Hyperlink Report: Lanier
Computer scientist, composer, and author, Jaron Lanier offers a humanist view of modern technology in his 2010 book, You Are Not a Gadget. This ardent manifesto is eye opening and persuasive. Though his critics call him a Luddite, his dedication to making technology better proves he is not. Lanier’s thesis explains how the structure of the Web as we know it was established.
While the subject matter is mechanical and serious, the writing style is less so. Lanier has you follow his train of thought through dense, technical territories, as well as seemingly irrelevant ones. For a book that has the potential to instill fear in even the most diligent media consumer, it instead imparts insight into our own behaviors and usages. Lanier’s personal stories sprinkled throughout the book mirror his message of putting the human back into the digital.
He explains that decisions made by early programmers shape users’ behavior at the most basic level; some of which led to the anonymous, mob rule design. The snowballing of these effects magnified a problem that only some people took care to notice, and even fewer try to change. Lanier emphasizes that the tech community needs to reflect on these issues in order to see the impact that they have had. While his goal isn’t to divide the tech community, his desire to reform the Web and inform others of the issues that befall it have sparked controversy.
Lanier clarifies that the series of things that he thinks could have gone wrong and did, “are really just different aspects of one singular, big mistake. The deep meaning of personhood is being reduced by illusions of bits.” This is a mere observation of the fact that we now, and will continue to, communicate through computers. This and other aspects he details have become innate in our technology through the process of “lock-in.” His hope is that more thoughtful designs will one day undo them.
Although this is a divisive book that many techies find to be anti-Internet and anti-change, Lanier doesn’t see himself or his writing in that light. He is hopeful that the Internet will get better, despite its dark corners, saying, “I hope the volume of my contrarianism will foster an alternative mental environment, where the exciting opportunity to start creating a new digital humanism can begin.”
Lanier is convincing in his telling, however it’s sometimes hard to believe his optimism when he describes what he sees the internet doing to people. He is aware of this, though, and adds, “It would be hard for anyone, let alone a technologist, to get up in the morning without the faith that the future can be better than the past.” He provides thoughtful insight on both the technical and philosophical aspects of computer and Web design.
His final section about thoughts for the future is thought-provoking to read seven years after the book was published. He often refers to things he has been waiting for the world to experience (like virtual reality, which he pioneered). Yet, in 2017, we still haven’t seen any big changes in the way the Web is operating.
