Digital Dilemma, True Confessions

Imagination Stagnation

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This weekend I went to see The Dog Man Musical. It was a live performance. Throughout the show, I felt really impressed how the actors moved through different roles, scenes, and moods. They accomplished this all with simple props, voice changes, and accesories. For example, one character was both L’il Petey, a tiny cute kitten, a nurse, plus other minor characters and scenery. To switch between the nurse and kitten, she put on an orange hat with ears or a nurse’s hat. When she was the kitten, she unrolled her orange shirt sleeves which had black stripes on them. The point is, the actors did a few small things and my imagination filled in the gaps. This demonstrates the magic of live performance and the power of our own internal creativity.

During the show, the main set remained the same, inside of a treehouse. However, similar to the actors changing roles, the treehouse transformed into many different scenes. Again, this was accomplished with simple prop changes, most of the which the actors moved on and off themselves as part of the action. For example, during the two hospital scenes, the patient lay on a desk in the treehouse. Then one of the actors held up a sheet so we didn’t actually “see” the action, but got a strong idea of what was happening anyway. After, the sheet was removed and we saw the end result. Again, our imaginations taking care of some steps.

With the introduction of generative, and now agentic AI, on the scene, I feel concerned about our imaginations. Sometimes too much automation and technology isn’t beneficial for our development. The other week I read an article in the NYTimes, “What 370,000 College Essays Tell Us About A.I.’s Effects on Creativity.” In short, the results were not good. Based on the analysis, the essays submitted post-AI demonstrated less variety and range of original, different ideas. Basically, the use of AI was resulting in a more limited number of ideas. This is presumably because AI is based on prediction derived from what happened previously. That doesn’t leave a lot of room for something new, innovative, and totally different.

Sometimes less is more when it comes to developing and cutlivating our imaginative powers.

Digital Dilemma, Google, Social Media

How Smart are Smart Glasses?

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Many years ago I blogged about smart glasses. At the time they were a new invention from Google. People who wore them were refered to as “gla**holes“. Smart glasses are kind of what they sound like. Basically a pair of glasses with built-in technology. They allow people to do a range of tasks hand-free including taking pictures or video, searching for information, or answering a phone call.

For many reasons, Google’s attempt at smart glasses never really transpired to much for everyday consumers. I believe some business uses developed for the glasses such as doctors using them to take notes and call up patient information during an exam.

However, one of the main reasons the glasses weren’t more popular had to do with privacy concerns. The concerns weren’t so much focused on the user’s information and habits, but rather on the people around them. With cameras built so discreetly into a pair of glasses anybody wearing them could capture images of anything, all with a seemingly harmless glance. Another reason for the lack of acceptance probably had to do with the price tag.

Flash forward 10 years and Meta, partnered with Ray Ban, launched version 2.0 of their smart glasses. The price is lower, starting around $300+ and available in prescription or clear lenses. The improved technology provides a more seamless user experience and more capabilities. Users can now listen to music, answer calls, take pictures, record videos, and search for information, some of the actions powered with AI. All of this accomplished with simple voice commands.

Although, the same privacy concerns still exist for others. Recording video or taking pictures of bystanders is as easy as a glance in someone’s direction. However, it seems in today’s super-charged media-frenzied world of influencers and surveillance where everybody has recording devices handy, perhaps this isn’t such a big deal. What feels like a big deal to me is the privacy of the person wearing the glasses. With so many scary AI threats and cybersecurity issues surfacing, I want to be less connected to the digital world. I would definitely worry about some random AI being able to hack my smart glasses.

Furthermore, the glasses require pairing with another device to have real use. The limited battery supply, lasting mere hours, also made me question how useful these glasses could be for anyone with a real prescription.

Human Archives

Larger than Life

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This past weekend I had the privilege and luck to finish my orchestral season with Carmina Burana. Though the name might not be rescognizable, the first movement is popular and iconic.. It’s been featured in 40+ films, commercials, cartoons, and generated parodies. As the conductor mentioned in his opening remarks, it’s created a “music of doom” movement.

The other opening remarks encouraged us to appreciate listening to live music. Another powerful reminder was to enjoy being part of something larger than ourselves. These words resonated strongly with me. I was sitting in the stage area, one of over 200 performers. The choir alone numbered around 160. In the orchestra extra players squeezed in where they could fit to play all the parts. We didn’t have a lot of space, but it hardly mattered. It’s rare to have the opportunity to play in such a big work, given the amount of preparation time and coordination required. Each of us individually made the commitment to ourselves and everyone else to play our part to recreate this momentus work.

I didn’t know much about Carmina Burana when I agreed to the concert. However, I looked it up. I felt delighted to learn that old medieval texts inspired the music. To me this represented the magic of music and aligned with the piece itself. Carmina Burana repurposed these ancient texts into something mesmerizing and captivating. In turn, many others recreate Carmina Burana into other works with new interpretations and meanings. Thus giving new life repeatedly to more than one incredible piece.

I have to confess, I did experience a bit of fatigue towards the end of the piece. It runs slightly over an hour and it was the second half of the program. This is mostly because I don’t play for 5 movements and my brain starts to feel tired from all the counting and focusing. However, I perked up in the last two movements. The main theme comes roaring back with a resurgence of energy. The movements pass quickly and you can feel the full spirit, intensity, focus, and effort from all 200+ people. We’re all centered on the same outcome. I remember feeling a charge and elation from the last few minutes of the piece. As the audience cheered, I stood up with everyone else, grinning, despite my tired mouth, and experienced for a brief moment a sensation larger than life.

Digital Dilemma, Social Media

The Attention Hijack

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I recently read an article about a famous children’s book author being critical of children watching screens too much. His position was that the children are reflecting the world we’ve created for them. The fix is to read to them more. Likely he meant read more paper books to children. While I agree with this, especially being a librarian, I think the solution is not as easy as he makes it seem.

When considering the state we’re in, most of us with a unhealthy addiction to our screens, it’s not so easy to disengage. Many services and communications are also only possible with our smartphones. I went to a new exercise studio this past weekend and the only way to register and pay for classes is through an app! Without a phone, there would be no way to participate. Even with my gym, I need the app on my phone to scan in at the front desk.

Technology companies also pay lots of money in research to keep us engaged and addicted to our phones. I’ve heard descriptions of these technologies as being as addictive as slot machines. Our attention, along with our data, is the most valuable commodity to these companies. With social media sites, everything about how they design them is geared towards capturing and keeping our attention. Some of the strategies include features such as a continuous scroll. This allows us to keep going and going, further and further down the rabbit hole.

Another feature is when videos auto-play continuously with barely a gap in between. The videos don’t stop at the end providing us with a moment of pause, and maybe reflection, to consciously decide if we want to play another video, or maybe go do something else. It also takes away our choice of what video we might want to play next. The next video plays automatically. It’s something determined by an algorithm to give us more of the same, based on past choices and perceived preferences.

Back to the children author’s remark, it’s not that easy for us to fight against the effort and manipulations of these powerful companies. These companies hire the best researchers and throw obscene amounts of money in a calculated effort to hijack our attention. Everything about it creates a dependency on these technologies, one that’s not so easy to prevent children from interacting with.

Human Archives

Getting Your Feet Wet

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Yesterday, while strolling next to the lake, we had the good fortune to see three geese families and their little goslings. It was one of the first nice days we’ve had since winter ended. My heart rejoiced to feel warmth and see so much activity, both human and animal. We stopped to watch the geese eating. They were munching in the grass fields with focus and purpose. Counting the goslings was hard since they were scampering around, resting, eating, and trying to keep up. However, I would estimate there were around twenty.

We continued our walk. After a few minutes I turned back to check on the geese. We spotted them crossing the promenade to reach the lake. Though some of the promenade is closer to the lake, the geese picked one of the highest. We backtracked to watch since I couldn’t imagine how all those tiny, cute, fuzzy, golden goslings would make their way into the lake.

Without too much hesitation, we watched the first family all jump right off the promenade directly into the lake. These goslings were a bit older judging by their size and color of their down. However, there were still at least a dozen small goslings all pipping and squeaking at the edge. The parents tried to usher the goslings in, but didn’t have much luck. Then they just jumped in the water and waited. All the goslings crowded and jostled at the edge watching their parents.

I watched in amazement as those tiny creatures mustered up the courage to fling themselves right into the water. I’m sure the water was also freezing cold, even though it was hot out. At one point, we thought there was only one left. But she started pipping and ran to the side. She came back with one other gosling. One of them jumped in and then only one remained. The last gosling kept squeaking, starting and stopping to take this giant leap of faith. Going to the edge, looking over and then backtracking.

Meanwhile, the geese were starting to drift off, but also keeping a watchful eye on the last gosling. By this point, there was a quite a crowd gathered around to watch the spectacle. Then the gosling jumped, landing with a splash. Everybody clapped and cheered.

One of the parents swam over to collect her into the fold, embracing her into their supportive community.

Digital Dilemma

The Power of Seeing “Eye to Eye”

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I feel that the power of seeing “eye to eye” is even more meaningful with AI lurking around. It seems many headlines focus these days on AI taking over jobs. Or major companies announcing mass layoffs. Although we can’t know the exact reason behind some of these layoffs, I think AI is one possible consideration. This all results in some of us, with decades of working years left in our careers, to contemplate what AI-proof skills can we develop to avoid obsoletion.

Naturally some skills that keep coming up are the ones that require human-to-human interaction. This includes things such as presentation, persuasion, communicating, influencing, and negotiating. All of these kinds of activities require humans to talk to other humans. This is the case even if AI is preparing all of the materials, arguments, rationales, and graphics. For some situations, it requires a human to interact with another human for that special, delicate touch. Learning how to persuade people and get buy in can be challenging. There is a lot of nuance and preparation involved to know how to handle each scenario. Though I’m sure an AI agent can learn to do these things, probably in mere minutes, some people may prefer to interact with another person.

On the flip side, opportunities to develop these skills may also become harder to find. With so much of our communication happening without face-to-face interaction, even practicing the most basic courtesies is not happening. For the younger generation, some of these basic skills may not even be learned. Digital communication through text and chat could also be happening with a machine on the other side. Unless a company discloses that you’re interacting with a chatbot, you might not always realize. I find most of the time it’s pretty easy to tell when I’m dealing with a chatbot, but the technology is improving all the time. I’m sure in a couple of years, I’ll be having conversations with automated agents and not even realize it’s not a human on the other end.

I’m sure the agent replacement is coming, but for the moment let’s hope that at least some interactions still rely on humans.