Archaic—where are we going?

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Today, I watched as somebody was attempting to access a website over the data connection on their smartphone. It was slow. Even though what he was trying to do would have been nearly unthinkable ten or twenty years ago, it was now looking archaic, particularly since someone else was getting ready to write down the website address on a piece of paper—now, that really is archaic.

Yesterday, I was sorting out some difficulties with my smartphone and computer being able to synchronize through my cloud account. This is a very useful possibility, however, my personal stuff is being stored on a server that is out there somewhere and that makes me wonder how safe it is from hackers. Probably something similar struck folks the first time they put their money in a bank.

If you have read some of my other writings or have been following my blog, you will know well that I tackle technology issues often. I think we all need to consider carefully about where the technopath is leading us. One very important question I feel we should be asking is, does it make us more human and truly improve our lives? Just about everybody I meet and talk to about technology is excited about what it can do. It is undoubtably amazing.

My purpose here is to look at what has happened in recent history, where we are, and to urge you to consider and to think. Then, I want to take a stab at extrapolating to determine where we might be going. Let me start with a few observations.

I’ll just quickly mention that my first experience with the telephone was with the one phone we had in our house and the line we shared with neighbours. It was known as a party line. I remember when the digital calculator came along. Mechanical calculators had been used for years. Many were huge and all were too big to carry around. Digital, hand-held calculators allowed people to carry them around and use them in all situations. People seemed to lose the ability to do simple addition in their heads. My parents and aunts could add rows of figures fast on paper, usually faster than I could punch the numbers into a calculator. I was among the last of high school students who were not allowed to use calculators in math classes.

I also remember life before the personal computer. The manual typewriter reigned and typesetting and graphics were produced by industry experts with special equipment. Eventually, the typewriter became electric and one day, it got a very small screen that could show a few words that had just been typed and, most importantly, allowed one to back up and make a change to what had just been typed. I’m sure you can see where that led. The personal computer debuted from Apple, invented by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, changed the world by a huge leap.

It didn’t take long before these individual computers started to be connected together. We’ll take a jump here to mention the next major change. Many groups of connected computers existed, however, the Internet prevailed as the largest. The Internet was born during the cold war and was designed to provide a way of communicating that could not be interrupted. In other words, the Internet can’t be disconnected or destroyed. This is a characteristic we should all keep in mind. Another original segment of the Internet was used by educational, scientific and research institutions to store and share information.

There are a few other pieces to the puzzle that I should like to mention. Cameras have become digital, no longer requiring film that had to be processed before a photograph could be seen. Photography has not only become instant, but cameras have been shrinking and gaining quality. This also applies to video cameras. Most people wear a wrist watch. While the phone has morphed into a multifunctional digital computer device, I find it amazing that it is only now the wrist watch is about to be replaced. Perhaps replaced is not the correct word. Absorbed might be better. The cell phone has been absorbing many devices we use.

Here is one more and probably the most important piece of the puzzle. Our information. We are living in what has been described as ‘the information age.’ All this, the devices that have been getting absorbed, is about storing and sharing our information. As this becomes faster and easier, we find we have more of it. It is mind boggling. We need more technology to help us remember, manage, organize and use all the information we have.

Thus, here we are, most people carrying around a small device that is a computer and communicator. It is cumbersome in that, we have a very small screen to look at, a small keyboard to enter information and it often fails. Sometimes, some of us revert back to using paper in conjunction with the digital device. It is difficult for us to read large amounts of information on screen so we print it. We wear a separate device to tell time. Our pockets and our purses are filled with everything from money in the form of cash to sophisticated credit cards with computer chips in them.

I have watched as computers that used to take up entire rooms became terminals connected to a central computer, to computers that sat on or under a desk, to computers that could be held in one’s lap, to a computer/telephone/camera/multifunctional digital device that fits in one’s hand. And that, as it turns out, is beginning to look awkward, cumbersome and slow, in other words archaic.

So, where are we going?

We all love our digital devices. I like to think that we feel we can turn them off whenever we want, although this seldom happens. While they seem handy in many ways, technology always seems to find new ways to get closer to us, to infiltrate our lives even more.

My prediction, actually it is already beginning to happen, is that we may soon be looking at the ability to have our digital devices implanted in our bodies binging all the capabilities we now enjoy with our current technologies and much more, much faster and without the awkwardness and cumbersomeness we experience today. Why would somebody want to do this?

Why would somebody want to carry a telephone around with them 242/7? Why would somebody want to be able to have complex math, complicated problems and simply be able to store and access vast amounts of information without much thought? Why not have images and video display instantly in your mind? Who would not want to get rid of their wallet full of valuable information and money that can be stolen or lost? You would not need a passport. Nobody else could use your device and you could not lose it.

The world, through the Internet, is becoming a giant brain. Sometimes I see an image of a human head that looks like the Earth and has web-like lines covering the brain. As we feed it more information about us, it grows and grows smarter about us. Why would we not want to tap into this huge vastness of human experience? Why would we even need our awkward, cumbersome physical bodies?

Why would anyone really want to do this? As with most technologies, there might be some resistance at first, however, it usually does enter our lives. Online banking is one. I remember thinking I would never trust my banking to be done online. Somehow, perhaps by charges or by convenience, I have adopted online banking. The RFID chip credit card was thrust upon us without choice. There are instances where one can’t make a purchase without a credit card. Will the day arrive when the only card accepted is a chip card? Can you see where I am going with this?

In considering these issues and situations, I have wondered if a revolt by a large group might change the path we are on? Might some people withdraw from allowing deeper infiltration of technology in their lives? Could there end up being two or more groups, such as those with implants and those without? Can technology completely replace the human brain, or is the human spirt what truly make us human and what can’t be absorbed or infiltrated by technology?

There are prophecies in the Bible about the sorts of predictions I have written about here and Bible prophecies have always come true.

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A byte of the Apple

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It might be difficult for some people to ask the enormous question, what are we getting into and where are we going with all this high technology? It is indeed a difficult question considering the wonderful things we can now do and the speed at which advancements continue to come to use daily. One might say it is mesmerizing. As it would be impossible to discuss even a half of the issues, let me look at a few that come to mind.

I have been using Apple Macintosh computers for well nearly 25 years. I have always liked the ease at which they can be used. It is, of course, the ‘user experience’ that has always been at the heart of everything Apple has undertaken. I must admit, however, that only recently have I begun to slightly question Apple. As with many other people, I admit to having a love hate relationship with most,if not all, technology.

When I look around, I see the good and the bad of technology and I don’t mean just the obvious spread of good and evil information. I have heard many people over the years state that technology, like everything man makes, can be used for good or evil. This would apply to computers and what is often called high technology.

It is easy to to be caught up in all the interesting things technology can do. We are told that our lives are so much better off due to technology. Let’s face it, technology is fun and it sure looks like our lives are getting better, however, as I have written before, it seems to me that we have crossed over to a new paradigm when we adopted digital technology. Something is truly and fundamentally different.

In the span of human history, computers have only been part of our lives for a very short time—sort of a blink of the eye of history. At first, they were hailed as wonderful number crunchers, however, a computer with only a fraction of the capabilities of even a small computer of today, took up more than one room and required several people to operate it. Here is an interesting aspect of computer technology. It grows in power and shrinks in size at a rate nobody could ever have imagined. Along the way, it captivates us with the wonderful things it does for us.

Perhaps our lives would be quite different if computers had remained in the hands of corporations that had the space and finances to obtain and operate a computer. But something happened in a garage during the 1970s. The personal computer was born. In a matter of a few years everyone could have a powerful computer. This was a fundamental change to mankind and it was ushered in by a company called Apple.

I want to take a moment to have a look at a few interesting aspects of Apple Computers and the personal computing industry. First, what is a byte? In simple terms, it is a collection of eight bits of data that makes it possible for a computer to know and render a single character, such as a letter of the alphabet or a single digit number. A bit is the smallest unit of digital binary data, a 0 or a 1. I guess, for some people, it represents knowledge. I’ll stick with information, as I believe knowledge is information that has, not only become part of our memory, it is information that we are able to use and apply in a meaningful way. Nevertheless, many people consider information as knowledge.

Humans are transformed when personal computers enter their lives. It is not just a device, it is a foreign world that I would state, is incompatible with the physical nature of a human being. I am talking about digital information. One could say it exists, but it does not exist. One can have information at their fingertips, but not have it physically in their hands, you have a file that does not actually exist in a physical form or space. One can go to a web page without going anywhere. One can communicate with another person without ever meeting them, or be their friend without knowing them.

Is all this real? Does it make us more or less human?

Much of the bulk of a computer is in the machinery required to allow a human to interface and interact with it and the information available. A keyboard and a screen are examples. Not only is this bulky, it slows the interaction down. Computers work in milliseconds, however, the operation of a keyboard takes, well, much much longer. Have you ever wondered why we have buttons and other graphics to make the digital world look like our physical world? All this contributes to a clumsy, awkward exchange between humans and computers, one that, if computers get smart enough, will frustrate the computer into perhaps bypassing the human. Might the computer decide to control the human? Could this already be happening in some way?

Have you heard the statement that technology is neither good nor bad, it is just how you use it? What do you think? Have you ever wondered where technology is taking us or are you simply infatuated with technology today and what you can do with it?

I find myself regularly taking a step, or more, back to attempt to observe where we are going. Perhaps this is one capability that the late Steve Jobs of Apple had. He is now considered a genius and visionary. As the story goes, Jobs chose the name Apple so that the company name would come before Amiga and Atari, companies who might compete with his company. It is a rags to riches story with plenty of ups and downs. Beginning in a garage, Apple is now the largest publicly traded company in the world.

In the book of Genesis in the Bible, we find the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden facing the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Was it not a bite, or byte taken of the apple. Take another look at the Apple logo. Curious, isn’t it?

In light of Facebook

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This week, Facebook has been in the news as it is going to move from being a private company to public with an Initial Public Offering (IPO). Over the past week, I have heard many comments about Facebook and they have raised a concern that has irked me for years. It seems that people, society, accept the Internet, not for what it is, but, for what it is not. What do I mean by this? Why is Facebook so popular and worth so much money? Why aren’t people more concerned about their personal information being used for purposes they are not aware of?

Take this comment I heard on the radio this week. Someone stated something that I have heard many times before leaving me to believe that it is a generally accepted truth. People seem to think that the Internet contains information and information is knowledge. To me, as someone who has been using computers for nearly 25 years, the Internet for over 15 years and who has studied the field of education to the level of a Masters Degree, I feel I can make a comment or two on this matter in an attempt to clear up some misconceptions.

Information is not knowledge. Information is information and knowledge is what you know. Well, now that is clear. No? Then let me give you an example. I have an interest in vintage jazz music and with nearly 40 years of interest in this genre of music, I know quite a bit about it. If I were to tell you everything I know, you would have information and perhaps some of the information might become, to some degree, knowledge. However, if I were to spend time engaging you in listening to jazz music and discussing it, you would begin to have an experience with it and make it familiar to you. That is learning and learning results in you acquiring knowledge, that is, you are able to use and apply the information. There, you can see, is a huge difference.

To truly turn information into knowledge, one must engage and have experiences with it. This is the purpose of education. The richer the engagement and experiences, the better the education and the resulting ability of the learner to be able to use and apply what they know. This is a concern I and many educators have about online learning. It does not, and can not, provide the same rich learning experiences that a classroom or other real life situations can. One would never want a surgeon with an online degree to operate. Well, that is a sort of extreme example, yet, you should get the point.

It seems to be an ongoing quest of purveyors of the Internet to relate it to real-life applying common nomenclature to new purposes. Even before the World Wide Web (WWW), with only text interfaces to the Internet, people searched for ways to make users feel comfortable with the service. In the early days, we operated bulletin board services (BBSs), initially with a text interface and later with a graphical user interface (GUI). As you can see, the idea of naming the service a bulletin board makes it somewhat easier for people to become familiar with it. Most people have seen and even used a real bulletin board. Some services offered methods to type back a forth in real time. This was and still is known as chatting. Chats on particular topics were called chat rooms. Not a room at all. Not really a chat either.

When graphics began to be used to enrich the online environment, designers made images that looked like real surfaces and controls with textures and buttons and knobs. These were and are fake. Why not invent something completely different. Perhaps because, the goal is to help users be and feel familiar with the environment, an environment that does not really exist.

Consider other terms used to sell users into the online world. Adapting already familiar words to digitally represented images, allows people, or users, as they are referred to, to be able to perform tasks in the digital environment. Is a window a window? Is a page a page? Do you actually go somewhere when to enter an address. Not really, These things and places do not really exist. It is all an illusion. As users, we really need to be careful that we understand what the digital environment is, what the services are and who we are in this new world. Traditional terms and understandings take on new meanings. Often, people take on a completely different persona online.

Let me return to the example of Facebook. Facebook has literally rocketed into ubiquity in our lives and I don’t think most people understand what it really is. On the surface, it looks like a way of allowing people to connect with each other and share information. That seems like a simple service and a great contribution to society. In fact, it is referred to as a social network. Yet, a comment I heard this week reveals the true nature of Facebook. Someone pointed out that, while Facebook makes people think they are customers of a service, in reality the users are the product of Facebook. So many people freely upload vast amounts of information about themselves and all that information is stored online and the privacy of that information is supposed, by the users, to be under their control and private. The true customers of Facebook are the people who can use that information and pay for it. That means advertisers. That’s correct, Facebook is providing a service where you give them information about yourself, tell them who your friends are and what you and they like. They even ask you to ‘like’ things to make sure they know what you like and to make more connections. They then sell you to corporations for money, and a lot of money.

Facebook does state that they do not sell your information. Perhaps not directly, however, what do you call it when they have a system that can use your information to show you ‘relevant’ ads. By placing an ad through Facebook, an advertiser is paying for Facebook to make sure the ad is shown to users who would be most likely to be interested in the product or service. The ad may then be shown to your friends. So, while your information is not sold for use outside of Facebook, it is part of the structure of selling advertising. The question is, how safe is your information? Can an advertiser find out who viewed and showed interest in a particular ad and then use that information to advertise outside of Facebook?

Could it be possible that our society is quite out of control. The idea of Facebook may have been hatched in innocents as a social network, however, it is much more now. Even the term friend seems to have lost it’s true meaning. How many people actually have a hundred or even hundreds of friends. Another idea that is not grounded in reality. How many people have told you they ‘talked’ to somebody on Facebook. How did they actually talk?

Communications seems to have taken on a new sort of connotation. Communications should mean a two way exchange of information disseminated through a rich environment. By rich, I mean one that allows as much information exchanged as possible and reliably, resulting in an understanding of the message. In face-to-face exchanges, over 80 percent of the message is non-verbal. This fact should be kept in mind when we consider the Internet as a communications medium.

Facebook neither has a face, is a face, allows for face-to-face, nor is it a book. It simply does not really exist and neither does the Internet, that is in a physical sense, other than the equipment used to transmit and store the data. This is an important point as the online digital world does exist, since it does affect our physical lives.

Throughout human history we value things with physical substance. Information has traditionally taken it’s value in the physical form it exists in, such as a book. Even with the development of recording techniques, it has been the physical form of the information that has carried the value. This is changing with the world of digital due to the information residing in a non-physical form and in more than one place. This is upsetting how we deal with value, copyright and what is and what is not.

Google arose much like Facebook. As the amount of information grew, so did the importance of being able to search to find exactly what you wanted. Google was not the first search engine service, however, it soon became the most used. Supposedly, it was the best. Search services have several forms. Some catalog information for users to browse through. Others, like Google simply gather information from everywhere and present it to users for them to wade through. Even the term searching is often replaced with Googling. People often say they Google something.

Google, like Facebook, also soon discovered that advertisers would pay for the ability to advertise to a particular user who was searching for something related to their product or service. So, Google could match advertising with users who might be interested or hot customers. This is target marketing.

But, how reliable is the information you Google, or any information found through the Internet? In traditional publishing methods, information is published through reliable sources. With the Internet, anyone can publish information, even those with incorrect, misrepresented, misinterpreted, unsubstantiated information. Some even maliciously attempt to do this.

Sometimes I want to learn about a product or service and use Google to locate information about it. This usually includes some of the many forum areas where other people share information and hold discussions through threaded messages. A thread is a series of messages on a topic where people comment on an initial message and the messages that are comments on another person’s comment stays with that comment in the thread of other messages, despite it’s chronological order. Forums are similar to BBSs.

One would think that a discussion by users of a product would be a reliable place to ask what is the best one to buy. Here is an example. Suppose you want to buy a blender. You can locate a forum of other people who are either users of blenders or are interested in purchasing one. Here you will find almost endless comments and useful information about which blenders are best. However, there may be employees or other people with a vested interest in pushing one particular brand. They might be masquerading as someone they are not.

Then, there are scammers. This is not new, however, avoiding scams is a bit trickier online. Anyone can look like almost anything or anyone. One may get an E-mail from a bank stating that they need to confirm their banking information. Graphics may even include the bank’s logo and that logo could be linked to from the actual bank computer server. I have even had E-mails with links to entire websites that look like a legitimate commercial website, however, many links would not actually work on the website. More of something that is not what it really is.

The point to remember is that the Internet, Google and Facebook are here to stay. They cannot be turned off or deleted. The Internet was devised as a Cold War communications system that could survive an attack on the United States. As I have written before, the Internet is learning about us as we add more information about ourselves. In a sense, we are migrating into the virtual digital world of the Internet. Is this a good thing? This is a question we really do not seem to have time to sort out. There are always people who want to forge forward into the new with complete abandon, wether they truly understand what is happening. Change is happening so fast that, for most people, they simply follow the fads and trends.

I have always been bothered by the notion that information about me personally exists as a sort of growing footprint of my life in the uncontrollable world of the Internet. It is there forever. Is it safe? Is it secure?

Let us consider banking. Many people, including myself, use online banking services. Yet, we occasionally hear of hackers stealing information and even digital money funds. I am convinced that we only hear of a very few instances. If we truly knew how often systems storing valuable information are hacked into, we would lose faith in the systems we have built our lives around. Our society suffer some severe impacts. Of course, one might say, bank robbers have existed as long as banks. Yes, however, the point here is that the amount and value of money or information is huge and the procedure of tracking the perpetrators down so complex.

You may be asking, if I have such concerns, why do I participate in and use such services. Well, it is difficult not to. There are many reasons. The services and systems are interesting and fun to tinker with, I suppose. For most people, one reason might be, that everyone is doing it and, in some cases, it is necessary. In some ways we are forced to use computer and online services either by companies and organizations requiring one to access information this way or through traditional methods becoming more expensive.

A company might find it easier and cheaper to put their brochure online. There are many perceived benefits to this. They can include more information, more types of information, such as video, and they can make changes at any time. So, now it is up to the customer to access the information and search for what they want or need to know. This can take time. What if you need to actually talk to a real person? While most companies do include a phone number, this is becoming increasingly rare, just as physical stores, in some cases, are less abundant. Some companies can do more business online. So, you may not be able to go to a physical place to have a full communication session with a real person, but, may have to communicate through less reliable means that might take extra time, due to the asynchronous nature of these methods. A reply to an E-mail may take a day or more.

For years now, I have heard many explanations for what is happening and what the digital online world means to humankind. Perhaps, the virtual reality is becoming a reality, that our online footprint is becoming who we really are, and that may well be different than who we are in the real physical world. Many people have different characteristics online than they do as a real person. Some people would even say that we are in the process of migrating into a digital existence. That we should shed our physical skins to live forever in a virtual world. Could we still be human? This is certainly extreme and I doubt it will ever happen.

I had a conversation with a friend yesterday, and he mentioned that, throughout history, mankind swings from one direction to another. It is hard to imagine the technological trend changing or even swinging the other direction. We always seem to add more technological innovations into how we live. It is also difficult to imagine unplugging from the Internet. We are there in some way and can never be erased. I guess we could change who we are in real life, become a different person to evade our online persona. Sort of like a witness protection program. One would have to disappear.

For some people, worrying about these matters is simply of less importance than actually plunging in and letting what may happen go ahead and happen. At this stage, they seem to be leading the way for everyone else. Is it possible to participate to some degree and still maintain control? Or, is it too late? Have we lost control? What could possibly happen that could be so bad?

What about genetics and DNA? It is now becoming possible to discover what diseases one is predisposed to. This raises some huge concerns. What if insurance companies knew you were going to get a disease or die. How would they insure you? Would they refuse you altogether?

There is a growing concern about the possible misuses of personal information. Many people have had a bad experience resulting from too much of their personal information getting into the wrong hands. We really do not know who knows what about us now. We often do not know who is hacking into our information. Problems can range from irritating inconveniences to personal disasters. I won’t go too far into this right now, however, I’m sure many, even most readers have experienced an inconvenience or two.

One day I decided to check my Facebook account. My attempt to log in failed. I received a message stating that someone tried to log in and the system had determined that it was not me. I had to reset my account. The reset process did not work the first time, or the second. After wasting a couple of hours, I managed to get back into my account, determine that someone not even in Canada, but, somewhere in the mid-west of the U.S. had tried to hack into my account. I then decided to minimize what I show on Facebook, tighten up my security settings and to not use Facebook very often. I even considered deleting my account, but, remembered hearing about how much trouble other people have had trying to get their account deleted.

Facebook is not the first social network, as these services are referred to, however, for some reason, it has become the largest. I remember many people using MySpace before Facebook. I’m sure there will be more, such as LinkedIn. Even Google is in the game now. I wonder why Facebook has become the defacto? Perhaps, it is because, at this stage anyway, Facebook is about advertising masquerading as a social network. Could there be a larger, more important reason? I would not doubt it. As I have pointed out, they seem to be perceived as something that is not what they really are. We should be concerned about the acceptance of things, not for what they are, but, for what they are not.

Refs for further reading & exploration:
Facebook
Facebook — Wikipedia
Information — Dictionary
Information — Wikipedia
Knowledge— Dictionary
Knowledge — Wikipedia
LinkedIn
Google+
Facebook advertising
Personal information — Consumer Reports
How safe is PI on FB — Avoid Facebook