“Das Ganze ist ein riesiger Misthaufen, der Perlen enthält. Aber um Perlen zu finden, muss man die richtigen Fragen stellen. Gerade das können die meisten Menschen nicht.” Joseph Weizenbaum
We rarely have access to data, which might be gathered by us, or could be harvested about us by corporations, public services or other services we use. We know the data gathered could unreasonably endanger or violence our personal rights. We might have the legal remedy but often we do not have the ability to collect, to store, to analyse or to reuse this valuable data. These matters of fact mean threats, opportunities and challenges. One big issue of tomorrow will be adressed by our need for integrated and easy to use solutions to prove our digital identity towards others, or to look up attributes of others. The questions how to intermediate those kind of multidimensional relations regards expertise from many fields, disciplines and institutions:
- Economical questions: How can I get value out of my own data?
- Political questions: Which legal entity represents my legal claims?
- Legal questions: Who intermediates between me and the dataversum and how?
- Technological questions: Who has the technological and executional ability?
- Questions regarding esthetics: How might my personal identity could be represented?
- Design questions: Who has the ability to orchestrate all elements and interests
What is the Politics and the World wide web consortium doing?
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is the international standards organization for the World Wide Web. The organization tries to foster compatibility and agreement among members [businesses, nonprofit organizations, universities, governmental entities, and individuals]. Privacy is a common concern of the Privacy Interest Group to provide transparency of privacy-affecting interactions as a standard. Also the design of useful interfaces, state management and controls are on the agenda of PIG. But where is the business model behind all that? Also the European Union is engaged in the privacy issue to reinforce the consumer confidence in online services. The “Special Eurobarometer 431” gives an overview about peoples opinion on the privacy issue [2015].
Stop searching. Start questioning
“I argue that we need to invent new ways to interact with information, new ways to represent it, and new ways to make sense of it. How are artists, designers, and architects responding to these challenges? Stop searching. Start questioning. Rather than trying to defend ourselves against ‘information glut’, we can approach this situation creatively as the opportunity to invent new forms appropriate for our information‐rich world”. Source: The Society of the Query and the Googlisation of Our Lives. A Tribute to Joseph Weizenbaum, by Geert Lovink
Privacy by design?
Privacy is a design issue but how can we transform this ‘field of responsibility’ into a ‘field of interest’? Marc Langheinrich [Distributed Systems Group, ETH Zurich] made some serious proposals from the ubiquitous computing point of view. Designers shall extend this discussion with rich ideas how the future of privacy could look and feel.
Falling Data: A remark
With the title ‘Falling Data’ we mention the visible [or invisible] path of our data as it enters the econosphere to become a friendly [or unfriendly] product. It was inspired by the term ‘Falling Star’. Craig Thomas defines in ‘The Econosphere’: “We need to start thinking about the economy as a holistic, natural system. To those who are inclined to see it, it is breathtaking choreography on a global scale with billions of performers, each one in character, playing his or her unique role so that the entire ensemble shines. The Econosphere provides for us, yet it is also of us.”
Source: changethis.com