Digital Dilemma, Digital Photos

Selfie Pay

by  •  • 0 Comments

As if we’re not obsessed enough with selfies, I just discovered a new software called SelfiePay.  The basic idea is that consumers can verify their identify for purchases by posing for a selfie at checkout to eliminate the need for passwords and verification codes.  The consumer may also be asked to wink, blink, or do a head tilt to ensure it’s a real person requesting the transaction.

On the backend, the merchant is equipped with facial recognition software to validate the image.  MasterCard and Amazon already have plans to incorporate selfie pay options at checkout.  For MasterCard it’s seen as a way to reduce the amount of legitimate purchases rejected because of suspected fraud.

Like every other new technological do-dad and “convenience” I can’t help but wonder about all that nitpicky stuff like privacy, security, and protection of personal information. I haven’t researched it, but I’ve always suspected that Facebook has been secretly perfecting facial recognition algorithms based on all the free data users unwittingly provide by tagging people in pictures.

I feel uneasy about the advances made in facial recognition software because I don’t know, nor can I predict, where all these advances will lead.  A part of me feels like this is the ultimate breach of privacy and I want to preserve my biometric data as belonging to me.  Previously the scenarios using biometric data were fairly limited to fingerprinting (i.e. being arrested, police checks), hand and/or eyeball scanning for immigration or security checkpoints.  With facial recognition software I won’t have any control over when, where, or how I’m being tracked.  I’m not sure I like the idea of my biometrics (e.g. face and fingerprints) becoming the password.  I just can’t imagine the security and encryption on the data stored by the merchants could ever be adequate enough.

And what if you’re generic looking, like me?  It could lead to mistaken identity.  I’m constantly approached by complete strangers who insist that I’m related to somebody they know, or that I’m an adult version of an old schoolmate.  This is rarely the case.  Just to illustrate the point, I was recently contacted by an ex-boyfriend who was so positive he saw me in Osaka that he felt inspired to send me an email, even though we haven’t kept in touch over the last 10 years.  Needless to say, it was not me.

 

Digital Dilemma, Spring Cleaning, True Confessions

Everything has Meaning

by  •  • 1 Comment

The other week an acquaintance sent me a link to a YouTube video about a woman living in 90 sq. ft. in Manhattan.  Wow!  I clicked on some of the related links and spent almost two hours watching short clips of people living in tiny homes. I was hooked.

I try to be lean and mean with my personal physical belongings, but these tiny home dwellers made me look like a hoarder!  I’m always amazed at these people who so effortlessly keep their homes free and clear of stupid, tiny, scraps of paper and other “stuff.”  Maybe they don’t assign meaning and value to things as easily as I do.  I aim to be tidy, but it takes real effort on my part.  Also, don’t these people have hobbies?  Admittedly my practice area is pretty compact, but I still need space for my instrument, tools, sheet music, stand, etc.

A few days later I watched “We The Tiny House People (Documentary): Small Homes, Tiny Flats & Wee Shelters” by Kirsten Dirksen.  One of my favorite segments featured a man living in 450 sq. ft. in Manhattan.  He talked about how living in a small space made everything feel meaningful to him because he didn’t have space for anything he didn’t value.  He also said that he liked having to make choices.

I started thinking about how well these ideas and philosophies translate to the digital world.  When was the last time we had to make a decision about what to keep or toss in digital format?  I think more often the decision is between purchasing the 2-terabyte or 5-terabyte storage plan.

When we are faced with restrictions and limits, it forces us to make decisions and assign value only to those things which are most important to us.  This idea applies to almost everything, including people and the time we invest in them.  One recurring theme with the tiny home dwellers was how liberated they felt not having to worry about so much stuff all the time.

I was super curious to know if this liberated feeling of the tiny home dwellers transferred to their digital belongings.  Maybe they’re really skilled at keeping physical items to a minimum but are secret digital hoarders.

Perhaps there will be a parallel movement of tiny digital dwellers for those of us who would like to be lean and mean in the electronic world.

 

Spring Cleaning, True Confessions

Moving: Bearing Witness

by  •  • 1 Comment

I believe that bearing witness is an important part of any purging process.  I’ve sat next to many people while helping them go through their things and make decisions, sometimes difficult ones, about what to keep and what to toss.

The challenge arises because we assign meaning and value to our “things” for any number of reasons, most of which are not based on logic and rationale, but rather from emotion or sentiment.  As a result, our “things” get intertwined with emotions and memories making it challenging to toss them when we need to make space, declutter, get ready to move, or move on.

I’ve come to understand the importance and appreciate the value of bearing witness to another’s purging process.  Or even to having my own purging witnessed.  Having another person there is important to validate the memories and emotions that we’ve attached to our things, some of which make it difficult to let go of the physical (or digital object), even though we can still retain the memory in our minds and bodies.

One afternoon a friend came over to help me pack.  That day I happened to be packing the contents of some shelves in my bedroom.  It was loaded with really personal things, some of which were from high school. I shared with my friend a journal from my teenage years containing a series of cartoons I had drawn with stick figures.  We laughed together over the drawings and captions.  My friend mentioned this was the real reason to have people over to help. It’s not just about the physical labor, but also about the emotional aspect of packing (or purging) that often needs a human witness.  Sometimes we need someone there to watch when we’re ready to purge as a way of moving on after a breakup or death.

Since I’m a regular purger, the whole process didn’t come with a lot of opportunities to reminisce and relive memories triggered by my things.  But then again, I only produced two bags of garbage and one medium-sized box of items to give away which made it more manageable in the frantic last few days before the movers came.

My kitchen cupboards, however, offered me some real opportunities to get creative with the contents resulting in some really odd dishes.  No reminiscing or witnesses necessary here! I think this would qualify as an exception to the rule.

Moving. Ugh.

Moving: Critical Tips

Moving: Lost & Found

Digital Dilemma, Social Media, True Confessions

Digital Emphasis & Weighting

by  •  • 2 Comments

One thing I’ve grown to dislike about social media is the way in which it alters our perception of what makes something important.  When we are offered only a few bits of information, for example on somebody’s online profile, it skews how we perceive something, or someone.  Yet, if we had the opportunity to meet someone in person to learn all the things we know instantly from an online profile, we would likely form a different impression and make different decisions.

One night I was out with some friends.  At some point in the evening the conversation turned to dating and Tinder. A couple people at the table were using the app.  I was curious to try it.  One of the guys was nice enough to let me make some decisions on his behalf.

Tinder is a popular online dating app that makes picking a potential mate like a game.  Users create a profile by loading up pictures and sometimes write something small about themselves or what they are looking for. The user selects a proximity range and is then offered a profile of their preferred gender which s/he must accept (swipe right) or reject (swipe left) to get to the next profile.

While perusing the profiles and swiping I was really surprised how judgmental and critical I became based on a handful of pictures and a few sentences of text.  For example, one woman had terrible grammar in her profile description.  To me that was an immediate left swipe.  My personal feeling about people who can’t take the time to proofread their online profiles is that they are not worth my time.

However, if I really hit it off with a man I met in person and then sent me a message with a few mistakes, I would probably be more forgiving.  Whereas if the messages happened in a digital environment before meeting it would likely result in instant rejection.

The man who let me swipe for him told me he instantly rejected women who didn’t have at least two profile pictures. This is yet another example of how we place great emphasis and weight on small things to make decisions.  I also wonder how the volume of available options impacts our criteria.  Maybe if we had less options on dating apps we might be more generous towards people with bad grammar or only one profile picture.

 

Digital Dilemma

Evite vs. Invite

by  •  • 0 Comments

Recently I was helping a friend put together her first evite (aka electronic event invitation).  While setting everything up I couldn’t help but remark on the awesome things evites offer that can’t be replicated with their physical counterparts.  Here are some of the many things I love about evites:

  • No stamps necessary
  • Takes minutes to create and send an evite
  • Received instantly, no worrying about invitations getting lost in the mail
    • Although sometimes it might go directly to somebody’s spam folder
  • Easy to send reminders/messages to invitees or attendees (e.g. if you still need responses)
    • With some evite apps reminders can be scheduled in advance to be sent at certain times (e.g. 1 week before the event)
  • Easy to add people and resend after the invitation was sent
  • Tracks attendees, no need to manage piles of RSVPs and create lists
  • Provides a map hyperlink to the event location
  • Easy to edit or correct mistakes in the evite
  • Easy to access the information when you’re out and about
  • Eliminates paper waste

On the flip side, there’s something nice about receiving a paper invitation in the mail.  Maybe it’s because we get so few pleasurable things via snail mail these days.  I have two friends getting married this spring.  Even though I knew about both events, it was still nice when to receive the formal invite in the mail.  Physical invitations include a lot of detail and tactile information that is missed in the evite. For example the weight of the paper selected, whether or not the ink is raised, handwritten touches, or embellishments adhered to the paper.

One set of friends hosted a small party for the bridal party and gave us all hand-crafted invitations, even though we’d all been asked verbally.  It felt special to be asked formally with a paper invitation, including a nice handwritten note, some homemade decorations, and a cool ribbon to tie everything closed.  These elements are largely absent with the evites.

Similar to ebooks, I prefer the evite over its physical counterpart because they’re fast, easy, and practical.  However, I do feel like we miss out sometimes.  When I’m going to an event I definitely want to have all the information available electronically rather than carrying around the paper.  On the other hand I also like the experience and anticipation of receiving a physical invitation.  These days it feels like a real novelty.

 

 

 

 

Deletion, Gmail, Google

Swiping Action

by  •  • 0 Comments

What does swipe action mean?  

Swiping offers us humans a way to process things quickly on our smartphones, or tablets, by moving our fingers in a certain direction over the screen.  On most devices and apps swiping corresponds with an action (e.g. change screen, delete, archive, next, etc.). In some settings the swipe can be customized to reflect the actions you use the most.  This is definitely something worth exploring with apps you use frequently as it can save time and effort.

When I first started using the Gmail app on my smartphone a few years ago I felt annoyed that the default action for swiping was Archive, especially since I didn’t really understand what Google meant by Archive.(Read about what it means here.)  At that time there was no way to change this.  Sometime last year I discovered that the default swipe action can now be changed to Delete.

The Gmail app will come with Archive as the default action because everything is geared towards having us save as much as possible, all the time.  Here’s how to change it, in case you’re interested.

Go to settings in your Gmail smartphone app.  If you have a lot of folders, or labels, you will need to scroll all the way to the bottom of the list to find Settings.

  • Select Settings and then General Settings.  (Image immediately following.)
  • Select the first option: Gmail default option
  • When the popup box appears, select Delete (See second image below.)

Select the first option: Gmail default action

Select the first option: Gmail default action

 

 

Option to select Archive or Delete as the default swipe action.

Option to select Archive or Delete as the default swipe action.

 

How is this useful in Gmail?

When I’m looking at a list of emails in my inbox, if I place my finger on a particular email and swipe right, the email will be deleted by default.  (This is contrary to the “swipe right” reference on Tinder, which is when somebody is saying “yes” to match with a profile.)

It makes it super fast for me to process emails, especially promotionals or social notifications, most of which I know can be deleted without even opening the message.  In case you make a mistake, or get a little swipe-happy like me, and accidentally delete something, an UNDO option is offered immediately.  Or you can restore it from the Trash folder for about 30 days.

Happy swiping!