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5 Predictions for the Next 5 Years

Written on January 15, 2012 in Communications & Technology, Lifestyle & Society

It’s quite common to see prediction posts produced in January, and for a futurist blogger the draw to do one is obvious. In that regard, and in the spirit of IBM’s Next 5 in 5 approach, here are five predictions for the next five years:

1) Smartphone integration

Let’s start with an easy one. The smartphone is becoming a ubiquitous tool, and their usage will extend to pretty much every aspect of our lives over the next five years. Indeed, you can make a solid argument that for many of us it’s already there. What we are going to see is a complete integration with our daily activities, and there’s a lot of thoughts out there on the future of smartphone design and utility.

The smartphone will become a more regular form of contactless payment. Coupled with access to your spending habits through other means such as loyalty programmes, your shopping experiences will be tailored to your presence in a store even before you step inside. This data will enable stores to directly highlight particular new items or deals that you are likely to be interested in, and indicate them and their in-store location to your handset. The extension of advertising will be used to entice you into stores as you walk by, and a number of sleek and attractive interfaces that collect this data from various sources in the one place will be designed to ensure that the information is neither annoying or overwhelming.

Fast food, restaurant and supermarket purchases will be made even faster, and indeed we’re already seeing these kind of applications, and the concept of a separate loyalty card will become obsolete as you will develop separate accounts for the many different stores that you purchase items for and they will all be stored via your smartphone in the ever-widening data cloud that moves with you.

The connectivity will continue as you travel, and will interface with the more comprehensive systems in place in your home and office. We’re already seeing the emergence of voice-recognition interaction whilst driving, and this is starting to be coupled with the streaming of your smartphone interface in your car’s dashboard. By the time you enter your home, the movements and updates from a day’s worth of digital interaction will already be synced with your home network and your focus will then shift over to the tablet as the central hub device. The key word here is integration, and the smartphone provides the key to integrating all of your movements with your digital homespace; whilst vice versa assimilating your digital identity with the various work and leisure spaces you engage with as you move through the day.

2) Smart TVs and the integrated home entertainment system

We’re starting to hear a lot more now of ‘Smart TVs’, and within the next five years this is something that is likely to gain considerable momentum. This will go beyond merely the internet-connectivity notion of ‘Smart TV’ that currently dominates the marketplace, with moves towards a more interactive and personal experience. If the thought of your TV having a motion and sound sensor attached to it bothers you somewhat, consider already the move into this arena with the likes of Microsoft’s Kinect. At the very least, your television is going to become a much more responsive and dynamic medium then the passive role it has played up until this point – and this will be coupled with it responding to your face, movements and words.

Hard media such as DVDs or Blu-Rays will be on the way out at the top end of the market, and instead this content will be streamed directly to your television through high-bandwidth internet connections. This will negate the need for any kind of storage space, as all of it will be on the cloud, and will also negate the need to have separate boxes of hardware sitting under your TV.

The videogame platforms of the future will be subscription based services (a present example of which is the OnLive platform that, although not without teething problems, is a solid proof of concept). Digital distribution models in general will be pushed strongly, as they overcome the primary developer concerns of piracy and second-hand sales eating into profits. When this integration occurs, you can expect to see Microsoft release a television and Sony will push big for this move as they face rapidly decreasing profit margins and market share. There’s more news recently of the Google TV service, and there have been rumours of a dedicated Apple TV floating about for a while. A move into this area from the king of consumer confidence-building will push the whole thing into overdrive.

We’re not going to see this eventuate completely within the next five years; but the foundations are already in place and are waiting primarily for bandwidth and consumer demand. Streaming movies and music in particular will gain a lot of momentum, and these systems will be built directly into televisions rather than require separate boxes or equipment. The next generation of videogame consoles will still follow the traditional model, but I’d hazard a guess that the generation after that will move away from physical media and pricey-to-produce hardware in favour of cloud-based streaming services.

3) Social Media web-browsing

Facebook will release a web browser. That’s the short version. It’s almost inevitable that there will be a successful attempt to frame our web browsing experience through our social media identity. At the moment this relationship exists the other way around, but there will be a move to shift this perspective. There are already attempts to do this, such as RockMelt backed by the founder of Netscape, but Google will likely soon lead the way with this as they attempt to salvage (or build upon, depending on your level of cynicism) Google + and the many other aspects of their online platform that they currently offer. I’m surprised that Google hasn’t already built a version of Chrome around this concept, but it can’t be far off.

Because of how it has evolved, social media emerged as an online service; but the sphere has increasingly manifested as a digital platform in and of itself. Facebook has been trying to extend its reach beyond the closed-doors of its community for a while now – see Facebook Comments and Recommendations as an immediate case in point. In addition, we have the increasing use of geolocational and augmented reality aspects of social media that don’t require a traditional browser and rely instead on new mobile interface paradigms. As we move towards a semantic web framework, the capacity for our social media identity to be the lens through which we view and contextualise disparate online elements will be pushed. Our emotional attachment to social media identities will almost assure that a well-considered and designed attempt at this will succeed.

Obviously, such a move has the same worrying implications for online privacy that have already been highlighted over the last few years; but like many of these concerns they will be ignored by the majority of web users who choose convenience and accessibility over autonomy and privacy. In addition, a great deal of time will be spent by companies such as Facebook and Google to build in genuine and secure privacy settings and data protection promises (whilst at the same time still promoting the idea of a true-identity web experience as preferable). The alternative is for more open-sourced, decentralised developments to emerge; something which will no doubt occur but whether they can gain enough traction in the hearts and minds of the general public will be a contest worth paying close attention to.

4) Crowd-sourced Politics

We already have all of the technological components available to more accurately and widely canvas public opinion on various political and social agendas. Over the last few years we’ve seen moves towards government petitioning systems in the US and elsewhere, and experimentation with forms of direct democracy that are facilitated via online platforms.

There will always be a demand for this kind of participation in decision making, and an increasing malaise if we continue to ignore this demand as evidenced by the inclusive aspirations of the Occupy movement (which have arguably begun to lose focus on this important issue, to their detriment). Ultimately, representation of this sort can only really be brought to scale effectively through the ideological underpinnings working in close tandem with technological implementation.

What will distinguish such a platform from any other site that has come before (such as user-voted platforms likes Reddit or Digg) is that they will be legitimised by their relationship with both local community and government processes and such efforts will also become more ubiquitous in their usage. Over the next five years, simple and secure polling systems that achieve large citizen uptake will broaden the validity of certain political positions and government programmes; Real-time, large-scale audience feedback to things such as political debates will become commonplace; and more complicated systems will be explored that could enable direct influence on an increasing number of future initiatives. The path that Iceland has embarked upon represents this concept in direct action, and the We The People petition system in the US is experimenting with technological solutions.

In the end, problems will always arise when you rely solely upon basic majority rule systems, and therefore we need to develop a more nuanced concept of what direct democracy means. What needs to be garnered from these recent experiments are some genuine and honest critiques of where the process works and, perhaps more importantly, where the idealism has failed to bring about truly productive results. Expect a lot more work on this from many different areas over the next five years.

5) Data Architecture and Visualisation rises to the top

The exponentially growing levels of data in modern society is astonishing when you begin to get to grips with it. We are now creating more data every day or two then we have collectively since the dawn of civilisation – let’s just let that sink in for a little bit.

The question now revolves around what we do with it all. Most of the data surge comes from user-created content that many would argue has little value outside of the local contexts of the individuals creating and consuming it; but there are wider social trends available in this date. Not least of which are the commercial avenues that data mining is capable of, and they have been discussed at length and will increasingly form the central profit model of many companies.

But in a more general sense, the need to make sense of vast amounts of raw data – to make it usable not just in an algorithmic sense (as in the case with data mining) but in a end-user, visually digestible manner. Platforms are already in use, and increasingly being developed, to allow various sectors to more effectively harness the power of information. The biggest push for this, as always, comes from the intelligence needs of military, police and government (GeoTime is a good example in regards to locational data). From military intelligence, to helping solve local crimes, to creating more efficient public sector workflows; the correct and effective use of data will play a key role not just in the next five years but from here on out.

On a more individual level, the need to create interfaces and visual graphics that help us make sense of the growing amount of data in our own lives will become central – and in some ways will also be invisible. This begins with filtering web searches, news feeds and other information streams according to your preferences and activity profile. Extends into creative and inspiring ways of using data to more effectively put across information and ideas (this great talk from David McCandless at TED explores some of those uses and is definitely worth watching). This is all driven by commercial applications for data mining and building effective platforms for companies to interface with the resulting information.

What we will see towards the end of the next five years is the culmination of this growing culture of data exchange into the public sphere. The manipulation of digital data in its many guises is generally considered to be a subset of information technology. The tools to put this into the hands of an increasing number of people will be developed and pushed over the next five years. Consider the impact that software such as Photoshop or iMovie have had on the current media revolution, now extend that into the realm of data use and analysis and we can begin to see how important a role such things will play in the democratisation of data in the post-digital age.

Do you agree or disagree with these predictions, and what are the implications of them? If you have any more five-year predictions to add, please do comment!

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We are the 99%! You are the Revolution!

Written on October 2, 2011 in Communications & Technology, Lifestyle & Society, Religion & Spirituality, Science & Environment

United for Global Change - October 15th 2011 We are the 99%. We are the hands and minds that allow the corporations and institutions of society to function and grow, to produce and profit. Our capability for global decentralised communication allows localised acts to transform the global landscape almost immediately through our ability to shift perspective faster and more effectively than ever before.

Because of this, we have ultimate power over our future existence; but this also means we have a responsibility to act collectively towards a higher mode of being.

The revolution begins now, with you.

Active and vocal resistance such as the Occupy Wall Street movement and its global counterparts must be supported wholeheartedly, but such expression is only one component of the transition that can occur once we hold as sacred our ability to connect and share. An uprising of the 99% is not a call for violent revolution – unless in explicit contexts of violent oppression – but is instead a sign that the global community is beginning to embrace a new way of being. Wherever possible this must manifest through peaceful means that embody the true depth of human communication rather than revert to the easily accessible hatred and anger that our primal instincts might instill within us.

Our focus should be on formulating a collective understanding of the ‘common good’ and how it relates to corporations, governments and communities. Discuss privately and publicly what it means to better these areas; how one can identify and encourage such behaviour; what alternatives or options might exist and how they might allow us to grow and evolve into the multitude of different contexts and forms that transform society.

As a society we have to better understand the difference between desire and need, to recognise when we have enough of a personal share and it is time to distribute of ourselves to others in greater need. Our demand is that we renew society around a central proposition of fairness and equality, arrived at through transparent representation, rather than remain with the status quo that often serves only the needs of a self-perpetuating elite.

We must not dismiss the true hardship of life that countless face, barely finding the capacity to eke out a meagre existence within the current order. Nor should we ever allow ourselves to forget that almost half the planet lives on the equivalent of $2 a day, experiencing difficulties that many of us cannot even fathom. But we must recognise that to make demands of an amorphous and unaccountable ‘They’ will not bring about the revolutionary change that is needed in the very fabric of society in order to ensure a fair and just future for all. Injustices should always be fought against within specific contexts and towards particular guilty parties; but the wider movement overall must focus on proactive progression towards equality and liberty that transcends national borders and uplifts the exploited rather than focuses too narrowly on tearing down the impenetrable.

We cannot progress on opposition alone, for we must also provide the solution and become an active participant in its manifestation. The momentum being gained through the current physical expression of discontent must be harnessed and utilised to bring about a positive change in the many and varied structures of global society. You are the revolution!

In order to see progress we have to start acting upon our grievances, for it is only through action that we can improve our understanding of goodness and life; of justice and peace. Embrace openness, and always maintain the peaceful composure of genuine fraternity whilst not holding back from standing up to those who attempt to break down the bonds of society. The 1% are not to be identified through a bank account balance, but rather those working actively against the common good, looting the global community in order to ensure dominance, and rejecting transparency in instances where openness will benefit a large proportion of society.

Where are the practical suggestions behind these words of idealism? Even whilst reading this you are already imagining them, picturing them each to your own context and capacity. You already know what to do, or at the very least how to make a start. Particular actions can’t be dictated to you, because the reality is that a truly revolutionary movement must find its birth in all of us. By doing so it manifests across all social strata and circumstance and builds strength through the bridges formed between different local situations. Transformative power emerges from the unique perspectives of all those who participate. The one thing you must do now is start participating with open sincerity and pure intention.

The popular occupation movement cannot in and of itself lead to the change demanded, but what it does very successfully is galvanise those who hear its message from the influence of a deeply corrupted system. A system that promotes narcissism over compassion and thrives on our capacity to feel powerless and apathetic amongst the distractions and noise of modern life. Stand in peaceful unity when you see such a movement emerge in your locality, but know that you do not do this just to represent your own particular beliefs and values; you do this to change the world for the better of all that wish to see humanity flourish in its diversity.

No matter what community you identify with, you have a sense of what it means to belong and an empathy that can extend its membership beyond the immediate and increase your networks. Always seek to widen your capacity to give and receive. Be emboldened by the magnificence of life and the miraculous nature of creative endeavour.

It is important that we overcome the disgraces of the modern world with a joy that signifies our hope in the inherent goodness of humanity. An uprising of this nature means nothing if we will merely fall back onto the old tropes of xenophobic tribalism and selfish endeavour. True activism requires one to shift the entire momentum of their life and to shift it in such a way that maximises positive impact in whatever context we find ourselves in.

Do not reject authority outright, do not fall into the trap of blind anti-authoritarianism that often serves to weaken the possibility of representation and participation. Strive for ownership of government, not rejection of it. Recognise that government exists in a wider sense than just the halls of parliament, and that we are all guardians of a just and honest society. Radicalism for its own sake runs the risk of serving up change without true form, of revolution without recreation. It also runs the risk of playing into the very hands of those who seek to oppress this movement by undermining the deeper and wider message of participation that it represents.

It is vital to keep a strong basis of peaceful solidarity and not be goaded into actions that undermine the core message. Aggression must sometimes be used against particular injustices in order to overcome their influence, however true systematic change cannot be predicated on hostility but must rather be built upon foundations of charity. To stand together arm in arm, literally and figuratively, is to create a unified solidarity that will embolden those who come into contact with it. It will allow and encourage them to make the changes in their lives that are required on an individual level, across millions and millions of people, in order to make a lasting difference.

This is why, if nothing else, it is your duty to identify that you are part of the 99% and that you do so not just because you are angry but because you are hopeful. There is no fixed political message, no ideology or dogma other than an acceptance that the way forwards is to be built upon equality, openness and mutual understanding. Be very wary of those who would seek to undermine this message with calls for violence based upon hatred, for they are either seriously misguided or attempting to provoke you away from productive action.

The moment to physically stand up and be heard is right now, but what must come afterwards requires a concerted effort to move the message beyond the picket lines and into the heart of our collective being. It’s about recognising how to actualise the capacity for charity and compassion that the wisest throughout history have promoted as the peak of human endeavour.

We must continue to be vigilant against injustice, but at the same time also accept some responsibility for allowing such grievances to occur in the first place. We must stand in solidarity alongside the vulnerable and exploited around the world, but at the same time recognise that standing alone is not the only action needed. Once we have accepted this responsibility we can make a solemn commitment to no longer be culpable either through action or inaction. This will be the watershed moment that brings about a true revolution and recreation of society.

We are the 99% and there is no need to expect us because we are already here. Those who make decisions and act contrary to the tenets of goodness, justice and equality are not afraid of resistance; they are afraid that we might realise that they can be ignored and sow the seeds of a new form of social existence. Now is not the time to tear down the 1%. Now is the time to make them irrelevant.

For more information see United for Global Change – 15th October 2011 and Occupy Together

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Best Ethical Apps for iPhone and Android 2011

Written on September 16, 2011 in Communications & Technology, Lifestyle & Society, Science & Environment

App Store (image by Cristiano Betta, Flickr, CC)

In an app marketplace dominated by games, to-do lists and social media, I thought it would be worth highlighting some ethical apps that are worth taking a look at. Turns out you can use your smartphone to help change the world (and no, I don’t mean by getting Justin Bieber trending on Twitter again).

Here’s a few of the better ones I’ve come across or heard about:

iRecycle (iPhone/Android, Free) – iRecycle is a little utility app that allows you to find the nearest recycling drop-off for a wide range of items. Going well beyond the usual paper/plastic capability you have at home, you can find where to recycle electronic goods, paint, metal, even hazardous material. Seems to have pretty good coverage, although like most apps is primarily focused on the USA and Canada. Also includes relevant news updates and various social media options.

Good Shopping Guide (iPhone £2.99) – It seems that every week, at least, there are new stories about major companies involved in unethical business practices. The power of social media has started to bring these issues much more to the forefront (Nike and Nestle we’re looking at you), and you can also purchase an app for your phone which will help you make ethical shopping decisions while out and about. Outside of the actual brand comparisons, there’s some great information about ethical issues within different categories which can be quite eye-opening and a definite conversation starter for the more ethically minded (for Australian brands, also check out Shop Ethical! USA gets The Good Guide which also very helpfully scans barcodes, and there’s also Free2Work which focuses on ethical labour).

Eco Mania (iPhone £0.69) – Whilst it would be remiss to say that you should rely on edutainment to teach your kids ethical standards, it can’t hurt to throw in a few titles here and there. Eco Mania is a pretty simple iPhone game that aims to teach the player the different categories of recycling and what can and can’t be recycled from home. Aspects of home life such as recycling is something that children should be involved with hands-on, and an app such as Eco Mania helps get the message across.

Privacy Plus (iPad £0.69) – Ethical software isn’t always about environmental sustainability or corporate ethics, privacy should also be considered an issue of ethical importance. Most people don’t really consider the need for privacy on a platform such as the iPad, which is strange considering that it’s often handed around and used by friends, family, visitors, work colleagues and many others. Privacy Plus doesn’t just offer an enhanced browser experience (Safari = bleh), but it also provides basic internet privacy when it comes to removing search terms, cookies, browser history and cache. If you’re on Android, you can one-up this with Orweb which not only has extensive privacy settings but also allows you to route traffic through a proxy service such as Tor – highly recommended.

ONE (iPhone, Free) – As much as it pains me to recommend anything related to Bono, it has to be said that the ONE campaign is onto something here with their collective advocacy app. Unfortunately it’s only available to download in the US, so I haven’t had the opportunity to try it out personally, but just by researching online you can see the capability of an app like this. The main concept is to mobilise large groups of people quickly, whether that be getting them to sign a petition, encourage a viral campaign through social media, or make thousands of phone calls to government officials. It shows a glimpse of how powerful crowd-sourcing can be for ethical purposes, and something that we need to see a lot more of.

United Nations News Reader (iPhone/Android, Free) – Whilst we can, and should, debate about whether or not the United Nations acts ethically on various issues, at the very least we must acknowledge that the UN often has an agenda that focuses on human rights, the environment, poverty reduction and many other pivotal ethical issues of the 21st century. This app keeps all the updates in one place, and is a great way to keep abreast of the current issues being tackled. There’s also Human Rights Watch which takes a particular focus on news relating to that topic.

Congress (Android, Free) – Unfortunately I haven’t been able to test any of the Android apps out (not owning an Android phone), but I’ve chosen Congress to represent a category of smartphone applications that help you better engage with your government and the democratic process. It’s important to utilise new technology in a way that allows greater representation and communication of and between members of society, and apps such as Congress which provide detailed and up-to-date listings of government representatives, the latest bills and laws being passed, and the results of various hearings are vital for the long-term wellbeing of modern society. For the iPad, check out MyCongress.

Seafood Watch (iPhone/Android, Free) – Quite a slick app for what many would consider a rather niche focus, Seafood Watch provides you with detailed information about how different types of seafood are caught or farmed and where to find the most ethically sourced specimens. User created content helps keep it up-to-date, although the focus is primarily North American.

iHobo (iPhone, Free) – An interesting example of how to make an impact with new technology, iHobo is kind of like the Tamagotchi of homeless advocacy. It’s a three-day application that puts a young homeless man on your phone, and how you react to his needs influences his fate. It’s an app that promotes empathy and compassion, and one that will make it harder to just dismiss that person on the street next time they ask you for some spare change. A great example from the charity sector by Depaul UK.

ObscuraCam (Android, Free) – Another one for the privacy crowd, this time related to the taking of photos on your Android phone. It allows you to pixelate faces or other areas on the photos that you take, and also removes EXIF metadata which is capable of storing things like date, time and location of the photo within the image file.

I was also going to include Sukey, an app that allowed protesters to communicate the location of police in real-time and avoid kettling tactics, but perhaps not surprisingly the website is no longer live. Do we think this had anything to do with the recent UK riots?

What other ethical apps are out there? Let us know by commenting below!

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Hack the Planet! LulzSec, Anonymous and the Call for Accountability

Written on June 24, 2011 in Communications & Technology, Lifestyle & Society

Over the last couple of weeks we have seen renewed scrutiny on elements within the cyber-underworld; most outspoken being the group of hackers under the banner of LulzSec who have gone on a very public crusade of service disruption and network infiltration for various reasons based in both ideology and frivolity.

We’ve also seen the saga take some more intriguing turns – such as the possibly unrelated but still relevant and deeply intriguing hack of Bitcoin, and the ideological rally call of “Operation AntiSec” and its initial results. The fight has even become personal for some lone-wolf hackers and security experts who are seeking to bring justice down on LulzSec themselves with some seemingly pertinent recent results.

But with no clear investigative breakthroughs, all of the ire of the authorities has focused momentarily on one 19 year old individual, Ryan Cleary, who seemingly has only a tangential relationship to current events but nonetheless has become the media’s pariah to be hung out for responsible citizens to tutt, scoff and shake their heads at the misspent youth of today whilst collectively reinforcing their own social prejudices.

If you go with the media on this one, then we are being besieged by rampaging and highly organised groups of hackers who are determined to undermine everything good and just about society in order to bring about their particular vision of anarchy and irreverence. Amongst this very public game of cat and mouse (that, for the moment at least, the hackers seem to be winning), the focus has become firmly planted on how global authorities are going to protect corporate and social interests from this new brand of internet vigilante.

What is missing from this equation, though, is recognition of the glaring betrayal of trust by corporate and government bodies that are allowing our personal data to be compromised so easily and continuously. Where is the call for more accountability from organisations that harbour or profit from our personal identities and online movements? The digital landscape continues to grow exponentially and our identities are more and more completely represented across its terrain; yet we still do not demand that the information be treated with the respect and security that should be considered mandatory to our handing over of such personal details.

Does nobody question that the attacked are also somewhat culpable in this modern saga, and that not all of the retribution should be focused solely on those individuals who openly and vocally highlight very real and glaring flaws in the current status quo? As much as we might wish to demonise groups such as LulzSec, we have to at least recognise that they are committing their crimes in a very public forum – tweeting it from the rooftops in fact – so that at least some of us might pay more attention to the fundamental requirements for both transparency and security (each according to their own context and place) that the new digital society must be founded upon.

To be clear here: those who commit crimes according to the law should be held accountable, but there is also something inspirational about the fact that, no matter what, there will always be people willing to stand up and say no to the possibility of wide-scale social injustice. This is an aspect of human social activism that shouldn’t merely be denigrated, but rather we should at least try and empathise with the reasons behind their activities and see whether or not there is a valid message to be heard that comments on the direction that modern society is (for the most part) trundling blindly towards. Believe it or not, you can penalise the perpetrators whilst at the same time considering and learning from their stated purpose.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a hacker story without bringing up the media darling Anonymous into the equation – and it is here where a few aspects of this story need to be cleared up and re-examined in a different light. If you go with the current spin then you would say that LulzSec evolved out of a schism within Anonymous; referred to here as an organisation which can actually break apart in such a way.

But Anonymous is no longer possible to pin down, it is not merely – nor ever truly was – a hacker collective in the same way that LulzSec is, it is not even any longer locatable within the minds and desires of various tech-savvy denizens of 4chan or other associated IRC channels or modes of communication. Anonymous is not an organisation, it is a medium of expression.

The original loose-collective of individuals (who will forever now be lost to the annals of history, remaining eternally anonymous) has spawned something greater than themselves; something which actually emerged organically rather than strategically, that the cosmos developed through the ideological processes inherent in our physical constitution. Anonymous can never be destroyed because it now exists as part of the collective consciousness of the new digital society; it can never be targeted as a group because there is no physical structure to focus upon; it can never be owned because as soon as something is grasped it becomes a localised manifestation with its own boundaries that remove it from the original medium of expression.

Saying this does not condone illegal behaviour, does not promote the infiltration of corporate or government networks, and actively rallies against the idea that Anonymous is only the bastion of those individuals who choose to live in the normally unseen corners of the digital landscape. Even if those who wish to identify themselves with it disagree, as a medium of expression it has no leaders; nobody to ultimately control how it can be used; no ultimate structure to rally against; no single source or location of activity. This means it can be used for both positive and negative outcomes, for both legal and illegal activity, for both (to put it bluntly) good and evil purposes.

Which is why we should not uncritically accept the notion that this modern take on the anti-authoritarian movement is something to be vehemently feared and persecuted, a scourge on modern society that must be eradicated at all costs. For to take up that crusade is ultimately to support a cultural movement against personal autonomy and freedom of expression in exchange for a very small sense of justice for relatively benign criminal activity (most of it on par with aggravated trespassing).

Will there be actions committed that are undesirable, illegal or thoroughly immature? Of course there will be, and have been, for it is the true nature of liberation to allow a space where the freedom to commit such unacceptable acts can co-exist with actions that are inspirational, righteous or socially uplifting. It is not the medium of expression that should be spoken out against, but individual manifestations which can be argued upon, debated on their true impact or – in cases where the law has been broken – dealt with by the justice system in a fair and reasonable fashion that accurately and honestly reflects the severity of their crimes rather than the hyperbolic projection of them.

What must remain throughout is the ability for all of society to partake in this discussion; not merely to accept the agendas and viewpoints of vested interests be they corporate, government, or media. We can disagree with the actions of many who fly the banner of Anonymous, or who belong to more traditional hacking collectives such as LulzSec, whilst still recognising that the issues they are highlighting are very real and important ones to be dealt with in a public forum.

The fact is, hacking like this has always and will always go on as long as there are networks in existence. The difference is that you are now being told about it, and from the mouths of the hackers themselves. Normally what happens is that organised crime syndicates access this information and you are never informed until the moment you see fraudulent charges on your credit cards; or governments at an international level fight off each others’ intrusions constantly in what amounts to the first cyber world war whilst keeping us in the dark about the true scope of these engagements. The activities you are seeing paraded out in the press over recent weeks must be cause for you to pause and consider the true implications of what is occurring – for this is not something that can be swept away by locking a few teenagers and other radicals in prison cells whilst trumpeting victory over the scourge of evil hacking that they represented.

We cannot solve these problems merely through attacking the symptoms of this modern disease. A far greater sense of accountability must be called upon in order to treat the cause of the intrusions, and whilst the hackers are being persecuted for their crimes we must also ensure that those who have been hacked admit their own shortcomings and are held accountable for breaches of personal data that they took on responsibility for in the name of capitalist profit or social governance.

There’s also a factor of personal accountability where we each must seek to better understand where, how and why we hand over personal information to be stored on digital databases on unknown servers around the globe. The fact that many of the government employees who were recently hacked in Arizona had trivial-to-crack passwords such as ‘12345’ or ‘rosebud’ highlights this element of personal accountability that must be pushed in the quest for greater digital responsibility.

Ultimately, a greater level of transparency should be considered vital to a truly representative democracy. Although it is problematic and potentially dangerous to approach this issue without any concern for legal process, this should not mean that we stand idly by and allow those who wish to fight for such causes to be demonised beyond any realistic assessment of their actions. When the powers that be come knocking and seek to take away more of our civil liberties in the name of protecting us from this perceived scourge (whilst at the same time using these tactics against us themselves) we must stand firm and announce that although we might disagree with their methods, we will not allow the destruction of the universal medium of expression that enables us to stand together; united under the banner of true accountability which shall result in long-lasting freedom and liberty for all members of society.

[Update: As of today - 26th June - it seems that LulzSec has taken it upon itself to disband, which is probably a very wise move when numerous global governments are baying for retribution. The AntiSec movement has seen a renewed focus because of their efforts, and the issues raised are ones we must continue to discuss openly and thoroughly.]

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Taking Control of Your Digital Footprint

Written on June 14, 2011 in Communications & Technology, Featured Article

With each passing week it seems that we hear more controversy over our privacy online and the systems being put into place, particularly on social media platforms, that enable an increasing amount of data to not only be collected about us but publicly displayed. For this reason, I thought it would be good to go back to an instructional post that will look at some of the ways you can reign in your digital footprint if you wish.

Your digital footprint is the total sum of the data out there that is connected in an identifiable way to you as an individual. This has both public and private aspects: examples of private aspects are government databases, and public ones are usually online communications or profiles. Being aware of the information about us, particularly that which is publicly available, is going to become an increasingly important skill to develop, and part of this awareness is an understanding of just where and how you can control these elements.

Unfortunately, it is increasingly true that you can’t control these things if you actually want to use services such as those provided by Google or Facebook (and you definitely can’t when it comes to government databases); however, we are thankfully still at the point where most public focused, and even quite a bit of corporate, data can still be controlled if you take a few simple steps.

Learn how to control your interface
The place to begin with is actually the element you have the most control over, the physical device or software that you are using to go online. Learning how to use your firewall and browser security settings when going online is absolutely vital to building a solid foundation for digital privacy and ownership. Combine this with an understanding of how websites work (for example, Cookies) and the data that is being traded back and forth when you visit one and you are on good standing.

Search for yourself online
Yes, I realise it’s kind of a running joke of narcissism to run an internet search on yourself; but the fact is that if you want to take control of your digital footprint you need to know just what is out there. Of course, you are only going to be able to find those components that are publicly accessible – but at this point those are the ones worth focusing on. Don’t just search for your name (particularly if it’s a common one), you have to search for your name and add various platforms/topics that you know you have discussed online in some fashion. Add to this any commonly used aliases in order to get a more complete picture (pay particular attention to points where these aliases might overlap, allowing a connection to be made). You will often be surprised just how long stuff sticks around. When I did this, I found a guest-book entry from last century (remember website guest books? how quaint)…

Delete old accounts or contact websites
Once you know what’s out there, you can start trying to get rid of it (if you want to). For online forums, if you can still remember your password then you can log in and start scrubbing clean manually. You should do this particularly for any identifying information that you might have put out there, or even delete the account entirely if you no longer intend to use it (AccountKiller is useful for this, because it’s not always straight forward).

An alternative to deleting individual posts on forums is often to contact the site administrators and ask if your account can be deleted, along with all of the messages associated with it. Many websites won’t like doing this for legacy reasons (it makes archived conversations difficult to follow when messages are missing), but if you ask nicely they’ll often do things like change the username or other options that distance the information from your digital footprint. Also keep in mind that posts you make on Facebook groups are now publicly searchable (even if you made them years ago), so it might be time to go back and get rid of some of them because chances are you used your full name for Facebook, right?

Vary the information you provide
Part of taking control of your digital footprint comes from preventative measures, and one of the easiest and most effective ones is to vary the data you give for particular items. For example, when you create usernames or login accounts don’t always use the same ones (particularly for public forums or comments); also keep in mind that you don’t always have to give your correct birth-date to just any random commercial company (yes, even Facebook), so have a few fake ones that you hand out. There are countless other examples, but the point is to make your data more difficult to correlate with just one single individual.

There are likely many people out there that have your name, but few of them share the same birthday; fewer still birthday and city; fewer even still use your online handle etc. Varying the data is about making it more difficult to trace connections, so wherever it is legal to do so you should be doing it unless you want everything you say to be connected directly to you and in the public domain. It should also be obvious by now, but don’t use the same password for everything (!) – if you must reuse passwords at least create a layered system that gets more secure and less used as you move through it.

Pay attention to privacy settings
This one applies mostly to social media platforms, and in particular to the anti-privacy strategy of Facebook, but is also relevant to corporate databases that you might sign up to. If you haven’t already checked your privacy settings/conditions (all of them, not just the basic ones), then you are probably in for a bit of a surprise about the amount of information you are allowing to be shared (or in the case of corporations, sold) about you.

Common things which people don’t consider are: allowing friends of friends to access your data; allowing third-party companies to access your data; allowing your listings to show up in public searches; allowing people to indicate your current location; grouping your contacts into different categories of transparency (separate work from play!); signing up for third-party offers and information; or giving over your name and address to just anyone who asks for it online or off. Reigning in your social media privacy settings alone can go a long way towards controlling your overall digital footprint these days, so pay close attention to it.

Actively create your footprint
Taking control over something also means to be proactive about its creation, rather than just being involved in its deletion. One of the best ways for you to control your digital footprint is to start with a clear idea in mind of what you want to be part of your public reputation and start developing it. Social media profiles such as those on Linked In, Facebook, or Twitter; YouTube channels with video of yourself; Blogs and Websites etc.

All of these things are about the active creation of a digital footprint that you have designed rather than inherited. You do have to keep in mind, particularly if you are young and outspoken, that you might change your view on things over time and be left with a clean up problem somewhere down the line (which is in large part what this article is discussing) – but in a world where online communication and representation is becoming increasingly unavoidable, maybe the best way of controlling your digital footprint is to embrace it wholeheartedly. The point here really is to presume that everything you do online will be publicly accessible and connected to you, thereby making you take pause for thought before adding to the vast amount of data being created on a daily basis. This might not truly be the case, particularly if you follow some basic rules, but it can’t hurt to presume it nonetheless.

Be aware of what a digital footprint is
The fact is that you are never going to be able to get rid of your digital footprint entirely – it actually exists in today’s society from the moment you are born and those details are put into the national register. The amount of privately collated data is just staggering, and in many ways unfortunately unavoidable. From a public data perspective, in many instances it can be quite beneficial to have easily identifiable information out there; particularly if you are trying to develop a reputation for personal or professional reasons. What you must always keep in mind, however, is that there are certain types of information that can be used against you in negative ways (addresses, bithdays, full names, current location, photos, outspoken views).

Being aware of the information you are putting out is the first necessary step in deciding on whether you want it to be there or not. Unfortunately, current social media platforms such as Facebook often try and slip these things past you without properly explaining their true implications. Your digital footprint can come back to haunt you when you are going for those job or university interviews; being unaware of it can also lead to issues such as identity theft, online stalking or social profiling to name but a few. The key is to be informed and aware. You might not be able to control many things that are already part of your digital footprint, but at the very least you can control some of the things that might be added to it in the future. Taking control of your digital footprint is an important skill to master as we head further into the information age, and by following the few steps above you can be well on your way.

These are just a few small and easy ways that you can take more ownership over your digital footprint – can you add any other useful tips to the list?

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Your Life: The Videogame?

Written on March 1, 2011 in Communications & Technology, Lifestyle & Society

Continuing the gaming focus of the last post, I wanted to look at something that we will likely see in the near future of videogames: the conversion of everyday activity into a gaming context. We’ve already seen a few examples of this take place and it is a form of gaming that has yet to really emerge but one that will take off once the mainstream crowds are drawn into the addictive lure of turning everyday mundane actions into status-based achievements.

If it is the individual that creates meaning in their own lives, then could gaming be the catalyst for increasing motivation, analysing success or just plain ego gratification?

Before you think this concept is too far-fetched, let’s have a quick look at a few examples that have already attempted this in various ways. The most popular of these is FourSquare, a location check-in application that currently has over 6 million users. The creator, Dennis Crowley, has gone on record stating that he was inspired by videogames, and this certainly shows as you collect badges depending on various milestones achieved – kind of like a social media boyscout troop. From simple things such as your first check-in, to more complicated activities such as checking in to the same venue as 50 other people (which usually only occurs at web-focused conferences or expos) or whilst on a boat. The more of these you collect, the more your social standing within the world of FourSquare increases and every badge received comes with a little sense of satisfaction. Add to this the concept of becoming a ‘mayor’ of a venue (i.e. the person who checks in the most), which sometimes comes with certain perks like purchase discounts, and you can begin to see how the simple act of going through your daily motions has had an extra layer of ‘game’ placed over it. FourSquare seems to be de-emphasising this gaming aspect over time; but it is undeniable that a large part of its initial appeal to users comes from these mechanics.

Moving on, mobile phones are now home to a number of applications that very specifically try to turn your life into one filled with experience points and levelling up. The appropriately named EpicWin is currently the main contender for this crown, and it is doing a pretty fine job of it. Unlike the approach taken by FourSquare, which sees gaming elements applied in a more abstract manner, EpicWin directly and openly tries to turn your life into a videogame. Here you level up a character – with traditional RPG stats such as strength, stamina and intellect – by assigning yourself tasks and completing them. With each task or chore achieved, you receive a self-assigned amount of points and your character progresses along a map in the game – giving you a sense of accomplishment and encouraging you to be more productive. Obviously such a system is easily broken, but to do so is to miss the entire point of the application and given that it is a solo experience (and therefore has no real sense of competition) there really is no incentive to do this.

It’s a great idea which unfortunately in this instance is still lacking somewhat, being little more than a glorified to-do list. However, the proof of concept and market space (the application is not a free one, and is selling well) is there and from personal experience I can say that I was more productive whilst playing around with this application; although admittedly my interest in it waned after a week or two as it lacks the depth and reward structure to be truly engrossing.

Will we see ideas such as these become more varied and fleshed out in the future? Absolutely and undoubtedly, and there is a simple reason why: economics. The profit available from any product or platform online is in almost all instances directly proportionate to the amount of time that people spend using it, particularly when we are talking about social media applications. The more time people spend on your platform the more your advertising space is worth or the more microtransactions you can convince people to purchase. For this reason alone, this blurring of the game/life divide will be explored; as the company that can successfully combine the addictiveness, competition and depth of a game like World of Warcraft with a real-world (socially acceptable and constantly used) utility and convince enough people to use it to achieve critical mass will be a multi-billion dollar organisation within a matter of months.

Consider Facebook and how widespread and addictive it already is. Now think about how much more engaging a platform it would become if every time you uploaded a photo, made a status update, or wrote on somebody’s wall you were awarded points that went towards levelling up your profile through various rankings. Or alternatively, if other people could give you points based upon your actions that they approved of (every ‘like’ gives you +1 to your popularity attribute; every time somebody shares one of your links +5 to your town-cryer skill). They could even make it quite detailed, and have a class-based system which saw you level up different aspects of your profile based on certain activities (tagging friends in photos and videos adds to your ‘social mogul’ status; writing on other people’s walls levels up your ‘gossip queen’ rank). If you thought Everquest or World of Warcraft were insidious with their ability to addict millions; just think about what would happen if such a reward system was implemented on Facebook!

Whether or not they would actually do this is highly debatable and at this stage of their success probably unnecessary, but somebody will try (if they haven’t already, I’m not sure if third-party Facebook applications can actually implement this) and eventually someone will succeed at gaining that critical mass necessary for this concept to become part of everyday life for many millions of people.

There are countless other possible examples of ways that your life could incorporate gaming elements to a greater or lesser extent. Augmented reality applications, which have been discussed here on Future Conscience before, are a technically impressive way to do this and there are already a number of great examples of developers trying to re-envisage the way we view the streets and landmarks around us.

What will be very interesting to see is how competitive these systems become, which is to say they will prove more commercially successful the more they are able to implement interaction and a sense of ranking between players. The vast majority of us are already inherently competitive when it comes to other people’s lifestyles and achievements, even if we are adept at masking it, and social media has shown that if you give people a platform to call out their own successes then they will use it – loudly. Give them a platform where their successes are constantly collated and compared to others in real-time…?

I can easily foresee a future where gaming begins to fuse with our daily existence to such an extent that the two become almost indistinguishable. It could even be to the extent that your ‘level’ or ‘attributes’ gained could directly impact the likelihood of succeeding at a job, college application or other such competitive placement. If the system was externally dictated (i.e. tasks and points were not self-assigned), secure and non-exploitable, then your achievements within it would count for a lot more than a traditional game would and could be seen as a kind of curriculum vitae. After-all, every level/skill/attribute would directly correlate to real-world experience, motivation and successful implementation. It could act like a kind of independent life-auditing scheme, in which those who are active and succeed at life (according to the metrics of success set by the designers) are given higher levels/skills/attrubutes than those who do not meet these criteria. As awful as that sounds, I really can see future attempts at implementing such a thing – the ramifications that we would have to consider if it were ever successful and widespread are grounds for another post entirely!

I clearly haven’t covered all of the possible manifestations of this idea – but they can be summed up in a simple dichotomy. Do we bring videogame tropes into various aspects of our life, or do we bring our life directly into the context of a videogame paradigm? We’re definitely going to see many examples of the former emerge over the next few years and, whilst the second part of that equation may seem over-the-top and a bit ridiculous right now, only a few years ago many people would laugh at the idea of other people being allowed to publicly display photos of them drunk on the weekend to everyone in real-time (to bring out this overused example once more).

Things change, and they change with increasing speed in today’s technologically developed world. Within five years we could be thinking about how we ever lived without our Starbucks coffee each morning providing us with 5 extra bonus points towards our loyalty attribute, a statistic which other non-related companies might use to then offer incentives to highly loyal customers to try their product too (yes, I can see the irony in that situation)… all of these things easily tracked through our universal personal device (previously known as a mobile phone) that never leaves our side and is even used to track our sleeping patterns (bonus experience in the partying skill for those who can stay out all night! Bonus points in the dependability attribute for those who get up early for work).

Combining the rapidly growing sectors of social media, location software, augmented reality, professional productivity and mobile platforms with the ego-stroking peer group competition and carrot/donkey mechanics of massively multiplayer online gaming really isn’t that difficult to conceive of. In fact, it seems like a match made in capitalist heaven. We can be assured that it will be attempted on this scale at some stage – the real question is will it be widely accepted? And, if so, what will that mean for the construction of our social identities and personal understanding of self-worth?

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