Do you really think said hackers are "gleefully building these tools" specifically in order to enable a surveillance state?
Of course not.
It's been said a million times before: every technology can be used for good or for ill. After all, the technology that enables you to drink the water coming out of your tap, one of the most important developments in the history of mankind, is the very same technology that makes mustard gas possible.
And of course there's that quintessential example: nuclear fission, equally capable of saving or destroying billions.
In fact, I'd go so far as to claim that every technology mankind has ever invented to benefit itself has eventually been turned against us. After all, last I checked fire was a pretty common weapon of war.
So is it possible that folks at Google are nefariously turning us all into biological components of their computing infrastructure, and in the process deliberately and consciously empowering a government-corporate surveillance state? Yes, it's possible.
It's equally (I'd like to believe more) likely someone just thought it'd be cool if my phone tracked my location and could provide me sight-seeing suggestions when I'm in a new city.
Now, this doesn't take away from the fundamental point of the article: that technology available today is changing our lives with consequences we have yet to fully comprehend, and will likely fundamentally change the way society functions. But I think it's unnecessarily cynical to believe those inventing said technology are deliberately attempting to bring about the dystopian future the author envisions.
> It's been said a million times before: every technology can be used for good or for ill
But what is the "good" about what we're building? The most cringe-worthy justification I have ever read for giving up privacy was this post by an Ex-Googler[1]:
> Digital identity unlocks universal personalization (i.e. better ads), payments and commerce (i.e. Snapcash), environmental adaptation (i.e. an Uber that plays your Spotify music), communications (i.e. Path Talk), and access (i.e. Sosh Concierge). Today’s most exciting apps are barely scratching the surface of what will be possible when there are years of preferences data stored up on each of us, that we can leverage at a moments notice, in any context.
An Uber that plays your Spotify music and better ads! This is the "good" we are chasing. I have never felt more ashamed to sit in front of a computer.
The general idea from that is: computer systems that know a lot about you can provide personalized services for you or about you. Those services can be to your benefit or detriment, depending on who controls the data, their intentions and their priorities (e.g. quick cash grab vs sustainable customer relations). If you want better examples: Google maps knowing your location allows you to navigate in places where you don't know the surrounding area or where you are exactly; Gmail reading all your mails allows you to filter crud out of your inbox and pretty much solved the spam problem that plagued the 90s; Facebook makes a lot of your life transparent to corporations, but it also does allow you to keep up with the lives of friends in distant places that you don't meet often. Now, I am all for solutions that make your private data more opaque to the services that consume it, and the way they consume it more transparent to you. But services based on your personal information will not disappear, and the reason is not some dark evil conspiracy to monitor your every step (or, at least, not just some dark evil conspiracy to monitor your every step) but the fact that people find this services useful. Like the industrial revolution, the issue is not that we are going forward with this new uses of energy/information, but that we are doing so largely without consideration of their harmful externalities (pollution in the case of the industrial revolution, misuse of private data in the case of the information one).
Even more uncomfortable: most of us are using them - even knowing all the dangers and even knowing how much we are giving control to others - because we find the tools useful.
Of course not.
It's been said a million times before: every technology can be used for good or for ill. After all, the technology that enables you to drink the water coming out of your tap, one of the most important developments in the history of mankind, is the very same technology that makes mustard gas possible.
And of course there's that quintessential example: nuclear fission, equally capable of saving or destroying billions.
In fact, I'd go so far as to claim that every technology mankind has ever invented to benefit itself has eventually been turned against us. After all, last I checked fire was a pretty common weapon of war.
So is it possible that folks at Google are nefariously turning us all into biological components of their computing infrastructure, and in the process deliberately and consciously empowering a government-corporate surveillance state? Yes, it's possible.
It's equally (I'd like to believe more) likely someone just thought it'd be cool if my phone tracked my location and could provide me sight-seeing suggestions when I'm in a new city.
Now, this doesn't take away from the fundamental point of the article: that technology available today is changing our lives with consequences we have yet to fully comprehend, and will likely fundamentally change the way society functions. But I think it's unnecessarily cynical to believe those inventing said technology are deliberately attempting to bring about the dystopian future the author envisions.