BFTP: Egger's The Circle - Google as Big Brother

I saw the new movie The Circle this weekend based on the Egger's book by the same name. Sadly, the movie did not do the book justice. But for those will not read the original, the movie does ask some of the same questions about privacy. Oh, I find Emma Watson as an adult actor (this and Beauty and the Beast) strangely bland. And she was sooo good in the Harry Potter films!

Anyway, I wish everyone would read the book. Here is my review from 2013...

WAR IS PEACE

FREEDOM IS SLAVERY

IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH - Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four

SHARING IS CARING

SECRETS ARE LIES

PRIVACY IS THEFT - Eggers, The Circle

Google's mission is to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful.

 
Effective dystopian novels take current trends and push them to an extreme. In his book The Circle, David Eggers doesn't have to push too hard or too far. The future he envisions is mostly here now. And that's just one of the reasons this book is frightening.

The story starts as 24-year-old Mae Holland begins working for the Circle on its large campus in California. The Circle is an none-too-subtle pseudonym for a Google which has swallowed Facebook, Twitter and a few other social networking companies. Run by a triumvirate of disparate leaders - the hoodie-wearing nerd, the kindly old social engineer, and the avaricious monetizer, the company is doing eveything it can to record, collect, and use data to both make society safer and "less messy" - and make a lot of money in the process. Their projects include nearly invisible cameras placed everywhere, planting tracking chips in children (that also include their international educational "ranking"), and having all public officials go "transparent" by wearing a live camera 24/7. As an employee, Mae is evaluated in real time not only on her customer service performance, but also on her social status with in the company and her influence she has on others' purchasing decisions.*

Eggers isn't dramatic in his lessons about the decline of privacy. Politicians and watch-dogs who raise concerns about the Circle being a monopoly have child pornography and evidence of links to terrorist organizations found on their computers. Mae, when she knows others are watching, skips eating her favorite foods or having a second glass of wine, knowing that her followers are watching. As social networking seems to take over her life, a friend comments, "You comment on things, and that substitutes for doing them." Her parents and old boyfriend who resist social media are characterized as anachronisms.

At the beginning of the book, I was disappointed that Eggars made his protagonist rather dim. But I slowly realized that Mae is not stupid. She is naive, impressionable, and, has a value set more in keeping with today's youth. Mae needs the approval, the immediate gratification, the attention, the stimulation, and the faux affection of her "followers." She is not forced to give up her privacy - she is gently and logically persuaded. She is a sheep being led to the butcher, not attacked by wolves. And she echoes today's Everyman in her lack of concern over personal privacy.

The book does make a case for many potential benefits of monitored society: reduction in crimes like theft and child abuse. Better medical treatments and educational systems. A more democratic, less corruptible political process. Bailey, the social engineer, is on a mission he genuinely believes will improve the world.

The great question this book left me with is "Why do we as humans value privacy so highly?" One doesn't need to be a criminal or a pervert to still not want all of one's life in the public eye. The need for privacy is at a gut level, an inalienable right, and must have some primitive survival component behind it. But what are the tangible benefits of choosing what to share - and what to keep to oneself?

After reading this, I feel I owe an apology to Miquel Guhlin and Steve Hargadon for being an apologist for Google and others for their data collection and use practices. Perhaps I've been a bit more of a sheep than I'd like to admit. Rather than as one character put it "How do we get the inevitable sooner?", we ought to all be thinking a little bit more deeply of the implications of a know-it-all, share-it-all society. 

Read The Circle. It may not be in the classic status of Orwell, but it's an important (and enjoyable) read.

Oh, ironically this review goes out via a blog with links to Facebook, Twitter, Google+. Please like it!!!

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For an excellent review that compares 1984 and The Circle, read Nocera's A World Without Privacy, NYT, Oct 14, 2013.

* After reading The Circle, I was freaked out by the obsequious customer service from Zappos after returning a pair of shoes to them. Hand written card calling me a cute name? Please.

Original post October 25, 2013

The case for social networks in schools yet again

Some educational battles need to be continually re-fought, especially those surrounding intellectual freedom for young adults. I was reminded of this when a parent requested that our district block all social media sites recently*. It was a good nudge for me to think again why I fight for tools that can certainly  be used in both foolish and dangerous ways to remain a part of our educational toolbox. Maybe I needed to re-convince myself.

I have argued that students should have access to Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, and Instagram in many of my posts and articles. But here is the high level summary of why...

1. Access to social media sites is an equity issue. Students whose only Internet access is through school resources - both computers and networks - are disenfranchised from social discourse were we to block these sites. For better or worse, social media has become the country's go-to source for news, opinion, and discussion.
2. Access to social media sites is necessary for students learning safe and appropriate Internet use. School is a place to learn from mistakes. Caring adults surrounding our kids can help rectify poor choices and turn the experience into a "teachable moment." Were students to reach college or work prior to gaining instruction and practice in the use of social media, the mistakes would have greater ramifications and the adult guidance less probable.
3. Access to social media leads to greater care of school-owned devices. On a very pragmatic basis, students will take better care of devices that they find valuable to them. We can harness their love of online interactions and personal inquiry by keeping networks, including social media, as open as possible. The likelihood of students remembering to bring their devices to school, to charge their devices, and to take greater physical care of their devices improves when the device is simply more than a link to digital textbooks and worksheets.

I've called giving student access to social media "the neglected side of intellectual freedom." The fight for human rights, it seems, must be won and then won again and again. I will keep fighting.

* I think we found a good solution for this parent - an extension that we can place on his child's Chrome account that allows him to create his own set of filtering rules. We will see.

Image source

BFTP: Reading incognito and revisiting childhood reads

Reading incognito

Women can now download electronic erotica on their Kindles, Nooks and iPads anywhere they want, with no bodice-ripping Fabio cover to give them away. Maureen Dowd, March 31, 2012

When I started reading on my Kindle six years ago, my wife must have asked me three times a day what I was reading. My standard response was always, "Porn." I don't know why she stopped asking.

I have a love/hate relationship with book covers. They've sucked me into buying a title many times. They are great icebreakers with your seatmate on a long flight ("So how do you like that Dan Brown?") They look pretty on the coffee table.

But at the same time, I am just as happy reading incognito. I think it stems from when as a kid I finished reading all the Hardy Boy mysteries and moved on to Nancy Drew, definitely a "girl's" book I didn't want to be seen reading. And as an adult it was embarrassing to have to go the romance section of B&N to get the latest in the Gabaldon Outlander series. It is historical fiction, not romance, I'd advise the store clerk.

As sad and troubling as these trials may have been for me, I think we all know kids in our schools and libraries who might read more, read more broadly, and certainly read more at an appropriate reading level, if other students couldn't see what they are reading. 

Who want to be seen reading a "baby" book? A book written for the other gender? (The old rule of thumb is that girls will read boys' books but boys won't read girls' books.) A book that may identify a personal problem being experienced. (A book on divorce written for teens, for example.) Even books that are controversial or have strong political or religious messages, can subject the young reader to teasing or questioning.

We need to figure out how to get our materials into digital format as soon as possible. Reading on a digital reader will remove stigmas that may well discourage reading.

Oh, Ms Dowd, I'm guessing it's not just women who are downloading erotica to their Nooks. I a little suprised B&N didn't call it the Nook-E.

Original post April 2, 2012

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Revisiting Childhood Reads

On the evening before our departure I saw them approaching along one of the great avenues which lead into the plaza from the east.  I advanced to meet them, and telling Sola that I would take the responsibility for Dejah Thoris' safekeeping, I directed her to return to her quarters on some trivial errand.  I liked and trusted Sola, but for some reason I desired to be alone with Dejah Thoris, who represented to me all that I had left behind upon Earth in agreeable and congenial companionship. There seemed bonds of mutual interest between us as powerful as though we had been born under the same roof rather than upon different planets, hurtling through space some forty-eight million miles apart.

That she shared my sentiments in this respect I was positive, for on my approach the look of pitiful hopelessness left her sweet countenance to be replaced by a smile of joyful welcome, as she placed her little right hand upon my left shoulder in true red Martian salute.

"Sarkoja told Sola that you had become a true Thark," she said, "and that I would now see no more of you than of any of the other warriors."

"Sarkoja is a liar of the first magnitude," I replied, "notwithstanding the proud claim of the Tharks to absolute verity."

Dejah Thoris laughed. (from A Princess of Mars)

It's always interesting revisiting favorite books from one's misspent youth. In anticipation of seeing the new John Carter movie, I re-read Edgar Rice Burrough's A Princess of Mars on which the movie is based*. I found it surprisingly more enjoyable that I had guessed I would. While the language is stilted and rather Victorian in tone and style, it's action scenes are suspenseful and frequent.

What kind of junior high kid reads books with complex sentences and vocabulary like countenance, verity, and congenial? Who'd read a book in which the heroine is always referred to by both first and last names (Dejah Thoris)? (Or maybe this the Martian equivilant of Mary Ann or Cathy Jo.) I also remember voluntarily reading Gulliver's Travels, Swiss Family Robinson, and The Three Musketeers.

Every time I re-read a book remembered fondly from childhood, I'm a bit awed by the text I needed to deconstruct. And while I've always like to read, I was never considered "gifted and talented." I suspect my teachers had a stamp made that read "Does not live up to potential" that was passed from grade to grade as I moved through school.

I've worried for a long time about how we use technology to "teach" reading. Reading text online and then taking trivia-based multiple guess questions has to be a passion killer for tons of kids. And I've seen first hand as a librarian how the child who can't decode "cat" in the reading primer, does just fine with "carburetor" in Hot Rod magazine.

Reading instruction would improve with fewer computer programs and more kids reading about what they love. Even Martian princesses.

* Free download in lots of places on the web including Project Gutenberg, Amazon, and GoogleBooks.

Original post March 15, 2012