After the diffusion of “The Social Dilemma“, a documentary released by Netflix a few days ago, the people of the internet are convinced that they know more about how the abstract world of social networks works.
The documentary undoubtedly achieved considerable success, but the most experienced eyes was considered somewhat overrated. In fact, at times, the docudrama is banal and gives only a partial view of the situation. For the less informed, who isolated not being aware of the fact that all social media are present with structures that “hyper stimulate” the person, neurologically leading him to a call to action, will have been an illuminating vision. But, for those who have long been wallowing in the turgid waters of communication in the twentieth century, this is nothing new.
The Social Dilemma takes place on two parallel strands:
– an unhappy family because it’s unable to communicate, due to the hyperconnection of the children (always connected and communicating on other more ‘abstract’ channels)
– the story and the real testimony of some of the most relevant collaborators of companies such as Pinterest, Facebook or Google (Tristan Harris, first ethics consultant for Google, then president and co-founder of the Center For Human Technology; Justin Rosenstein co-inventor of the Facebook “like” button; Jaron Lanier, a virtual reality innovator; Shoshana Zuboff, Harvard Business School professor)
The first, trivial part is what happens every day in a family where serious basic communication problems have not been resolved over time. The second part instead contains some really interesting concepts. The main concept it wants to convey is:
If it’s free, you are the product.
The applications on which we spend most of our time are free to use because they are able to track behaviors and actions that have significant importance for companies and businesses, interested in knowing the subtle mechanisms of their consumers’ psychology and therefore in purchasing advertising and data.
The fateful ‘avatar‘ is shown, a computer remake of the average personality of each of us, capable of reproducing our attitudes and acting as a test bed for the future actions of advertisers.
Although the vision of the oleographic puppet is quite science fiction (and can therefore lead to disinformation, a principle on which the documentary itself lashes out ..), the concept of tracking and analysis of behavior is right. The most succulent information are the number of clicks on a post, the viewing time and permanence on a particular post, the searches on Google.
Why did Netflix buy the film? Because otherwise there would not have been such great silence about him.
Despite Netflix’s intention to promote niche content, The Social Dilemma is a vision of something most of us already knew. And, if it is true that most of the population currently uses social networks, it is also true that it is still a choice. The applications, which can be easily installed and uninstalled, sometimes have a very unfriendly and discontinuous use. It is no coincidence that a niche of people is emerging, which could expand with time and the different stances of the individual, of a part of young people who increasingly decide to remove these apps from their home.
College students who need to focus on exams, people who refuse to spend screen time, or those who are totally disinterested in the virtual. Certainly some children really have problems with addiction, but the obvious assertion that we are all completely slaves appears, as can be seen from these small but growing gestures, sometimes generalist. The hope is that artificial intelligence stops when it encounters ethical and subtle points, which must not be crossed in order not to replace the human being for the machine, definitively. The introduction of these themes in the popular world will certainly help raise general awareness and knowledge, who knows, will lead to greater attention in the use of these platforms.
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