For him, the problem of digital forgetting transcends the purely transactional concerns over who has access to what data; even if access to private information is uncompromised, our mental balance could still collapse under the burden of too much data.

Today's read was written more than four years ago. It's still remarkably relevant, however. I was reminded of it when I read about Rebecca Woolf on NPR, a Los Angeles blogger worried about the effects of our photo-happy society:

"Then they've got a thousand photos, and then they just dump the photos somewhere and don't really look at them very much, 'cause it's too difficult to tag them and organize them," she says. "That seems to me to be a kind of loss."

It's a problem most of us can identify with. I vaguely recalled reading something similar ages ago, and after some digging through old Instapaper articles, I found Morozov's piece.

I said the piece is still relevant. In fact, it's probably more relevant now, simply because of the rise of life-logging. We take so many pictures, document so many experiences- but what do we do with them later?

Not much. It's a lot of work to remember those past experiences.

So what effect does all that cataloguing have on our memory? And what must technology do to make life-logging truly valuable? Morozov offers his wonderfully enlightening take.

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Read Speak, Memory now or [save it for later](http://www.instapaper.com/hello2?url=http://bostonreview.net/Morozov-speak-memory&title=Speak, Memory&description=Evgeny Morozov on External Memory).

For the last half-decade, three-dimensional printing has been billed as the next revolution in manufacturing. The Economist and Wired have declared it world-changing technology. Last year, retailers including Staples and Amazon began to sell their own 3-D printers, and this year, Amazon has introduced a marketplace for 3-D printed objects.

3D printing is going to change everything... or not. It depends on who you talk to. Like any technology, it's almost impossible to accurately gauge just what the impact of said technology will ultimately be.

In the case of 3D printing, there's no denying that the implications are enormous. Where once robots were feared to be taking over human jobs, 3D printing may render that conversation largely moot.

So what's all the hoopla? What can 3D printing do, and what can it not? The Times recently opened up its Room for Debate series to that question. The result is an informed, lively debate on what the future holds.

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Will 3D Printers Change the World?

That’s why I use Google search and Maps despite not liking Google much, why I still use Instagram and haven’t deleted my Facebook account despite not liking Facebook, why I still use Twitter heavily despite their many dick moves, and why I even recently bought a Samsung SSD because the alternatives weren’t competitive.

Boycotting is a tricky game. In a democratic and capitalist society, we vote with our wallets. If we're boycotting a physical store like Chic-Fil-A, the level of inconvenience is minimal; just go across the street to the next fast food joint.

If you boycott Hobby Lobby, things might get a bit trickier. How far would you have to go to find the same goods?

In the online space, boycotting to show a business your disapproval of their business practices isn't just a matter of convenience (typing in two separate urls takes the same amount of time and effort). It's also a matter of who has the best product. In some instances, there's a huge gap between first- and second-best.

Taking that into account, Marco Arment explains why he uses products, including Amazon, despite objecting to their business practices of late.

Sometimes, there's just no competition.

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Read I'll Never Fly Amazon Again or [save it for later](http://www.instapaper.com/hello2?url=http://www.marco.org/2014/08/10/never-fly-amazon-again&title=I'll Never Fly Amazon Again&description=Marco Arment on boycotting Amazon).

Later, people asked me, "What do you think elevated the post?" Likes, comments, the number of people who made them, what they said, velocity, timing, my profile—all of that, in some way, played a part. The real answer, of course, is the algorithm. It is written in a wild array of numbers, symbols and computer-speak that only a handful of Facebook employees understand. And as I watched my faux-news go, I felt how that combination of numbers and signals and people starts to resemble one giant interconnected neural network—like a vibrant MRI of a human brain as someone plays chess or has sex.

Facebook seems determined to get on my bad side lately, which may be why Caleb Garling's latest experiment resonated with me.

Garling set out to "trick" Facebook's algorithm, which surfaces some stories to the top of users' news feeds while suppressing others. It does so by scanning each update for keywords which imply personal milestones.

That would mean that, theoretically, a story about a pregnancy, a marriage, or a job change would be more likely to be seen than, say, a political post. But is that the case? Is it really so cut-and-dry? Garling tested that very hypothesis.

Read Tricking Facebook's Algorithm or [save it for later](http://www.instapaper.com/hello2?url=http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/08/tricking-facebooks-algorithm/375801/&title=Tricking Facebook's Algorithm&description=Caleb Garling sets out to trick Facebook's NewsFeed algorithm).

My contention is that Pinterest is one of the four ways that people find things on the Internet. The default, of course, is Googling (or—fine, Microsoft—Binging). For real-time searches, there is Twitter. For people or entities, there’s Facebook. But if what you want to find are things, objects, then Pinterest is the way to go.

After Alexis Madrigal stumbled upon the idea of Pinterest as a "database of intentions," he sat down with the co-founder of Pinterest, Evan Sharp.

Interestingly, the very vagueness that has left me wanting a use case for Pinterest is what Sharp breaks down as the pivotal component from which everything else is built ("ideas," "discovery," etc.). That slipperiness leads to a very intriguing idea: Pinterest has the potential to change search.

Read What is Pinterest? A Database of Intentions now or [save it for later](http://www.instapaper.com/hello2?url=http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/07/what-is-pinterest-a-database-of-intentions/375365/&title=What is Pinterest? A Database of Intentions&description=What is Pinterest? A Database of Intentions).

But it goes deeper than that. What Pinterest has created — almost unintentionally — is a database of things in the world that matter to human beings. While Google crunches numbers to figure out what's relevant, Pinterest's human users define what is relevant for a given topic. And because of that, they could become a legitimate competitor to Google, the world's most valuable Internet company.

Pinterest has always confounded me. I want to use the service. Its unique blend of aesthetics, utility, and experience makes it a pleasure to use... but I've never really known what to use it for. I've gone back and forth on this issue a few times.

So what is it that's so appealing about the site? And what does it mean for the future of Pinterest? Alexis Madrigal may have nailed it.

Read Can Pinterest Compete with Google's Search? on NPR or [save it for later](http://www.instapaper.com/hello2?url=http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2014/07/30/332317807/can-pinterest-compete-with-googles-search&title=Can Pinterest Compete with Google's Search?&description=Can Pinterest Compete with Google's Search?).

Outrage over these experiments could suggest that we too readily trust that data is essentially neutral or “honest.” But clearly, social media informs the structure of our interactions and how we exist and identify ourselves through them. As Rudder points out, our formation as online subjects is already manipulated and shaped by the scientists who create these digital platforms. Consistently, the interests of consumer capital are a driving force here. We were never just sets of pure data, floating together in neutral cyberspace.

The furor over the infamous Facebook experiment seems to have died down, but OkCupid has resurrected the debate with an admission of its own. Some comdemn their actions, some argue that this is the way websites operate- end of story.

But like the dangerous distinction between public and private, Natasha Lennard believes there's a dangerous dualism between the concept of on- and offline. The danger inherent in that distinction leads data scientists to toy with our lives, even if they believe they're only toying with an algorithm.

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Read OkCupid and Facebook Aren’t the Only Ones Manipulating You, but That’s No Excuse on Vice News or [save it for later](https://www.instapaper.com/hello2?url=https://news.vice.com/article/okcupid-and-facebook-arent-the-only-ones-manipulating-you-but-thats-no-excuse&title=OkCupid and Facebook Aren’t the Only Ones Manipulating You, but That’s No Excuse&description=OkCupid and Facebook Aren’t the Only Ones Manipulating You, but That’s No Excuse).

I would be frustrated because I would tell them we need customer service training as much as sales training, but it came from Philly [Comcast’s headquarters] so that’s what we had to deal with. [Managers] would listen to the call, even have secret shoppers call in. If we didn’t ask [customers] to get more products we would be spoken to. Eventually, selling became part of tech support and billing.

If we were to cast a movie about a corporation that embodies everything we as consumers despise, we would surely give Comcast the role. The company has laughingly abysmal customer service ratings and a reputation to rival that of Lex Luther. Hell, even criticism of Comcast has its own Wikipedia page.

A recent customer service call gone horribly awry certainly didn't help matters. Instead, it served as a symbol of everything that's wrong with the company.

In the wake of that call, Adrianne Jeffries went searching for answers. How could one company be so awful at satisfying its customers? Jeffries went straight to the source: Comcast employees. More than 100 of them, in fact.

The enlightening result tells us all we need to know about how not to run a multi-billion dollar cable business.

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Read Comcast Confessions: when every call is a sales call or [save it for later](http://www.instapaper.com/hello2?url=http://www.theverge.com/2014/7/28/5936959/comcast-confessions-when-every-call-is-a-sales-call&title=Comcast Confessions: when every call is a sales call&description=Comcast Confessions: when every call is a sales call).

And the bigger the pool the more irresistible it is likely to become. This is not just common sense, it explains why the N.S.A.’s repeated assertions that they aren’t actually looking at the content of emails, or targeting Americans, should have been greeted with skepticism. The pool of data is a pool of knowledge. Knowledge is power; and power corrupts. As a consequence it is difficult to avoid drawing the inference that absolute knowledge might corrupt absolutely.

Thirteen months ago, Edward Snowden made the world aware of the NSA's PRISM program, which harvests metadata from all over the internet.

We were outraged. We took to Twitter, to our blogs, to anyone that would listen to condemn the NSA's actions. Petitions emerged, as did new revelations, and it looked like we were on a path to change- even it was excruciatingly slow.

Thirteen months later, we seem to have forgotten. Michael P. Lynch wants to help us remember. In the Times, he lays out the case as it stands, not only explaining that we should be angry, but why we should be.

Awareness fades, but this one's too important to let it.

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Read Privacy and the Pool of Information now or [save it for later](http://www.instapaper.com/hello2?url=http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/07/27/privacy-and-the-pool-of-information/?_php=true&_type=blogs&nytmobile=0&_r=0&title=Privacy and the Pool of Information&description=Privacy and the Pool of Information).

It’s not marked as advertorial, but it is. You are being sold to and lied to even more often than you realize, and by even the most established and credible of publications. The media outlets you trust are under such (self-imposed) pressure to serve up more and more content that they’ve turned their sites into promotional platforms.

Fact: the web runs on content.

Fact: content is an entirely different beast than journalism.

We tend to think we can tell the difference between the two, but are the lines being blurred ever-so-subtly? Amy Westervelt thinks so.

Which is why she's getting out of the content business. On Medium, she explains why.

Read Content Used to be King. Now it's the Joker on Medium or [save it for later](http://www.instapaper.com/hello2?url=https://medium.com/@amywestervelt/content-used-to-be-king-now-its-the-joker-d40703c18c73&title=Content Used to be King&description=Content Used to be King).

The phenomenon of doxxing (revealing personal information about a person online) has made clear that public information exists in a context of power and consent, and we must construct our ethics in that context. We can’t do that if we are still pretending that taking information that was merely available and instead making it easily accessible is an act without any moral or ethical consequences.

The word "social" implies a certain level of publicity. The web, by its nature, is social, so it stands to reason that the web is public.

Be careful what you put online, right? That axiom has been uttered so many times it's lost a bit of its potency. But the term is symbolic of the way we look at the web at large: as a binary system. It's either public, or it's not.

Anil Dash raises a few interesting questions in today's piece, though. What if Twitter conversations were more like conversations had in a public restaurant? It's public, in the strict sense of the term, but there's a bit more nuance there than a binary approach allows.

I don't agree with everything in this piece, but I love the fact that Dash is asking these questions. It's the start of a conversation we should've begun long ago.

Read What is Public? now on Medium or [save it for later](http://www.instapaper.com/hello2?url=https://medium.com/message/what-is-public-f33b16d780f9&title=What is Public?&description=What is Public?).

I started in the general vicinity of the letter d and then just let loose, trying to tap at random across the characters. The first time I tapped out dcisnence and drew existence. The random string dzyjzynxe produced distance. The third time I went a little longer and beset my keyboard with descinnztsb. This instantly transformed itself into deacon stab. And there it was, a little potted history of humanity: first birth, then exile, and before you know it somebody's gone and shanked a priest.

The entirety of the technology we hold in our hands is more than the sum of its parts. Our phones are made of metal and plastic and silicon, true- but they're also made of stories. Or, at least, the technologies that comprise our pocket computers are themselves comprised of stories.

Autocorrect is one such technology. It's become the butt of many jokes, but it's also one of the most useful pieces of the smartphone puzzle. And it all started in the early 90s, with a Microsoft Word developer.

Read The Fasinatng … Frustrating … Fascinating History of Autocorrect or
[Save it to Instapaper](http://www.instapaper.com/hello2?url=http://www.wired.com/2014/07/history-of-autocorrect/&title=The Fasinatng … Frustrating … Fascinating History of Autocorrect&description=The Fasinatng … Frustrating … Fascinating History of Autocorrect)

If you think “Yo” has two characters, you’re not counting in binary. Yo is your mailman putting up the mailbox flag. Yo is a buzzer going off letting you know your table is ready.

When Yo! was released, the internet exploded in ridicule (myself included).

If you're not familiar, Yo! is an app that does one thing: it sends a two-letter message to any user in your friends list: yo.

That's it. That's the only feature of the app.

On first glance, it's an easy concept to ridicule. But what if Yo! could do more? What if it were an elegant solution to a great many problems? Matt Hartman believes that Yo! is just that... which is why the Betaworks investor put his money where his mouth is and invested in the dead-simple app. Over on Medium, he explains why he's so excited about the future of Yo!.

Yo! to invest ➝

They enable us to infer the other person’s intentions, as well as how involved they are in the conversation, whether they are stressed or relaxed, if they are attracted to us, and so on. Nonverbal signals add a level of depth to the interaction, but demand cognitive and emotional effort.

In one of the first episodes of HBO's Girls, Hannah discusses with Marnie the heirarchy of various types of communication: text, Google chat, Facebook messenger, email. Face-to-face is best, she says, and of phone conversations she simply says they're "not of this time."

Most of us can relate. I've never been much for phone conversations, and, except in rare cases, I strongly prefer text. I'm not alone in that; these days, most of us seem to prefer online communication for its efficiency.

Why is that? And what are the tradeoffs?

The emotional involvement behind social media interactions ➝

Maybe the decline of deep reading isn’t due to reading skill atrophy but to the need to develop a very different sort of skill, that of teaching yourself to focus your attention.

Nowhere has the digital versus analog debate raged so fiercely as in the realm of reading. And most, to this point, have gotten it wrong.

There are two reasons for that: first, we don't know enough. Any opinion that claims to have sufficient knowledge to pit analog against digital reading should probably be disregarded. Second, both sides of the argument tend to go all-in for one or the other side: either reading on an analog medium is better, or it isn't.

The truth, of course, is nuanced. And, not surprisingly, it has more to do with us than with the medium on which we read.

How to Be a Better Online Reader ➝