Digital Dilemma

Deleting Trends for 2023

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At the start of 2023, it seemed as if the tech world had never been more exciting. Naturally this coincided with my first break from the blog in over ten years. Not sure if this is a real world example of the “grass is always greener,” but I’m happy to catch up now.

Shortly before my pause, ChatGPT arrived. The effects of Elon Musk taking over Twitter started to become apparent. Public institutions started banning TikTok. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is in the news daily, it seems. It’s been an eventful few months.

First off, ChatGPT! People in my personal and professional life ask me about this. Have I used it? Would I use it? Should we be concerned at work about people using it? What can we use it for?

In summary, ChatGPT is an AI-powered chatbot designed to be conversational and use more natural language (i.e., how we speak with one another) to interact with us. Chatbots have been used for customer service for years already. You may have used one at some point by texting or calling customer service. The chatbot listens, or reads your words, and then directs your query accordingly (e.g., to an agent, more information, etc.). ChatGPT, however, does a lot more than customer service. The uses discovered already are mind boggling. I’ve read some articles about people using ChatGPT to create content (i.e., something like this humble blog post) or write essays for school. Others use it for conversations, to answer challenging questions, or help preparing for interviews, including writing CVs and customized cover letters.

To answer the questions above, I haven’t used it yet. However, I’m planning on using it to write a blog post and see if my regular readers can tell. Yes, we should be wary of using any new technology before we fully grasp how to use it and its impacts.

This last point is a good transition to TikTok. I haven’t blogged much about TikTok, probably because I don’t use it. But it’s popular, and similar to ChatGPT, has an awesome array of uses. Recently, many public institutions started banning TikTok from work phones and onsite resources (e.g., college campuses) citing security concerns. In my opinion, too little, too late. Though I am glad to see digital privacy concerns getting some attention.

To sum it up, top trends: AI, privacy and security, and stronger regulations for the tech industry.

Digital Dilemma, Social Media

Registering for Email Accounts In Utero?

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I recently read an article about parents who set up their children’s email and social media accounts at birth. In some cases, parents registered accounts before the birth!

Although we all want the best for our kids, is this really a good idea?

On the practical side, it assumes that our kids will be using the same email and social media we use. Keep in mind, technology changes rapidly, on average every three years. Facebook (Meta) and Twitter haven’t even been around twenty years yet. Email has been around for decades. Should we assume that our kids will use that as a primary form of communication the way we do? Last summer my practicum student replied to our ad to work on an email management project. She did a brilliant job, which I found impressive for someone who doesn’t even use email.

On the privacy side, shouldn’t our first priority be to protect our children from, and on, social media? I have an email account with my real name. Though sometimes I wonder if that’s such a good idea with email handles linked to so many aspects of my identity. In many ways, an email address is another unique identifier. Although an email address may not be as distinct as a SIN/SSN, driver’s license, or passport number, in combination with other elements it can be used accurately for identification. All this to say, is registering an email or social media account with our kid’s real name in their best interest? Especially before the child is even able to use social media.

Another point on the privacy side is posting images or news about children on social media. The article described some parents creating an ersatz digital archive for their kids on social media accounts. But again, this assumes the technology will be around by the time the child is able to use it. Or interested in it.

And what about the child’s right to privacy? A lot of new technology uses artificial intelligence (AI) and facial recognition to identify people in real life instantly by using posted images on the internet. When our kids grow up, do we want some cache of digital images documenting their babyhood and childhood available on the internet?

Until privacy laws improve and technology protects our privacy better, I wouldn’t set up anything for my kid digitally, unless it was absolutely necessary.

Human Archives

Regeneration

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Last week I ventured outside for some yard work. The air had a hint of warmth. A subtle heat radiated from the late afternoon sun. I still needed a light jacket on, but it didn’t feel chilly. It was a welcome change following several large snowstorms all in the month of March.

Armed with a yard waste bag, a claw, and some gloves, I set to work clearing out the leaves. Each stroke of the claw revealed a delightful trove of ladybugs. Dozens of them gleaming like fiery-red embers against a backdrop of subtle browns. I lost count of how many I saw dotting the garden. They tromped around fearlessly.

My heart soared to see my aphid-eating troopers already in position, and I’m sure, hungry after a long winter. Although I try to have a healthy respect for all creatures, even creepy things like earwigs, I can’t muster up a lot of love for aphids. I suppose their one redeeming quality is providing a free lunch for ladybugs. If this means I get to see more ladybugs, I guess they’re not all bad.

Seeing so many ladybugs also reminded me of spring’s force. Once spring starts, it’s unstoppable, even if a random storm or freezing night occurs. No matter what happens, the cycle is reborn, providing fresh opportunities and new beginnings, even to things we seem to do routinely year after year.

True to form, it did actually drop to freezing. One week later, I returned to my yard work, this time with a heavy coat on, feeling a slight chill. The claw hit clumps of frozen dirt. A sheet of ice covered the outdoor planters that had collected water when it rained. My fingers numbed clearing out debris. Even still, dozens of ladybugs lay nestled in the leaves, huddled together on dead stalks and new growth. They weren’t moving as much as the week before, likely because it was cold, but they were still just as vibrant.

Human Archives

Recover and Recharge

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As a busy person, I’ve mastered the art of the “active recovery.” I discovered this term from doing spin classes. During spin class, “active recovery” meant pedaling easy with little resistance, as though we were on a straight, road somewhere. Active recovery happened after some debilitating (at least for me), intense, long journey up a steep incline with lots of tension on the bike. Though I didn’t realize it right away, I often do active recovery in my daily life. It’s a way for me to keep on top of things, while also getting some much needed R&R. That’s the idea, anyway.

However, the active recovery doesn’t always allow adequate time for the recharge. I try to find activities that accomplish both recovery and recharge. For example, playing music is an active-recovery recharge. It’s one of my lifelines. While rehearsing or performing, it allows me the opportunity to recover from stress build up and take a much needed break from the daily grind. At the same time, I feel pumped up and energized from the experience of playing music with other people. Though sometimes the recovery from a particularly emotional, or late night performance, can be a little challenging.

Coming out of the pandemic, I’ve been feeling a little more depleted than usual. I realized I need to carve out some dedicated time for recovery that’s not always so active. The pandemic disrupted many of my usual recharging activities Some of the activities have been slow to come back. It’s also taking time to re-integrate them into my schedule and routine.

Due to all these factors, I will be taking a break from my weekly posts to focus on recovery and recharge for a few months. Throughout the pandemic, the weekly post was another lifeline for me, even when it was challenging to make the deadline. Though tenuous at times, holding on to this small routine each week that I’d been doing for so long already, kept me grounded during some of the worst lockdowns. It felt like something small and normal I could cling to when everything else was changing so fast.

Stay tuned. I’ll be busy behind the scenes while I take a break from the front end. I’m aiming to resume writing in the spring when I’m recovered and recharged enough for the next 500 posts.

Happy New Year!

Ocean sunrise in the Dominican Republic, April 2015.
Uncategorized

The 500th Posting

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Reaching another milestone always feels like an accomplishment. This one, however, even made me pause. Every Monday, for 500 Mondays since June 2013, I’ve published a blog post. Rain or shine, sick or healthy, on vacation or pressed with deadlines, I wrote the post. Phew!

The milestone posting provides me an opportunity to review my thought process and interests for the past year. Some gloomy, some profound, some redundant, some refreshing… well, you get the point. But every 50, I go through and pluck out my favorites.

Around Halloween, I offered a few more slices of my Technombie world. Jasmine, scurrying out the back door of the Baby Designer Studio, crossed paths with the seedy underbelly of the operation. Meanwhile, one origin story of the how the feed developed started to unfold.

Other themes explored include the effects of the pandemic on testing failures, dealing with the incessant information fire hose, and challenges with the ever changing hybrid work environment. Covid is here to stay. As are many of the changes brought about suddenly by the pandemic. In some ways, the pandemic amplified existing problems, while resolving some and creating new ones in their place. It’s a different world now.

Many of my posts this year focused on where we’re moving with technology including new ways to shop and what that means for us. Searching the internet is heading in new directions. The ever present threat of misinformation and how to control it is still an unresolved challenge.

Technology forces us to change so fast we sometimes can’t appreciate the things we lost with our old, clunky methods. I discuss this in “Death of the Home Phone,” and highlight a new digital dilemma we now face because “There’s an App for Everything!”

This year I started playing a new favorite game, Wordle, that can only exist digitally. Another favorite post featured a poster from the Drug Enforcement Agency decoding emoji. And naturally at least one fave on facing our Information Gluttony.

I’ll end my milestone highlights with a few from my Human Archive series including one on processing grief through “Unexpected Triggers” and “How I Learned to Move my Energy” through paint blobs. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention a couple of posts focused on snow, given the current stormy conditions including “Snow Days” (definitely not the same in the hybrid environment) and “The Silence of Snow.”

Digital Dilemma, True Confessions

Too much customization?

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Last weekend I ordered pizza from Uber Eats. Admittedly, I don’t often order take out (or delivery). If I do get one of these things, I’m more likely to order directly in the restaurant and wait for the order. I’m a bit of a dinosaur this way. I also rarely get take out mostly because I hate all the packaging.

However, I did end up ordering it through an app. I was amazed at the amount of options to select and screens to scroll through to order a simple pizza. Honestly, it almost felt more time consuming and complicated than it would have been to order directly from the restaurant. I intentionally selected a pre-made option, rather than creating my own, which no doubt would have resulted in even more menus to click through.

The whole experience left me wondering if there’s such a thing as too much customization. I remember a particularly poignant lesson about offering choices and decision making from my catering days. I often did corporate catering at the New York Academy of Medicine. A lot of events were buffet lunches where we offered no less than 10 soda flavors, plus water, at the drink stand. In addition to the standard offerings of Coke, Diet Coke, and Sprite, some less common options were available. I recall specifically the Grape and Orange Crush. They’re not typical offerings at most venues.

Every time I stocked the drink bar I grumbled at having to stock and track so many different options. My manager, at the time, was adamant that having Orange or Grape Crush available could make somebody’s day. This was his rationale for the extra effort.

Then we had a new manager who cut the drink table down to four options. Instead of making somebody’s day with special soda flavors, we now made their day by improving the buffet line speed. Turns out people were inundated with too many decisions at our drink table. Consequently, this always created delays and bottle necks. With fewer options, people selected a drink quickly and moved on.

I couldn’t help but think of this valuable lesson scrolling through page after page of menu and topping options. Instead of being a time-saving convenience, the ordering process felt tedious and cumbersome. Too many options to pick and consider. Honestly, it was a little overwhelming. Next time, I’m eating in.