Faceless rule-makers

Yesterday’s post about Facebook’s abysmal security algorithm prompts thoughts about the power of faceless rule-makers and how they deploy that power.  Lest we forget, computer applications are designed by humans, who are as prone as the next person to commit errors.

Whether it’s a computer, an in-car system or a game on a tablet, it cannot have been tested in every conceivable scenario. I recall some years back seeing the standard message on computers, along these lines – ‘You have committed an illegal action.’ Which definitely alarmed law-abiding new users, who worried about what they’d done… This is typical of some programmers – too lazy to program and test for all eventualities, they let the conditional options drop through a number of possible messages and then throw in a catch-all – ‘illegal alert!’ – to capture any other unforeseen route a user might go down.

It’s the English language being misused: illegal in my dictionary says it’s something that’s contrary to or for bidden by law. The last time I looked, computer programmers didn’t make law – they make rules. The same goes for android and robots used with regard to tablets and apps. Android is an automaton resembling a human being; robot was invented by Karel Capek in his story ‘R.U.R – Rossum’s Universal Robots’ and derives from the Polish, Ukrainian robota, forced labour, and Russian, robota, work. Early twentieth century definition now accepts that it can be a machine that carries out a variety of tasks automatically or with a minimum of external impulse (such as factory robots); that’s still a big leap from software applications.

Are the individuals who label these applications so devoid of imagination that they must steal an existing term for their jargon? Ask any sci-fi writer and he or she would probably come up with something appropriate. I realise that it’s academic my discussing this, when you consider that for the Windows operating system you have to click on ‘Start’ to log off (which was removed, sensibly, but the clamour from old users has demanded its return, a yearning for the familiar).

I digress. Consider two new ideas being bandied about of late – driverless cars and driverless lorry convoys!

We’re slowly blindly going down that path that was trodden decades before the Terminator movies were thought of, be assured.

If users become dependent on all these applications, then when they go wrong, as they do and will continue to do so, the resultant responses will be anger without management, frustration, and a tendency to rebel – whether as a hacker, a troll or in a more personal manner. It’s the stuff of science fiction. Harlan Ellison’s ‘ “Repent, Harlequin!” said the Ticktockman’ was about nonconformity being a felony, as well as being a moral tale. Sci-fi authors extrapolate current trends to see where it might lead. Jim England’s story ‘The Globe’ (published in Auguries #6, 1987 is about, among other things, litter louts being zapped by a surveillance stun-gun. And the late Bob Jenkins published a short story ‘No Fire Without Smoke’ (published in Adlib, 1985, reprinted Portsmouth Post, 2007) that casts cigarette smokers as public enemies, liable to be incarcerated or even shot…

'The Globe', 1987

 

The point – faceless rule-makers, if allowed, can take us down a road of unintended and even unperceived consequences.

Back to normal tomorrow…

 

FB – Face Bully?

In the scheme of things, it’s no big deal. I can live without Face Book. I mean, there are children being slaughtered throughout the world, notably in Ukraine, Gaza, Iraq and Libya. Why does the world’s media call the latest incarnation of deranged misfits, IS, the Islamic State? Because that’s what they call themselves? They’re not the true face of Islam. They should be labelled for what they are – Insane Scum, Insane Savages or something more truthful.

Still, I digress.

A couple of days ago, I posted an FB message to a friend on his birthday, and also sent an image of tapas – since he has lived in Spain, and would get the virtual party reference.

Tapas - Wikipedia commons

 

I immediately followed up this with another image, this time of glasses of Spanish wine, for his virtual party. (I wasn’t able to include more than one image per message). And to cap it off, I sent an image of some bottles of cava – Spanish equivalent of Champagne at a fraction of the price…

Cava - and glasses of wine - Wikipedia commons

 

And immediately I received a FB message telling me a security check was required to ensure I was who I was. Great, I thought. I only had one of those last week, and answered the question and received a clearance code on my mobile phone, no problem. So, here we go again. I duly read the capture code or whatever they call it – say, KsFgLi – and input this – and immediately I was informed that I’d failed the security check and would be temporarily blocked for 30 days. This means that I can post to my FB timeline, and share other posts on my timeline; I cannot send PMs and I cannot comment on my own posts or anyone else’s anywhere on FB. No court of appeal, no best of three attempts at the code. As far as they’re concerned, I’ve fallen foul of their rules. Yeah, right.

In retrospect, it’s obvious to me that I mis-read the code, which isn’t surprising since often they are quite indecipherable; the point is, I didn’t feel unsure about the code, so I input what I thought I read.

Why am I bothering to write this? I’ll just have to wait out the 30 days, surely. Yes, I suppose I will. I was going to attend some FB friends’ virtual book launches, but that’s not possible now. There were other FB contacts about blogs etc I was involved in, regarding sharing information etc; I’ll find a way round that, eventually.

What bugs me is the Draconian approach to the blockage. FB in bullying mode.

Clearly, the algorithm system is programmed to identify any posts that originate from one source and consecutively aim at another source; the limit is probably three; it may be as little as two but I type fast…! It may be linked to images rather than simple text posts. The automatic response is a security check process. In effect, it’s a robot checking to ensure that I’m not a robot.

 
I take issue with the imposition of the blockage after I failed only once at the security check hurdle. Banks’ ATMs allow at least three attempts at getting the PIN code right.

I take issue with the imposition of 30 days’ blockage. Why 30 days? A nice round number. What does that achieve, exactly? If I had been a spammer, then I’d have learned my lesson after a month, is that it? I’d have thought spammers would have multiple accounts anyway. Does 30 days allow me to go to Specsavers so I can get my eyes tested and then better decipher their awful codes? There’s no reason why it should be 30 days instead of 24 hours; in effect this ‘grounding’ is tantamount to treating users as recalcitrant children.

 
We’ve all been there. Authorities impose constraints or new laws because of the irresponsible or even criminal few so that the majority suffer – whether that’s speed-bumps, traffic calming, the confiscating of nail clippers at airports, or a 30-day temporary blockage on FB. It isn’t rational, but they’re the rules we’ve made. Yeah, right. No, at best, it’s lazy programming, at worst, it’s bullying.

So, dear FB friends, if you don’t see my half-witticism comments on your pages for a while, that’s why. (You may even breathe a sigh of relief!)

Tomorrow, I'll look at some fiction that extrapolates on the 'punishment' meted out to rule-breakers...

[Later (26 August): while temp blocked you usually can't see a comment or like so you can't click on them. However, yesterday, on one post there was a like offered so I clicked on it. A message came up, saying I was blocked as I 'might' have violated the rules... but I could contact via help, which I did, and stated my case succinctly, and today I received a response to the effect that I am now unblocked, back to normal.]