DATAcide: The Total Annihilation of Life as We Know It
The internet is other people, and what we get is what people, on the whole, want. It's like the olympic gold medal in <i>Cool Runnings</i>: if your life is meaningless without it, it's still going to be meaningless with it.<p>> These are the most boring people on the planet.<p>Yes, we are. That's the real revolution here: that you don't have to be "wacky" to participate, to set the agenda even. Facebook forces us to accept that most people are boring. Forces us to at least consider the possibility that terrifies the politico-artistic-humanities complex - that maybe it's ok to be boring.<p>> if our data is the oil of the 21st century, then why aren’t we all sheikhs?<p>Or maybe our data isn't actually that valuable. Maybe it's worth approximately what we sell it for.<p>> There’s no sneering, no sarcasm, and no self-deprecation. Everyone is just sort of floating along in an earnest tranquility. As if each anecdote about “that cool loft I found on Airbnb” contained some deep spiritual significance beyond my grasp.<p>Isn't this a good thing? What do we think the author would have written if everyone were being cynical and snarky?<p>> magical cloud of squandered human potential<p>No such thing. Data isn't destroying these things - it's just forcing us to realize that they were myths all along. I think the author kind of acknowledges this with the statement about how "those invisible power structures continue to thrive."<p>The Internet only amplifies what's already there. It can, and does, help you do what you want with your life. But you have to decide what that is for yourself.