In the early days of pre-computing, there was a reference to something called “the digital”–from which this week’s poem takes its title.
If I say to you:
Towering figures from the history of computing, like Claude Shannon and John von Neumann, argue with social scientists like Margaret Mead and her then-husband Gregory Bateson about feedback mechanisms, the concept of information, and something called “the digital.”
The Cybernetic Humanities, Leif Weatherby, on LA Review of Books post, 2017
. . . does that suggest any parallels to today, where we talk about something called algorithms? Or monopolies? Or AI? Maybe, maybe not.
What I find fascinating is how we are so mixed in our opinions about algorithms, AI, and computing & privacy in general. We want, what we want, when we want it. And it would be awesome if our computer figured that out and served it up to us, so all we had to do was push a button, or say “confirm.”
And then we want our computer to know when we don’t want whatever it was we just wanted.
Even better, we want ‘the algorithms’ to give us not only what we want, but what we didn’t even know we wanted, until we saw it there on the computer screen.
And for goodness sake, don’t tell anyone else what we want.
My husband does not need to know I have bought a fourth pair of sandals.
This month. For example. Just saying.
Sometimes we sound like children
I mean, think about this. We say things like “Wal-Mart is killing independent businesses.” Then, we go to Wal-Mart because we can save $1 on a printer cartridge. Or because it is open all night. Because it is the only place near us that carries printer cartridges. Or because, even though it doesn’t carry our printer cartridge, Wal-Mart will order it and then we can go pick it up there, still $1 less, and faster, than anywhere else we can get it.
In the above paragraph, substitute in any other business we (as a society) tend to be up in arms about. Say, Amazon. Say, Google. Say, Facebook.
Facebook is the example I think is the most interesting. Is Facebook a monopoly? Because some people think so.
But I don’t have to use Facebook, do I? I can email or text my friends (my real friends, the ones who aren’t just scrolling past my posts to see if have any cat photos today). But of course, there are things I can do on Facebook that email and text (or that old school snail mail thing) don’t do well. Talk to groups at a time, for example. Create communities where people are talking to each other and to the community about whatever interest that group has been formed around. Say, photography. But does that make Facebook a monopoly? Should we break them up, like AT&T?
Well the old school monopolies were different than those companies we accuse of being monopolies today.
When AT&T was broken up into the smaller ‘baby bells’ it was just the same as cutting a pizza into smaller slices.
Breaking up Amazon, for example would result in a digital services company, and a delivery company, and an on-line warehousing company, etc. Definitely not just interchangeable slices of a pizza.
Same for Wal-Mart, which could split up its physical stores from its warehouse and logistics from its consumer services.
Think Wal-Mart isn’t a service provider? Eyeglasses anyone? They replace kids’ frames for $10. . . which, speaking from experience, is a deal they can’t possibly be making money on, unless other peoples’ kids are easier on their eyeglasses than my kid is. Again, just saying.
But in the end, it comes down to we want what we want when we want it. And when someone else can do it better / faster / with fewer annoyances / in a more trustworthy manner / in a way that makes us feel better about ourselves, Wal-Mart and Amazon and Google will go the way of the wooly mammoth. And given the pace of change these days, that will probably happen before the next ice age.
Backing off the broader perspective, don’t we have something similar going on in our day to day work? Those things that were supposed to make our lives easier (like online ordering or search engines that remember what we like). . . well, it turns out, there’s not much chances of avoiding ‘the digital’. But the digital keeps changing. There’s internal messaging, and email. and external messaging (like Skype) and probably a few more I haven’t been dealing with lately. There are invitations and work flow management tools and. . .
Something Called The Digital
If someday I exclaim how awesome
all those emails and to what they added up
please inform me I’m misguided. This,
like all else, to be endured and overcome:
the hundredth push-up, the thousandth day
combing electrons into shape, behind
this stockade of empty files. Safe from those
who dare drive longboats toward my shore.
See? Cubicles upon cubicles. Preparing
protons, invitations, expectations. Half traps, half
embroidered hopes. And I could do the same:
press send and pelt their petty homelands
with tiny cannonball requests: please suggest,
opine, approve, even if delayed. Accumulation?
No good, no service, nothing to be held
or recollected fondly. Nor art nor recompense. Just
messing about as if with purpose. I call it
Tom’s All Night Diner and Message Machine,
but the bit about the Diner is a lie. All that’s left:
to tolerate the winding down. Frantic electrons
string gossamer dross along a fractal web.
If you enjoyed Something Called The Digital
You’ll find more of my poems on this blog or in the collection Stars Crawl Out From Their Caves, which is available in both ebook and print.
Missed a poem of the week? Links to prior weeks are on this page.