You are data: manipulating, analyzing, and partaking in social simulations

Jessica Kotzer
Oct 25, 2018 · 6 min read

First things first — I just need to check if I have any new notifications on my social channels since yesterday (before I forget). I won’t waste too much time. Will do proper work as soon as I do this one thing…

I’m scrolling through my Facebook homepage, and a video ad starts to play. I stop scrolling and turn up the volume. A puppy runs into its new owner’s arms. I’ve seen the video; I helped make the video, and I can tell you that Doggr, the company I worked for as a digital marketing strategist, pays very little to inflict itself onto its target audience — one minuscule cent per 30-second video watched, at most. One dollar for every hundred 30 second segment of your life. This is what your time is worth.

At the end of Doggr’s ad, an arrow directs me to view the ‘epic new offers’ Doggr has in place and I think, what offers? I click on the ad and get rerouted to the sales page and as it turns out, Doggr is going to start paying breeders for every puppy they sell using the platform. They will also start matching breeders so that they can breed new mixes of dogs that are in high demand according to the bids on the Doggr platform.

This can’t be right.

I log onto Facebook now and go onto Doggr’s page seeking further confirmation. Sure enough, there’s Anson, my old boss, and master of scrum, in a video pinged to the top of the company’s page. His man bun is gelled back as usual. The Doggr logo runs from the neckline down his t-shirt. I click on the play button and Anson explains to the camera how the new platform will work. “For every adopted puppy, we are giving away 10 PupCoins. Use these to extend your membership or trade them for one of the many gift cards listed below. How great is that?

This has Norman — the company exec — written all over it. I want to call him and tell him to stop this nonsense and remember the vision. “It’s about helping puppies find homes,” I’ll say, “not incentivizing breeders to breed more and create an oversupply of puppies.” But I don’t, because it’s just the nature of business. He’s got the data; this is how to monetize it.

I try to distract myself by scrolling through the Facebook homepage. It’s a distraction, alright. It’s that infinite scroll that hooks me. I’m embarrassed to see an array of self-help and get-rich-quick gurus intrude my scroll. I’ve been targeted by these advertisers because, as my user data would suggest, I’m a click away from becoming a potential conversion. But more than embarrassed, I’m intrigued. Because underneath it all, lies a bottomless pit of fiber-optic cables, trillions of dollars in transactions and the most advanced data technologies in Earth’s history. It’s a goldmine of data and I was one of the clogs in the wheel that spread messages for no more worthy a cause than to help yet another tech company make a cut of the revenue.

I used all the ‘white hat’ tricks available. When Facebook started playing videos in the feed without any initiation from the consumer, I told the Doggr marketing team to make Facebook video ads. When I learned how to use cookies to follow users around the web, I put Doggr ads wherever they went, in little ad boxes and banners and pop-ups along the edges of their favorite blogs and social sites. Everywhere, with the mere exception of porn sites, I followed the users, the consumers, you. I didn’t think much of it at the time. I was just happy to be a part of the team. A cultural fit. Digital advertising, to me, was like putting recyclables into the garbage; not great for the environment, but incredibly convenient.

I remember telling the CEO of Doggr how his company was doing incredible things for its customers and the future of doggy ancestry (goodbye puppy mills). He shrugged and said he saw an opportunity and took it. He was glad, though, that I was passionate about the ‘societal bull.’ “That’s why we need you,” he said. “You make us look good.” Making things look good: that was my role. Twitter, Instagram, Facebook: they provided free platforms for our users in exchange for their time and drool. And now I can’t help but wonder if it’s not just the nature of business, but human nature, to bait-and-switch one another, or in this case, click-bait-and-switch with monetization links.

There is a way to it, to the inclusion of social channels, and we’re moths to the flame. The flame’s not always that warm, but we all want love, don’t we? And if being a conversion is as easy as clicking a button, well.

The internetted world, no matter how it connects us, is a simulated world.

“worm's eye-view photography of ceiling” by Joshua Sortino on Unsplash

As a digital tradeswoman, I spend a lot of time in ‘social simulations,’ as well as analyzing the data behind those simulations. Sometimes I have moments of realization that life should be lived offline and I get this burning desire — as futile as it might be — to go off grid, strip away the fog, get deeper, dive as far as I can until I’m close enough to that baseline, that non-simulated existence. I’ll never be “Born again Christian,” or understand wtf we’re all doing here, but can I know something else; a simpler life? Can I just forget about the hypotheses and theories and laws of physics and wake up, listen to the call of the archetypes, clean out the Jungian garbage in my psyche and be? Can I feel like a part of the earth? Earth: the most established simulation, the one thing that might not be a simulation at all?

Other times, I realize that the ‘real world’ is a concept; there is no separating the earth from the internet. The internet never sleeps. It’s packed full of information and we add to that archive every time we go online. We live on through these archives. There’s a comfort in that.

Machine learning is becoming more advanced, scalable and accurately predictive, and we can gift our smart machines with the infinite scroll that is big data. Between us and them, we can understand our online behavior more and more. What we want, what we crave, what we care about; this information, in combination with hard scientific data: genetic data, environmental data and so forth, is powerful.

Being a part of the age of information is being a part of something big

“silhouette of people standing on mirror during golden hour” by Mario Purisic on Unsplash

We live in a time when data is destined to be examined and cross-examined many times over. Living ‘the simple life’ sounds grand, but manipulating, analyzing, and partaking in social simulations is very much a part of reality. Our intentions are clear in data, and sometimes, it’s good to be targeted. Sometimes, companies have good intentions and offer value to whom they target.

There are and will be many uses for social data. Inevitably, monetary optimization will be one of them. But for a lot of people who work in data and technology, it’s not about ‘white hat tricks.’ Data isn’t just for advertisers who see us as mere clicks and conversions, and social media isn’t just for moths to flames. By partaking, we contribute to an archive that offers very real information about who we are and what we need.

Our social simulations don’t need to be all baby photos and click-bate. We are data, and in data, there are discoveries waiting to be made.

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