Convergence, or “Till all are one”

Humans are like flesh Transformers.

Adapting to changing conditions… or conversely, adapting our environment to our needs…

It’s really all that separates us from the beasts (or maybe I should say separates YOU guys from the beasts… I’m still a beast with three simple needs that all start with F).

Think about the amount of adaptation that has been required for a human being who has lived over the last 100 years.  Commercial flight, space flight, gene mapping, gene sequencing, computers, the internet, heavy industry, manufacturing, telecommunications — all of these technological advances have become such a part of our day-to-day lives, that without them we would probably be lost.  Civilization might even crumble.  Thats the extent to which these advances have been adapted by and integrated into our modern society, primarily in the West, but now more and more in the rest of the world as well.

And its in the rest of the world that the rate of adaptation is truly amazing… a testament to the fact that biologically, we are one species with a similar ability to adapt to change.  People in Bangladesh, who 20 years ago may not even have talked on a phone in their whole lives, now walk around with a mobile phone clipped to their belt (usually a Nokia).  The mobile phone itself, as a device, has really become ubiquitous to humanity to an extent greater than any other technological device that has been invented in the past century.  One could say that it’s a measure of the great transition of the time in which we live, from the industrial age to the information age.

Even for me, in the US, the cell phone an adaptation that I barely took up ten years ag0, maybe eleven.  Now you can find them in the hands of a farmer in the remotest village in China (or Bangladesh for that matter), and I’m sure not many people are left on Earth who don’t know what the capabilities of the device are.  The rapid global expansion of telecommunications in the last 10 years alone is phenomenal, and a breath of positive foresight by large telecommunications companies that for once benefitted both their relentless need for profit as well as the lives of the citizens of the countries they expanded into.

This global technological convergence is a result of many factors which I’m not going to go into detail about, such as rapid communication, easier transportation, and better education.  But it is a fact that societies which 20 years ago were 100 years behind the west, today are perhaps only 20 years behind (although granted, the issue of poverty remains unsolved for the most part).  And the rate keeps quickening, as countries like China start to research and develop their own technologies, and as countries like Japan outsource their R&D to Bangladesh.  A friend of mine here was telling me about a Japanese company that is outsourcing the development of 3D technology using standard LCD screens to a local partner in Bangladesh.  According to him, the technology is already ready for the market.

So what are we going to see in the future?  A technologically equal society with large pockets of poverty?  The dictionary definition of convergence is the coming together of two or more things.  In an IT or technology setting, the meaning takes on a different connotation — the coming together of two separate technologies into one technology.  Like for example the computer and the phone = iPhone.   Or, in the future, computer and TV = yet unnamed thingy that does both.

I randomly took this video the other day and realized that its a perfect example of technology convergence in Bangladesh.  Exhibit A) Shitty public transportation that runs on environmentally-friendly Compressed Natural Gas.  Exhibit B) Dude pulls out his Nokia as soon as he gets off said shitty public trans-po.

But in a broader societal context, we can take convergence to mean the coming together of two societies at different technological development timeframes into a society where all technology is available to everyone (at a price, of course).  So is that really what we’re heading to?  A society where medical immortality is available to those who can pay for it?  But where half of humanity still doesn’t get enough nourishment to meet their minimum requirements and live in squalor?  I’m not judging — just throwing it out there as a possible scenario for humanity’s future — barring self destruction of the species, of course, which is probably more of an inevitability.

Convergence… it levels the playing field… if you got the cash.

Filed under: technology, adaptability, adaptation, asia, bangladesh, cell phones, china, convergence, japan, mobile devices, mobile phones, R&D, research, research and development, technology, transformers

All Along the Final Watchtower

Is it a little fucked up that I get more emotional about BSG (Battlestar Galactica), a show about cyborgs and artificial intelligence destroying humanity, than I get about most human beings?

Perhaps, but I’m sure I’m not alone.  This is what happens when we, as viewers watch shows for years at a time, week after week, experiencing traumatic experience after traumatic experience with characters we’ve grown familiar with.  It is a testament to our own self-reflection and self-obsession as a society that we often don’t even interact with our own family members as much as we do with these fictional persons.

I was catching up on last Friday’s episode, and I found myself reacting very strongly to a musical score that includes a remake of All Along the Watchtower by Bear McCreary, which I suggest you play as you read this post for full effect (note the use of both Western and Eastern musical themes — may be cheesy but it matches the underlying primary theme of the show — read on).  As we draw near the end of the series, I can’t help but observe the parallels between my own life (although I’m not going to go into that today), our society, and the themes explored in BSG.

As is true of any good show, BSG is a reflection of our own society today.  Although the story itself may have a science-fiction setting that in the past may only have appealed to nerds such as myself, the emergence of the themes it explores — as the prevalent moral paradoxes of our current civilization — have given it a mass-market appeal.  Terrorism, suicide bombing, occupation, rebellion, xenophobia, xenocide, secularism, religious fundamentalism, and the dichotomy between technology and humanity — all are presented to us repeatedly throughout the series.  The protagonists who we grow to care about are often the ones who commit crimes, stifle free speech, judge with religious fervor, and engage in human rights abuses.  The lines between “us” and the “other”, as defined by intelligent self-aware technology, are blurred, as are the morals and values each society holds dear.  As viewers, we are betrayed again and again, when characters who seem morally unflappable display character deficiencies which shake our foundations to their cores.

But lets go back to the single major theme which I feel defines the show.  Us vs. them.  Man vs. machine.  West vs. East.  We begin with the premise that the differences between our societies can never be reconciled.  That we can never understand each other.  That the only choice we have is to destroy or be destroyed.  Sound familiar?  The series shortly came out after 9/11, and must have been written with much of the political turmoil of our nation and our planet in mind.  The machines represent a world-view that does not include humanity in its future, and set out to destroy us.  But throughout our relationship with them as our enemy, we see examples of reconciliation between the two cultures, and even mutual understanding and love.  It sounds much cheesier when I explain it than it really is — all I can say is go ahead and invest the 40-50 hours into the series that you do for other shows you watch and love, and you won’t be disappointed.  The acting, the storyline, the special effects — all of these come together to make a show which in my opinion is equal to the best out there right now (and perhaps, one of the best ever), like Lost or The Wire, and in many ways less thematically trite than both of those.

Human or Cylon? Either way works for me.

The series isn’t done yet, and I don’t want to ruin it for anyone — especially since with 3 episodes left, I don’t know what the hell is going to happen.  This season has been a series of glimpses into a bigger picture which is still somewhat unfathomable.   With the quality of the writing that has been prevalent so far, I can’t help but think that somehow, it will all be revealed in only 3-4 more hours, but I for one, remain totally clueless about how that’s going to happen.  But it is interesting that our own real world has seen the end of a political viewpoint where continued conflict with forces that are diametrically opposed to our own world-view was the only way to resolve our differences.  BSG is, to me, a direct measure of and reaction to the policies that have dominated global politics for the last decade.  But that story, and this one… is over.

I would like to take this opportunity to say that as a genre, the science fiction television show has given us many insights into our own civilization from a macro perspective.  I think this is due to the fact that by attempting to paint a picture of civilization as it may exist in the future or elsewhere in the galaxy, the writers of these shows are forced to extrapolate what the defining legacy of our species is going to be.  What issues are really going to write the future of humanity?  It won’t be the micro-societal interactions between drug dealers in Baltimore or individuals trapped on an imaginary island.  It’ll be war, love, understanding, and hate on a global scale that make or break us.

Next post will come from Bangladesh — as this post goes live, I’m on a plane.

Filed under: Entertainment, AI, artificial intelligence, battlestar galactica, BSG, singularity, technology

From Social Media Whore to Cyborg

My new Safari 4 Homepage -- too much information? It saves all my top sites and presents them in this view

So tonight I was watching the President’s speech to Congress and twittering at the same time, and I was asked if I was interested in a job opportunity based on my political commentary.   I was never much of a twitterer — I only have like 20 people following me, and although I’ve been a member for over a year, I never really used it much until very recently.  I couldn’t figure out what it was for.  How does someone use it?  What does it do?

I’ve been figuring it out slowly.  I’m not going to get too into it, but I think its greatest application is to be able to tell, through keyword searches, what themes and topics humanity (albeit a small percentage of humanity, and perhaps not representative of the whole) is thinking about at that moment (singularity jeebies anyone?).  One of the most twitted words during the President’s speech tonight was “quitter“.

A good secondary application is to stalk celebrities.  I’m now following the real shaq, thanks to someone’s facebook status update.  As of this evening I’m also following (twitterspeak for stalk) Steve Nash and Congressman Steve Israel (D-NY).

The scary thing is that this all really happened in the last few months.  All except for venerable facebook, which is kinda the friendster of modern social networking (that’s why I’m hardly ever on it anymore — check my wall).  First it was google reader.  Then slowly I started with the sharing of the links, the following sites like digg and reddit, then the blog, and now twittering.  Slowly I feel like I’m being inundated with so much information, but so far, my brain hasn’t exploded.  In fact I’m feeling quite intelligent — almost like I took a great leap forward in communication in the past few weeks.  Or in methods of communication.

But when does communication become information inundation?  I feel like I’m going faster and faster… well not that I’m going faster and faster, but that communication is getting quicker and quicker.  Yesterday I was ironing a shirt, and I almost decided to look up the proper way to do it on the internet.  Ten years ago that would have been ridiculous.  Ten years from now, I might be able to do that without dropping the iron.  Ten years after that, I might be able to learn how to do it instantaneously.  Some stranger posted a link on the singularity in my comments and I read it, now I feel like I”m living it.  And embracing it.

I’m a firm believer in the theory that exercising your brain and using for creative problem solving can only improve its elasticity and make it last longer, and at my advanced age thats a big plus.  Turning into a robot… we’ll worry about that later.

Filed under: Networking, Social Media, AI, artificial intelligence, blog, digg, facebook, google reader, MBA, new media, reddit, safari 4, singularity, Social Media, social media marketing, social networking, technology, twitter, unemployed, unemployed MBA

The Gaming Dilemma

To game, or not to game, that is the question.

Sorry to bastardize Shakespeare, but if he were alive today I’d ask his permission on FB.

WoW

Yesterday, after a 6 month hiatus, I reactivated my WoW account.  WoW = World of Warcraft = biggest online gaming time sink ever invented.  World of Warcraft, to those of you who may not know, is the most popular online (MMORPG) game to date — as of last November, 11.5 million subscribers.

 

“NEEEERRRRRDDDDDSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Yes, it pretty nerdy, but also surprising popular, with rumors of everyone from Dave Chappelle to Jon Stewart (quite a diverse gamut of Comedy Central celebrities) enjoying the occasional WoW gaming spree.

The Beginning

I first started playing back in 2005, and for a good year, I was pretty addicted.  I used to obsess about it at my dead end job, spending my hours not on the game researching about the game, planning what I was going to do in-game, and dreaming about some day achieving l33t status amongst my gaming peers.  Lame?  Perhaps, but 11.5 million nerds can’t be wrong.

I’m not gonna get into details about the game, but suffice it to say after that year-long period, I cooled down somewhat, until I managed to get Viv addicted to the game as well, at which time the resurgence of my gaming personality ensued, with her following me around healing me as I killed shit.  She got tired of that pretty fast, and went on to start her own character which killed shit, but never got past the low levels.

Misha Gets a Life

After starting business school, due to partying, studying, and other time constraints, as well as the fact that my server was on US time with US people, while I was in the EU, 6 hours behind, my gaming fell off, and I started losing touch with my virtual buddies.

Fast forward to last summer.  Unemployed, friendless, I started playing again.  But not for THAT long, as I managed to engage myself on the Obama campaign.  Besides, somewhere deep inside, I knew it was not healthy to get started on this while still unemployed.  You can really live in this game.  Instances, or dungeons, can be done with anywhere from 5-40 other people, and can take anywhere from 1-5 hours.  When you’re part of a serious guild, you’re expected to committ at least 2-3 nights a week to this, and perhaps more.  You start feeling guilty when you don’t sign into the game, and start wondering what people are thinking about you.   You feel like you’re letting people down, etc., etc.  Its not only like a club, its like a life — a social life, even a professional life.  You have responsibilities.

The Rebirth of Uncool

So a couple of months ago, M, a colleague of mine from ESADE (also currently unemployed), revealed that he had started playing himself.  For a while I held 0ff, but last night, I reactivated my account, and after 4 hours of updates, started playing.  I immediately felt a sense of both boredom and excitement – a familiar (sigh) feeling, as I wasted an hour traveling to find M in a certain zone, found out all my skills were now different, respecced my character, and sold a bunch of shit — total time spent on game: 5 hours; total time online: 1 hour; total time playing: 10 minutes.  Now I remember why I hate this game — still, I’m looking forward to tonight.  And here I am, researching once again how to kill shit in the most awesome way, at my new dead end job.

Xbox?

Funnily enough, I recently invested in an Xbox 360.  I thought this was gonna be my big gaming thing (and it still might be).  But I’ve gotten quickly bored with any of the games I’ve played, and have yet to finish even one.  I’m sure that once I have my own place and can invest in Xbox Live, the 360 will whir noisily once again.

Till that time, its time to tank some instances. 

HEAL ME YOU FOOL!

Thoughts?

Filed under: Entertainment, singularity, technology