Social media on crack to the point that it dictates and controls the stream of experiences in your life. Nosedive felt like a nightmarish way to live but it was unlike any other black mirror episode in the way the story is presented. Throughout the episode I found myself facing moments of unease and deep realization brought me closer to the true meaning of this story. We all have presumptive assumptions about the people we encounter digitally on a daily basis. These assumptions bring us further away from deep connection with people when its done on a social networking platform. Social media paints a false picture of peoples’ lives and Nosedive takes it steps further by engulfing a person’s entire life and capabilities according to their social rating. Ratings dictate everything even to the point that Lacie wants to move into a housing complex and it requires a minimum rating she doesn’t currently have so its used to show how exclusivity of a “higher class” is controlled. I felt attacked when Lacie gave the man a good rating because he direly needed it and the people all around her saw that as a weakness on her part and gave her bad ratings for it. Social media feels like that sometimes because you may not feel comfortable voicing your opinion online where it is up for judgement by others. It breeds a society of fakeness where people only do what they perceive is best for their image but doesn’t actually represent who they are as a person and their beliefs. Nosedive is a wake up call that makes me want to distance more and more from social media dependency. Social media is not all that bad but it removes us more and more from those organic experiences we should strive to engage in. The pastel colored theme of the episode is another aspect that made Nosedive feel more warm and realistic unlike the other Black Mirror episodes which are dark and overly futuristic.

The Offspring is a quite interesting episode about the development of a new artificial intelligent life created by Data who itself is the first android in the Star Trek series. He creates what he calls Lal from a series of neural network copies of his system and knowledge database. Lal is referred to as his child as Data feels that he is passing on his legacy and uniqueness as a species but Picard feels this was a grave mistake. Creating a new life form bothers him because Data was once a unique being and now that he has created life it brings up a slew of ethical questions. The step forward in technological AI development is what worries the admiral of the Starfleet because it is a huge stride in the field. This stride has been done in secret by Data and it primarily worries the Starfleet that this transition will end their control over all technological development. More importantly they understand how dangerous it can be if there are more androids which can be stolen by enemies who may use them for destruction. This relates so clearly with how technology is developing at this very moment in time. Artificial intelligence is highly researched and developed but where can a society begin to draw the line on the ethics of the matter. How can we teach a system to think for itself and expect it to abide by our strict system of behavioral mannerisms and ethical judgments. The more advanced we become as a society the more control we lose on the things we create. In my field AI seeks to help aid in the processing needs we require to read and analyze data. There are many things that programs aid us in completing exponentially faster and ultimately i can see a future where AI should focus on improving those practices. It worries me that AI could become destructive that is why it should be monitored closely so that it functions within the parameters of what we require it to do.

How does one go about preventing the digital monopoly when google provides a service that no company is able to compete with? They control the market in that sense because their services are so efficient and cater to the entire world.

Safiya Noble unearths a troubling realization in Algorithms of Oppression. She posits that the internet is an oppressive tool used to fuel the subconscious racism deeply rooted in digital algorithms. The internet claims to be a neutral technology yet it feeds us racist and misogynistic qualities without many us even comprehending what is happening. A simple search of “gorgeous” in google images will prove this.

As you can see the “neutral” search engine has displayed numerous white women and its interesting that in this case the word gorgeous is highly attributed to females and fails to show any males. Is the reason for this because women tend to be referred to as gorgeous on the internet more than men or is it because these search engines want to feed us a false idea of what gorgeous is because its backed by organizations and companies who seek to benefit from the idea that gorgeous means a slim and caucasian female? Similarly if you google “handsome” this is what you will get.

Surely now you can see the similarities in the two searches. Again only caucasian men coming up as handsome which is again apparently a “neutral” result according to these digital companies but the the real proof is in the pudding. Noble talks about breaking up these mega monopolistic companies like google because they systematically reinforce racism and sexism. But how does a society go about breaking up these monopolies when the very reason for them existing is because the masses have chosen them over all other alternatives for the daily technological needs. Google comes off as an ethically sound organization that is here to aid society not hurt it but maybe their very existence is a breeding ground for oppression that has surpassed even their control. A network of users feeding these ideas allow the algorithms to learn from them and ultimately turn “neutral algorithms” into biased propaganda machines.  

Her – Quite a strange film. The different thoughts about what a loving romantic relationship is are interesting and a bit concerning. The person in this movie is quite clearly damaged in his view of other people in the world. The computer is like a blank slate that learns how to interact from him, and only him primarily. It is of course going to learn to behave in the way that is most pleasing to him. Obviously this turns into something that he laves, but it is like falling in love with yourself in a way. The computer, while it has it’s own awareness, is inclined toward the user from the start and must use him as its testing platform for anything it may learn from other sources like online, for example. So, for him to fall in love with the OS, is like falling in love with himself. The ex-wife makes a really good point when she says that she is happy he found something to care about that doesn’t have real emotions that he has to deal with. The emotional depth of a computer that only knows one person well, is not comparable to the emotional depth of a normal human being. The fact that this depth is enough for him to be emotionally satisfied is strange to say the least.