Technology 8 | unobtrusive lucidity

Forget Me Not…

I do really stupid things sometimes.

I mean, I suppose that as poor decision making goes, mine are relatively minor. Still, I have those few things in my past that I deeply regret, just as we all do. My poor decisions, though, aren’t confined to the past. Take the recent holiday weekend, for example. We decided to have a family trip to the beach, and it was our daughter’s first experience with the ocean. I forgot to take any photos. That’s something that I regret. There’s something about the day that I regret worse, though. Our daughter was having great fun throwing sand everywhere. When my attention lapsed for a moment, she bombarded Karen with sand, ruining her lunch as she was unpacking it. In a moment of frustration with myself for not watching her closely enough, I snatched the toy shovel from our daughter’s hand. She cried, looking at me hurt, not understanding. I apologized and snuggled her, and her sadness had passed a few seconds later. Still, I hope that, later in life, she doesn’t remember that incident. I hope that she doesn’t remember my raising my voice in frustration with her normal 2-year-old behaviors, either. And, even while I tell myself that, I recall how impressed I am with her memory and ability to articulate things, and I am deeply afraid that she will.

I want my poor judgement to be forgotten.

Sort of like how my car insurance chose to forget my last speeding citation. I know that I made a mistake, and I’m looking for the chance to move forward from that.

Anything similar spring to mind for you? I imagine so.

This is the sort of thing that I think is at stake as we discuss the right to be forgotten in our online world. It is a relatively simple matter of choice for one human being to forgive the wrongs of another. It is more difficult for our legal system to do so, as it is based on punishment instead of rehabilitation. It is impossible, however, for any of us to truly forget the wrongs that someone has done, or for them to forget ours, because anything that has ever been known to more than a trusted confidant (and perhaps even then) can be found on the Internet. A record can be pieced together from some combination of sources, and those records can be found by anyone with enough keystrokes and motivation for research.

For every mistake that we’ve made, everything that we long to be forgiven or hope never sees the light of day, there is a Lisbeth Salander who is motivated and capable of discovering the information and using it to potentially harmful results.

I think that information should be able to be erased, at least where it directly involves people, because people are more than the sum of their choices. People make the decision to move forward and become someone better every day, and many do so successfully. Given the right circumstances, we would all welcome the chance for a fresh start. This is most difficult to do, however, if nothing that we’ve done can ever be forgotten.

In short, we all long for forgiveness from something. If, however, we remove our collective ability to forget, are we inhibiting our ability to forgive each other, as well? Because forgiveness is a critical part of the human experience, and it is often at odds with the information structure that we have put in place around us.

A world in which we are inhibited from forgiving is a poor world in which to live. I think that, for the sake of everyone, some information should be considered deletable from the public eye. Does this fly in the face of what the Internet is, of the great cultural resource and equalizer that it is? Can anything be applied as a universal standard, including our knowledge as a human race? An interesting conundrum we face as we charge forward to our future, isn’t it?

We’re Known by our Toys

THIS JUST IN: our society defines itself by its technology.

I know, I know. That’s a shocking statement, but let’s move quickly to acceptance, shall we? Humanity is beginning to truly realize its essence when we are creating, and so we create and build things, and use those things to make our lives easier, and thus we are very proud of those things. It’s the beginning of a theology of technology, and it’s a very natural…and, at it’s core, I’d say it’s a very good…inclination.

At first blush, though, those of us who don’t like to succumb to trendy things might see it as a mindless, materialistic “keeping up with the Jonses.” We might push back a bit (I remember when using a Mac or an iPhone was different, instead of trendy), perhaps by refusing to use what we prefer if it becomes too popular with everyone else (well, I still use my iPhone, but a lot of my colleagues are Android users…).

It’s just that sort of thing, though, that leads to some interesting statements about ourselves. When e-readers were becoming all the rage, I read an article (somewhere…the location escapes me at the moment) that humorously discussed how the Kindle would remove the status of literary snob. After all, no one could tell that it was A Tale of Two Cities that you were reading on the subway, only that you were carrying a spiffy little device.

Two jobs or so ago, I had a desk between two of my colleagues. The guy on my left used a PC laptop and carried an Android phone. I was in the middle with my all-Apple gear. The girl on my right was the most diversified…she used a PC laptop, an Android phone, and an iPad. Maybe I’m just geeky enough to notice something like that, but I think that it says something about us, something about the new way that we assess each others’ personalities.

Because we’re now not just reading A Tale of Two Cities on the subway with an e-reader. We could be using a Nook instead of a Kindle, or any number of tablets. Instead of noticing the book cover, we notice someone’s device preferences (which is a sad commentary on an increasingly illiterate society, but I digress).

Sometimes, especially among the geekier circles in which I make a living, I’ll hear people argue over things that I thought weren’t really things that we debate any longer. Mac or PC, iOS or Android. I’ve actually heard people argue over what’s better, as though there were some personality flaw involved with someone choosing to still carry a Blackberry.

I think, though, that the reason is because we’re looking for a way to stand out, to identify ourselves to others in a society (and especially in a workforce) that prizes homogeny and doing what’s popular. The thing with the diversity in the types of innovations that we create in our striving to fully realize our humanity is that they are created by different personality types, with different personality types in mind. Someone who uses an Android phone wants a completely different experience than I want. I want a totally different experience by reading on a Nook than someone else would expect with a Kindle. The issue is both the device and what the device accesses, as well as how it accesses it. Visual aesthetics are different. Different individuals are more concrete or abstract than others, and need a different sort of information structure to navigate the web that connects us to the world (a web that increasingly becomes a necessity).

So, as much as I want to tell you how much my Mac is better than your PC, there is no right or wrong answer here. What is present is an opportunity to learn about the person sitting next to you, to begin to understand how they think. That leads to understanding how they see the world. And that leads to understanding how we are more alike than different.

Which is just possibly how a theology of technology may begin.

Who said collecting expensive toys was a bad thing?

Wait? Where Was I?

I’ve heard people ask…reputable people, and in far too many places to link to here…why American authors aren’t writing novels of the calibre that we’ve seen in “classic” literature. Many think that the quality of fiction today just can’t compare to the great writers of our history. I push back on this in a few ways. While I don’t argue that there is an objective standard for good writing (or any other art form), I think that there’s also something to be said for subjective tastes. Though I can’t fathom why, there are a lot of you out there that don’t like science fiction or comic books, and may have difficulty appreciating even the best-written of the genre. That’s a matter of taste. There are still science fiction authors that one would objectively recognize a excellent writers.

The complaints that I list above, though, aren’t typically about so-called “genre” fiction, but rather literary fiction. They also tend to be made…and this is the second place in which I push back…by ivory tower elitists. I’ve certainly been accused of being a bit elitist at times, but literature, just like any art, is there for everyone to appreciate, engage, and discuss, regardless of vocation or educational standing. Sometimes analysis and debate of literature can cause us to miss the point of a wonderful story, and, again, we can say the same for any medium of creative expression.

I have to agree, though, that it’s more difficult to generate quality work of any sort today. And, while art should be there for everyone to engage, that assumes that everyone has the attention span with which to engage it. The issue in both of these statements is the same: we’re so invasively and so easily distracted by things that draw us away from our creative efforts. Fellow-blogger and author Michelle Argyle wrote about something similar just today, when she discussed how wearying it can be to put so much of yourself out there for the world to see.

Odd how we feel that we have the right to dissect our culture’s celebrities, while using social media platforms that can potentially make any of us small celebrities in our circles of influence.

A lot of others have written about this, as well. Nicholas Carr has written about the phenomenon of how the Internet’s structure re-wires our brains in a 2008 article in the Atlantic that received a lot of traction, and also in a new book that I haven’t read, but that looks fascinating, The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains. I’m familiar with different studies that indicate how difficult it is to regain focus on an important task following a single distraction (is that my phone dinging?), and how this negatively impacts productivity in a corporate environment.

How much more so in the creative process, which requires sustained, focused attention to the art which is so lovingly being crafted?

Or, the book that we find progressively more difficult to read? The painting that we can’t sit still long enough to to contemplate? The child with whom we struggle to provide our full attention because of the nagging tasks competing for us within easy arm’s reach?

In a more comedic way, this says it well. We’re losing a part of our humanity as we lose our focus:

Slowly Adapting

I remember this local store in my hometown that my parents used to visit nearly every week in some capacity or other. I couldn’t tell you what the store sold specifically. In my memory, perceptually distorted now (way) more than twenty years later, the shop seemed like perhaps an antique store, or a place similarly cluttered. I was never interested in what they sold in the front. When we visited, I went to the back, where there were four walls that were bookshelves, floor to ceiling, of used books. There was a hush that fell when you walked into the back of that store, as though the words, thoughts and ideas contained within those thousands of pages absorbed the stress of the outside world. I loved going there. My love of bookstores began at an early age, and have stayed with me since.

Today, I still love visiting used bookstores. I have other motivators now, as well…namely, that I would much prefer to give my business to a local establishment. This is the same reason that I make every effort to buy my comic books from local shops, as well, even though I find reading them digitally to be quite addictive.

This weekend, I watched our daughter run and squeal excitedly through the children’s section of our local library. I am thrilled that she is thrilled around books. She brings them to us, asks to sit on Daddy’s lap and have a book read to her. I want her to fall more and more in love with books every day.

The reason that I’m excited by new media is that it makes possible the discovery of great art, important ideas and critical information to those who quite possibly would not have had this access in the beginning. Yet, this leaves me torn at times. I was exploring our same library’s ebook offerings this weekend, and found them sorely disappointing. When I decide to buy a new book, the first place I go is to my Nook. I would rather download and click than turn pages. I think that it is wonderful to have access to great books in this way. And, all the while, I’m cognizant that we may be losing something important in the transition. In the interest of balance, I try to do things like visit used book stores regularly.

Still, this passing concern re-surfaced over the weekend when I read this article about the controversy over the first sale doctrine. This court case is fascinating as it depicts how our legal system struggles to keep pace with technological innovations. We’re potentially at risk of legal action with the most innocent and natural usages of our technology, it would seem, and even those who prefer to purchase our media legally aren’t safe.

Of course, this brings us around to the issue of big businesses controlling artistic expression in the name of profit, as well, but that is a topic for at least one of its own posts.

One of two things needs to happen: either our legal system needs to keep pace, or our innovation must slow. I don’t want innovation to slow, for exactly the benefits that I mentioned earlier. And, I don’t think that it will. I know that I want our daughter to enjoy the same freedom of passing books and music that she loves between friends and family as I did in my childhood. I want that to be even easier for her than it was for me, and I don’t want legal tripwires to prevent that from being a part of her life, or to limit it in her life.

I think that it might, though, if we don’t learn to speed this process up a bit.

Photo Attribution: JvL under Creative Commons

Backward and Forward

I was a sophomore in high school when America entered yet another war, and I remember sitting in the back of my parents’ car on the way to a church service and hearing on the radio that what had become known as Operation Desert Storm was in full swing. We went home that evening, and I turned on the television to see coverage of what was transpiring on the other side of the world. I had never been cognizant of my country being at war before, and I felt all of the anxieties and emotions that went with it. I didn’t know where to turn as news channels were concerned, and I remember settling on CNN, simply because that was the one that I could think of and find first.

The network sort of stuck with me. I remember how the programming changed through the years, as I watched it nearly every morning, especially after I finished college. I don’t watch much live news programming any more, as cable is a relic of a bygone age in our household. Still, CNN remains a primary source from which I get the headlines, usually via phone or tablet somewhere between breakfast and the end of the morning commute. Taking the time to watch a program in the morning really isn’t so much a luxury that I have any more.

It’s interesting to reflect on how my news watching has changed over the years. I transitioned from cable, to podcasts, to streaming live coverage, to reading it within a mobile application. The progression has seemed so natural that I really haven’t even thought about it.

Until the most recent update to CNN’s iPad app, though, which now launches with the sound byte of James Earl Jones proclaiming, “This…is CNN”, apparently a network-wide return to its roots. Hearing it took me back to random evenings in high school sitting in front of the television. There was a segue from this into a general memory of spending weekday evenings watching television with my parents, and the feeling of safety and family that such a memory invokes.

Now, I’m more than aware of the studies linking regular television viewing to degradation in family communication…we haven’t let our daughter watch television until nearly the age of two. The memories of doing so with my parents, though, remain a wonderful recollection for me today.

I wonder if our daughter will experience anything similar, as watching broadcast programming is such an increasing rarity. I don’t think that there’s anything missing in that experience, per se, but I am curious as to what events that Karen and I consider commonplace will evolve and form wonderful memories for our daughter…and maybe that she’ll even nostalgically blog about later in life at some point. That will be beautiful news to me.