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Social Cooling – How big data is increasing pressure to conform

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Re: Social Cooling – How big data is increasing pressure to conform

#61

Post by Mikushi »

voidhorse wrote: post #11

I think the creator may be better off conducting a through philosophical investigation in efforts of pinning down the concept. You would be much better off giving full citations to Foucault and Deleuze, and full analysis into the Snowden incident and the fallout rather than a sort of half nod to, what I think, are the foundation beams of this concept. This page kind of assumes the audience is already willing to admit…

> All this being stated, ya'll should check out Horkheimer's essay "The Concept of Man." He wrote it in ~1952(might've been 53 or 57, I'm forgetting the exact date)--and it's crazy how prophetic that essay turned out to be. It shows how all our innovation really just led to an amplification of social structures and patterns that were already emerging during the dawn of automation and mechanization. I think it's relevant to your project.

Do you mind sharing a link to it? A quick search didn't return anything close to that title written by Horkheimer.

Re: Social Cooling – How big data is increasing pressure to conform

#62

Post by socialcooling »

nachocode wrote: post #18

This is a very delicate topic indeed. On one hand, users are not willing to pay to use the services of platforms such as Youtube or Facebook so they need to find ways to monetize. On the other hand, As a user, you feel that your trust in platforms has been betrayed by knowing that platforms are selling the data that you willfully post to the public.

Yes, it's becoming more difficult to argue that users are giving 'informed consent' when they sign up to 'free' services.

In the EU the new GDPR law is already making the 'informed consent' requirement more strict. http://www.eudataprotectionlaw.com/consent-under-the-general...

Re: Social Cooling – How big data is increasing pressure to conform

#63

Post by Katastrophial »

It's a great presentation of facts into an infographic form that is easily digested by lots of people.

It could use some serious fine tuning for grammar though, likely as a result of English being a secondary language.

If the guy who owns the website is on here, I'd be happy to help out with the syntax and grammar. PM me, I'd love to help out with this - it's really well laid out.

Re: Social Cooling – How big data is increasing pressure to conform

#65

Post by randommm »

It is obviously bogus that Foucault raised that issue in 1975. For example Erving Goffman introduced the term "Total Institution", which implies total surveillance already in 1961. Subsequently, there have been many public reports concerning the information society and the problem of data bases. For a legal assessment see Westin, Columbia Law Review 1966, pp. 1003ff.

Re: Social Cooling – How big data is increasing pressure to conform

#66

Post by bem94 »

vladf wrote: post #57

I might be misunderstanding the point being made here, but at one part doesn't make sense to me. The digital reputation argument seems to be saying "big data is bad because your reputation (i.e., people's valuations of your past actions) is now more accessible to people." Such an argument can hold two ways: 1. Giving anyone access to your reputation is inherently bad. 2. Giving some amount of people access to your re…

I got the impression it was more to do with gaining access to the various pieces of information which make up your online (and offline) reputation, out of their original context. That lack of context then means the otherwise benign info suddenly makes you look awful.

That's the big thing here, the internet strips context and nuance from everything you post unless you take a lot of time and thought over exactly what you say. It's proably fair to say most people on the internet don't do that.

Re: Social Cooling – How big data is increasing pressure to conform

#67

Post by bem94 »

imron wrote: post #51
bem94 wrote: post #13

I really feel that engineers need to wake up to this kind of thing. I'm not saying we should stop (although that's what might happen), just that we pause and consider what this is doing to the world. It is the undercurrent for so many profound changes going on right now. Are we really comfortable as individuals building systems which predict someones mental (ill) health, personality traits or ethnicity just so we can…

> I really feel that engineers need to wake up to this kind of thing. Wake up to this thing? Who do you think is enabling it and laughing all the way to the bank and/or the VC money?

True. But from my own experience I get the impression most engineers are ignorant in this regard rather than malicious. Though I'm happy (or not..) to see evidence to the contrary.

We all enable it, I'm not sure the awareness of the full affect is there though.

Re: Social Cooling – How big data is increasing pressure to conform

#69

Post by Pigo »

captainmuon wrote: post #59
bicubic wrote: post #3

I was going to write at length about my concerns on this topic, and then I decided not to. Because it's entirely possible that one day many years from now, a prospective employer/insurer/whatever finds such a comment and flags me for it. That's the cooling effect in a nutshell.

I've been saying this for a while: We as a society have to stop taking everything that is said on the internet so fucking seriously. You shouldn't have to think everything perfectly though that you write. It's OK to say something dumb, or even offensive. It's not great, but no big deal either. I don't want to live in a world where we have to polish and double-check every thought that leaves our minds. It used to be t…

I completely agree, and it's the very reason social media holds no interest for me anymore. I think people have forgotten what it used to be like on Myspace and the early days of Facebook. Social media was about self expression and finding out where the party is, now it's a finely tuned marketing platform for grandmothers.

Re: Social Cooling – How big data is increasing pressure to conform

#70

Post by Symmetry »

Regardless of current issues, I figure that in 30 years everybody will have access to AIs capable of trawling the internet and correlating all my online identities. At least barring things like nuclear war, global draconian censorship, etc. I've taken to just using my real name in most places online to remind me of this. If I'd created this HN account a few years later I'd be AndrewClough rather than Symmetry.
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