessons From Hollow Man. Do you know these movies? I sure do hope so, as they're both not only wildly entertaining, in their own distinctive ways, but also because I'm going to use them to say something about our online digital lives.
Image by Book Catalog - source: Flickr
In The Truman Show our protagonist, the lovable Truman Burbank, finds himself trapped in an artificial life; during the film he slowly discovers that all aspects of his life are being controlled, and that he's the unknowing star of a very popular reality show. He gets little hints that not all is dandy, and discovers, the hard way, that he's not allowed to leave the movie set. In the end he manages to escape this little artificial bubble and even has a brief conversation with the creator of the show who "adopted" little Truman as a baby and placed him in his own little Utopian life. This film addresses a lot of moral and social questions and symbolizes the human wish for autonomy and free choice, among other things.
In Hollow Man the main character, played by Kevin Bacon, volunteers to be the subject of a scientific experiment, and becomes invisible as a result. Instead of being terrified by the prospect of always having to wear a mask to not freak people out by letting them see a faceless coat walking by, he gradually learns about the many benefits this invisibility gives him; he can spy on anyone whenever he feels like it, as long as he doesn't wear any clothes. And not wearing any clothes isn't a problem, because hey, no one can see him anyway. As the film progresses we, the audience, are witness to the evil that this real life anonymity awakes in him. What you can get away with when no one knows it was you who has done it...
Do you see where this is going? I bet you do. In our daily interactions on the online platforms provided to us to share our opinions, wins, losses, joys and sorrows, we are providing companies with massive amounts of personal data, which they use to create digital avatars, little digitized mini-me's, which are then sold to the highest bidder. Online, we're all Truman, captured in our own personal information-bubble, courtesy of Google, GMail, Amazon, Facebook and the likes. Income is for a large part generated through "clicks", so all the algorithms running these online apps are built on "clickability" of content, and just as in traditional media, the number one rule is "if it bleeds it leads"; these companies, through their algorithms not only place us in our bubbles, they benefit by creating strongly opposing bubbles, as outrage and anger create the kind of sensationalism you want for "successful" content.
Image by Blogtrepreneur - source: Flickr
And that's where the Hollow Man inside all of us comes into play; the very much cultivated digital tribalism that results from us being trapped in opposing information-bubbles, is further enhanced and accentuated by the freedom we gain from being nameless and faceless online... I've recently listened to a discussion on on Sam Harris' podcast with Roger McNamee. Roger has a unique perspective on Facebook and it's creator, Mark Zuckerberg, as he has been his adviser from 2006, when Facebook was just two years old, until 2009. In this discussion he explains just how much our lifes are being controlled by not only Facebook, but Google, YouTube, Microsoft, Amazon, Instagram and Twitter. Essentially he explains how the business-model of these giants are in large part responsible for much of the polarization we now see online between all sorts of different social, economic and philosophical discussions.
It's a funny thing when you think about it. We all know that when I search for something in Google, I get wildly different search results than you, dear reader, as these results are based on our personal browsing histories, our own personal preferences and biases. The answer to all questions is "ah, just google it". This means there are no answers. Imagine this mechanism extended into something like Wikipedia, that I get a personally tailored explanation of whatever I'm looking for... Democracy. Think about democracy and what devastating effects this development already has; since Obama, a lot of campaigning is done online, with Facebook and google and twitter. Could it be that the polarizing effects of their click-based business-model is partially responsible for the extreme candidates we see gaining momentum in the entire western hemisphere? Stuff to think about methinks. The discussion between Sam Harris and Roger McNamee is as good a place as any to start the pondering:
Making Sense with Sam Harris #152 - The Trouble with Facebook (with Roger McNamee)
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