Where else? In the algorithmic prison. Companies and governments use information about us in a new—and uniquely insidious—way. By exploiting massive data files, most of it harvested from the internet, they categorize us, predict whether we’re good or bad, our creditworthiness, our tastes and consumer habits—and then act accordingly…
If an anarcho-autonomous proclamation said these things today, it would certainly come from backward people who “want us to return to the caves.” Yet it was the ultra-establishment American magazine The Atlantic that wrote them… In 2014… Nine whole years ago.
Has anyone escaped the algorithmic prisons since then? Very few. Many more rushed in gladly to lock themselves inside. “It’s convenient,” they said, thinking the doors were open.
What would you do as a government if you had rid yourself of opposition to such a degree that, by 2014, your own people were talking about “algorithmic prison”? Wouldn’t you make sure not only to double-lock the cells but also to have the inmates perform their forced labor with joy?