THE CIRCLE

Sometimes a book comes along that really makes one think about how one is living and where our society is heading. The latest book from Dave Eggers called The Circle is one of those books.

The novel is set in Northern California and tells the story of a recent college graduate named Mae who lands a job at a tech giant called the Circle - think Facebook meets Google. Mae is quickly drawn into the charms of this company with its free cafeteria, many college-like interest clubs, and its diverse group of very bright and driven young people. Along the way, Mae gets a clearer view of the Circle and how its business model is largely built on getting its customers and employees, alike, to allow the Circle access into their lives. This is much more than mining status updates and search histories. The Circle creates products and technologies that are increasingly intrusive and that come to dominate nearly every aspect of the users daily activities.

This may seem quite dystopian or far-fetched until one actually evaluates one's own life and use of technology. For example, I would not be able to share this story with you if it were not for the fact that Google runs the Blogger website.  Similarly, I commonly share photos with you on Instagram, which is owned by Facebook. These sites are currently free, but, at any moment, these companies could charge a fee that we would probably pay to keep using this content. Moreover, all of our "likes," "comments," and "re-tweets" are being monitored so that companies can micro target us and get us to buy their products. Finally, every single search we do on the internet is visible to every search engine company. It is only a matter of time until we have to pay to keep our search histories private. All of this is to say that while technology and the internet have improved the world in so many great ways, there is a price that will be soon extort from us for this technology.

I do not think the answer to this dilemma is to retreat into a cave or become a Luddite. However, I would suggest that you do not do anything online that you would be embarrassed to have your parents or coworkers find out about. Think before you Google because Google and the like are thinking about your googling.