"Now
I am become Data, the destroyer of Conventions."
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2021 I
thought I had exhausted my views on data, which I definitely regard
with a mixture of love and hate but I've felt a certain shift in
the balance over this last year, probably because of the involvement
and impact it's had during the COVID-19 pandemic. Data stepped up
another gear everywhere and everything seems to be running on it
now. I think it's made me contemplate even more what power is, who
has it, or “owns” it and how it is used. |
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Another
naturally occuring curiosity was something first noticed thousands
of years ago in fish that gave a shock when touched and lightning
bolts that appeared to be the same sort of energy of immense intensity
- but it took until the 19th Century for serious experimentation to
begin and then around 1880 Edison harnessed electricity for lighting
in a commercially viable way. Then, as they say - the rest is history:
because once electricity and how to generate it was understood, electrically
powered innovations exploded going from a lightbulb to the very same
Mars Perseverance Rover in only 140 years. But the point is that every
single electrically powered device ever invented is reliant on the
same knowledge of electricity for its power source (open knowledge
like the wheel) - so no matter what the energy source the power created
is identical. And so production and supply of electricity whether
it is converted from coal fired steam, from oil, or nuclear it is
generally available to most of the planet wherever there is a source
of energy that can be exploited and converted into electrical power.
This of course has given rise to - and been the root cause of - a
lot of the global problems in the last 140 years because of the struggles
and conflicts fought over who controls the sources of energy. After
all it is what it “says on the tin” - POWER. |
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Which
I suppose brings me to the crux of this piece - and about the title.
So it's just my observation of what power really is but specifically
the power which is now in the ascendant – raw data. As with these
examples of other fundamental discoveries – the wheel and electrical
power - once identified and harnessed, their uses are limited only
by the imagination and invention. So now if the new base unit of power
is data - already having a profound influence on the planet and still
at the embryonic stage – then structures setting up to harvest and
process these unimaginable quantities of raw data are basically the
true power-brokers of today. |
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They are able to “hoover” up and utilise almost any information they choose from their customers, exploiting their desires and their weaknesses, be it for goods, services, communication, entertainment or whatever. And it isn't just their customers they exploit, they do exactly the same with their competitors: or just gobble them up whole, straight from their inception (hence the Pacman imagery). They can initiate or clone a new virtual or online based version of almost any business they choose. Some can even conjure new businesses up out of empty space – in empty space - almost overnight! Which is brilliant of course, but it begs the question in every case – how did they grow so quickly - what are these behemoths consuming? It's as though they're taking some sort of growth data-steroid. Well part of the answer of course has to be the spark of innovation or opportunity which someone has seen in utilising this new power source of raw data. Then with a novel or specialized use of data it can very quickly construct or attract a new marketable product – all it needs then is the right amount of ready investors to jump on board. Something else just struck me as interesting – considering where most of these Big Tech companies are located – is this just the same as the gold rush? Anyway, growth usually starts slowly but through specialisation (or being first in its application) it can easily propel it to the top of any specific food chain very quickly where they then get to keep picking the “biggest, ripest fruits” before anyone else gets to them. Some recent examples of the power they now wield (rightly or wrongly) are search engines blocking undesirable competition, Presidents blocked from communication facilities, whole countries blocked out from newsfeeds etc. and of course these are only the “big” headline stories we get to hear about...ironically reported by the very same organisations that are doing it. I have to put in here that I'm only refering to so-called “free” democratic systems - we can't even imagine the other 99.9% that's going on in the whole of “data-land”. And
all I can say about the power of currencies is that they are only
symbolic constructs and have always been manipulated: but in the words
of Bachman Turner Overdrive – “You Ain't seen Nothing Yet”. |
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Oppenheimer quoted the Bhagavad Gita when he saw the raw power of a nuclear explosion...Now I am Death, the Destroyer of worlds. Of course I'm not actually likening it to the same or similar situation...but Quantum computing is coming next! ..................But even then...there will still be the “Ghost in the Machine!”
14.03.21 |
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