I read a novel recently - Qualityland.
Its about a country which I think is basically Germany being overtaken by a massive goods retailer supported by associated social media like Fb, twitter, spotify, tinder.
It will be a HBO series at some stage I think. Obviously be based in America.
In the book people are given levels indicating their worth and are sent goods by drone before they even know they want it based on algorithms, and what they can afford and their social media output. A dating app suggests their perfect partner at any time and will suggest a more perfect partner whenever they come up.
Everything is perfect in Qualityland because the numbers say so!
Sci Fi can hold a mirror up to society but there is an element of realism there. We put so much info out there. Even on here you feel like you could neatly group nearly all the yank posters in the lounge into **********s and ********s.
Amazon arent quite there but as they hover up small independent retailers the issue becomes:
If one place sells the best ice cream and has a huge queue but another place sells pretty good ice cream but has no queue. You'll probably go to the place with no queue.
But we are getting to the point where the best place never has a queue because we do not need to go anywhere to physically get anything.
We already know Fb can influence elections with targeted ads to undecided voters. We know data companies can basically model results.
Even on a personal level if you have any sort of self awareness at all (which most people don't) you know a data mining company could probably predict how you'll vote until the day you kick it. They could probably figure out what car you will drive, what house you will live in, who you will marry, the social class of your friends, basically anything. We know dating websites use algorithms.
I suppose hook up websites like tinder are actually an anomaly now.
How often do you truly go off script?
I mean literally anything. Like one day you will wake up and spend $300 dollars on a bottle of aftershave instead of €30. Or you go big and leave your 6 figure salary job to be a postman?
Its about a country which I think is basically Germany being overtaken by a massive goods retailer supported by associated social media like Fb, twitter, spotify, tinder.
It will be a HBO series at some stage I think. Obviously be based in America.
In the book people are given levels indicating their worth and are sent goods by drone before they even know they want it based on algorithms, and what they can afford and their social media output. A dating app suggests their perfect partner at any time and will suggest a more perfect partner whenever they come up.
Everything is perfect in Qualityland because the numbers say so!
Sci Fi can hold a mirror up to society but there is an element of realism there. We put so much info out there. Even on here you feel like you could neatly group nearly all the yank posters in the lounge into **********s and ********s.
Amazon arent quite there but as they hover up small independent retailers the issue becomes:
If one place sells the best ice cream and has a huge queue but another place sells pretty good ice cream but has no queue. You'll probably go to the place with no queue.
But we are getting to the point where the best place never has a queue because we do not need to go anywhere to physically get anything.
We already know Fb can influence elections with targeted ads to undecided voters. We know data companies can basically model results.
Even on a personal level if you have any sort of self awareness at all (which most people don't) you know a data mining company could probably predict how you'll vote until the day you kick it. They could probably figure out what car you will drive, what house you will live in, who you will marry, the social class of your friends, basically anything. We know dating websites use algorithms.
I suppose hook up websites like tinder are actually an anomaly now.
How often do you truly go off script?
I mean literally anything. Like one day you will wake up and spend $300 dollars on a bottle of aftershave instead of €30. Or you go big and leave your 6 figure salary job to be a postman?
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