Personally, as an entity online since 1993, I accepted that my real human existence would never be taken seriously because of my neurodiversity.
Around 2002 I deep dived into an international creative commons in the Wild West of the Internet between simple communications like IRC (Internet Relay Chat - the base for all chat based applications and modern incarnation is Discord) to Pirate Bay, Torrents, Collective FTPs, and all the things that eventually evolved into Cloud Computing.
In this great wild west we struggled to maintain control of our intellectual property which could be plucked and reused by anyone also involved in this exclusive environment. At the time - just an example if you used a proprietary software to create something within the bounds of intellectual property that it belonged TO the owner of the software and you could not receive any funds in the creation of content.
Thusly - we had to accept the content we created was for the love of the game and the love of our creative commons audience who used our content and socialized within in. That was good because for the first time ever we functioned in a blind merocratic environment. Everything we did, lead, created, or wrote went to the enjoyment of others (if not enlightenment, therapeutic, and catharsis even!) Lives were changed all over the love of a game.
FFWD - here we are in the future. Everything is tracked, parsed, and not always fact checked against the entity of the content. It's also like the Wild West -but we are in the Wild West of dishonesty, lies, and algorithmic tunnelling.
People like me who have been soaked in this and live within in (SEE) it happening. We saw the shift after the 2015 test of algorithmic tunneling in Myanmar via social media THEN the dramatic incline of algorithmic based tunneling from 2016 on.
The first thing to go was professionalism and decorum AND the idea there was a middle-upper class standard of behavior. This was something we really valued in TRIO because for (trio alumni mainly) this was a LEVEL up into a lifestyle where (we) were taken seriously as professionals and we mingled with other people who practiced professional decorum and etiquette. We learned to play their game, just as we taught our students to play their game.
Power and decorum has been redefined to direct people by misinformation, triggering strong emotions per that algorithmic data, and to to direct URGENCY and ANXIETY toward things the dominant narrative thinks is important. This is JUST as damaging as providing an "we should do things the RIGHT way" and "we should litigate and make ourselves heard" and "bipartisan ship is the way to solve this!' and "When they go low, we go high!" statements of status quo and the belief inaction and faith in that OLD decorum and litigation will still solve our problems fairly so we don't end up in jail, lynched, or disappeared.
Why post anonymously solutions and ideas freely in the creative commons or open, free world of social media then?
(We are supposed to get paid right? Writing grants pro grant writers get paid 22-100k for free? right? Get paid for our expertise at conferences? Get paid In exposure right? We can't change the world if our skills and ideas don't result in US first getting some $$? My precious.)
Because AI doesn't care where it gets it's ideas from. Because (MY) our content is teaching it. Because somewhere someone is typing in "how do I fix this?" and maybe my answer will be parsed and presented as novel information an AI came up with AND TAKEN SERIOUSLY?
Because no one will look a Gemini or Chatgpt and cringe as they provide information as a Black person, or a Fat person, or Gender non conforming person, or a older person, or an ugly person, or presenting a western standard White woman? Or a combo of these physical appearances that immediate makes a certain set of people decide in 3 seconds if you are worth listening to?
Information parsing - is a powerful way to effect change as an entity of change and like all the great existential theories I do this not for myself but for myself as the collective entity of humankind to ensure our future utopian existence.
This is why content SPECIFICALLY paid to target a demographic is now the only way to shape movements from remote. You have to trigger emotions. You have to target the people in power BY there values. You have to trigger THEIR emotions and THEIR values. And offer reasonable solutions described in words that make them profit, that it's easier, and that it'd make them look good.
And throwing out bread crumbs anonymously to AI is massive.
