Re: Push-Technology and Technology News

Chris Hind (chind@juno.com)
Sun, 16 Mar 1997 21:47:27 -0800


>However, there are often numerous pages, as well as others popping up or
>dissapearing every now and again.

Exactly why I want to suggest that microsoft or netscape come out with a
tag to automatically change a searchtool's url pointer to aim at a
different location if that page moved.

>Rather than looking at push as simply slow TV, think of it as customized
>TV. Last month I was lamenting that the channels and shows I liked on
>the tube were so spread out that it was a pain in the butt to hunt for
>them and keep track of what I want to watch when, so much so that I
>often miss things I wanted to see, and see nothing interesting when I
>have the time available. Push technology is like a smart VCR. I would
>love for the cable company to offer the ability for each customer to put
>their ten or twenty favorite channels all in the 1-10 or 1-20 slots, so
>you dont have to go skipping through the channel spectrum. This is a
>need that is becoming more prevalent as more and more channels are added
>to the dial.

Exactly what push technology is also. Imagine content SO FUCKING ADDICTIVE
you just want to sit infront of the computer/tv combo box 24 hours a day
because it's throwing all the information you CRAVE constantly at you. All
this information streaming in is aimed directly at your id. Of course this
content will come along with a advertisement or two aimed directly at your
id and you'll have to learn incredible will power to resist the urge to buy
"exactly what you were looking for".

>Rather than lament this sign of media convergence, we need to recognise
>that we are the exceptions, the elites in the new order. Our tastes are
>not necessarily the same as the masses. THey are much more used to and
>demanding of the practice of being led around by the nose ring. They
>typically do not want to have to think about that which is not immediate
>to them. Recognising this, we can use this trend to our advantage in our
>memetic engineering. Seeing Reilly Jones' excellent commentary of Stove
>critiques of irrationality in our intellectual and memetic landscapes, I
>am struck by the idea of using push media to push extropic memes into
>the mainstream just as irrationalist thinkers did the same in our higher
>educational system.

Push technology is precisely the opposite while it may appear as that at
first. Through intelligent agents and collective intelligence, two mindsets
of the same type will begin to diverge to become more individualistic. Push
technology gives you more of what you like when you like and subtle
differences will begin to form which will cause the gap to widen between
individuals just as potholes in a road form due to ice expanding. All
content providers on the net providing webpages and the like will suddenly
be able to find their audiences though push technology and the suggestions
collective intelligence technologies will make based on their personal
profiles. The media companies may think they're winning the war on the net
and that media centralism will continue but they're dead wrong, it's
exactly the opposite. Alot of people on this mailinglist and beyond think
the same as us. We will be matched up with their profiles and we will even
be able to compare who is like whom. Through push technology we will also
be able to 'find' all the would-be extropians out there all over the planet
that haven't heard of us and will enable all of us to unite to form a power
of sorts to combat entropy worldwide. (It may sound a little unbelievable
but so is nanotech).

>While it seems paradoxical to propose using entropic methods or media
>techniques to spread extropic meme's, we need to recognise that methods
>and techniques are not the message, nor are they themselves entropic,
>merely that they have been used by entropic forces up to this point in
>time. We need to realize that the masses will always demand watered down
>versions of "the truth", they can't take 200 proof TRUTH without
>overdosing and having an allergic reaction. Diluted doses of any foreign
>agent builds up a tolerance over time.

Wrong. This is the technology that will CAUSE individuality to rise faster
than it has ever before. You've already seen how the web can cause people
to find new interests by accidently clicking on links and even creating
ideas caused by that accidental clicking and causing two totally off the
wall ideas to converge. This is the perfect environment for breakthroughs.
The accidental clicking or even innacuracy of search tools may cause people
to notice a bit of interesting information they never realized before and
cause them to research it further and develop a new interest. Notice how
people can wander off topic when doing a search with a searchtool? You need
to go from point A to point B to find point C way off in another area. It
only gets better from here on out.

"Risk: You cannot discover new oceans unless you have the courage
to lose sight of the shore."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Chris Hind (chind@juno.com) Upward, Outward, ACTION!
Email attachments: (bholat@earthlink.net)
NeoReality (Personal) http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/6810/
Ethereal Outlook (Extropian)
http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/6810/outlook.htm
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