After the surprise of ‘devil-gate’ during the last tutorial, I have now had The Cloud appear uninvited onto the homepage of my phone.
This used to be an image for a Transport for London shortcut, which I use fairly regularly these days to get around. But one trip to M&S cafe later, and I have an uninvited commercial bleed into my phone. This reminds me of my earlier ‘Hijacked‘ post although this seems more cynical somehow. And it also makes me wonder about the networks that are around us as we are merrily going about our business; how we take traces and imprints of them away with us; and what traces of ourselves we leave with them.
Or perhaps it’s just a seat for an angel as a counterpart to the tutorial devil! Very uncanny – but that’s another story!
How true, Steph. I have been mulling over these crossovers, and constantly thinking how our present society is being taken over by technologies reflected in the icons and advertisements that flood one’s internet pages, and when one is mobile (still attached to technology aka mobile phones). And also whether anyone is less or more hijacked, and why.
Thanks for the comment Chantelle. I think that the mobile hijacks might be part of the ambient intelligence that we were discussing the other day. The piece that I read had a great bit about consumerism and advertising wherein the technologies we are surrounded by and use might have the ability to tell us what we want before we know we want it, because of the memories they have of what we’ve done already and how they fit into patterns and norms. Creepy? Or useful? Or just seeping capitalism? I can’t quite decide!
I was also wondering about who got hijacked and why in terms of youtube ads. I wondered if it were only successful videos which were plagued by them. But I’ve had a bit of look and I *think* that the owner of the video can opt in/out of having ads played at the beginning of the video. If they opt in they get a payment, (probably dependent on some conditions). So, it seems, another money-making explanation.