Context Lenses

Originally published in East & West Magazine
July, 2010


Your entire life is spent absorbing, processing, analyzing and storing data. But you probably don’t call it “data”. You probably call it “the news”, or “gossip”, or “information” or whatever. It’s warm and rainy today. The soup of the day is split pea. That man is wearing a blue tie. There are three eggs left in the refrigerator. That shoe smells bad. This is very hot. Big or small, important or seemingly insignificant, every sight, sound, taste, smell and feeling you experience every second of every day is recorded as data. A lifetime of information, stored right there behind your eyes. These tiny data events are taking place constantly and over time become a larger collection of data known as “experience”. This database in your brain is the cumulative result of everything you have ever experienced. This is your frame of reference, which provides the context through which you view the world. So how do you manage your data? How does your frame of reference inform and influence how you manage new information? How do you apply the data you have acquired to your daily life? And perhaps most importantly, how do you guard against those who would seek to manipulate you by interfering with the data that you take in or the way you use it? 

“… we just had the fifth anniversary of YouTube and the twelfth of Google, and between them, they're killing off a great institution: lying. You just can't lie anymore -- facts are too easy to check …” – Bill Maher (Real Time)

What is a lie, but intentionally incorrect data designed to provoke a behavior desired by the provider of that data? We see it everywhere, from advertisements making bogus claims to baby-kissing politicians and street corner con artists; people passing along false data in order to get other people to engage in behaviors they otherwise would not. Massive quantities of time and money are spent by people of all stripes and motivations to put data in front of you, true or otherwise, to alter your behavior to one that is more beneficial to them, often at your expense.


The good news is that you no longer have to blindly accept as truth what others tell you. You have all the resources you need, literally at your fingertips, to filter out the bad data and get to the truth. But do you use it?

“You can’t handle the truth!” – Col. Nathan R. Jessep (A Few Good Men)

A great many people believe that marijuana should be/remain illegal. Probably a majority, depending on where you are at the moment. If you are not one of them feel free to sit this section out. If you are one of those who believe that pot should be illegal, write down as many of the reasons as you can think of why. Look at that list. This is a list of opinions you have based on information you’ve collected over your lifetime; from your parents, friends, teachers, the media, whoever. This is a part of your belief system. But there is a problem: every single item on that list can be debunked in seconds by anyone with access to Google and a pinch of curiosity. This is the truth: there is absolutely, positively zero evidence in any credible study, medical journal or any source whatsoever that marijuana is harmful to people. Quite the opposite, in fact. In the United States alone tobacco and alcohol-related deaths average over 500,000 annually. Estimates as to how many fast-food-devouring Americans die each year due to obesity-related illnesses vary between 300,000-400,000. And the number of deaths related to marijuana anywhere in the world in the entirety of recorded human history? Zero. Not even one. So here we have three of the top killers of Americans, cigarettes, alcohol and junk food, taking the lives of almost one million every single year in that country alone … yet the possession and consumption of all of these things is perfectly legal, even encouraged. Marijuana is but a harmless, benign plant.


These are the facts. These are the data. Even a study commissioned by the United States government under former Republican President Richard Nixon (no fan of hippy culture by any stretch of the imagination) concluded that cannabis poses no credible risk of any kind and recommended that the ban on marijuana be lifted, even going as far as to declare the prohibition unconstitutional (which it is). The study was, of course, immediately buried by the government which instead intensified their efforts to propagate false data and issue more disinformation. Take some time to check it out for yourself. The facts are there and readily available. Visit www.google.com. This is just one seemingly innocuous example, but it begs the question: if they are willing to go to these lengths to mislead you about something so minor, then what other data are they misleading you about? War? Yes, Nixon lied about that too. Prolifically.


The next question that must be asked is what will you now do with this new set of data? Will you replace your old, incorrect data with the new, accurate data? If not, why not? Will this information cause you to eat better? Exercise more? Will you stop using alcohol and tobacco? Will you be more cautious about accepting what you are told by others? Will you use this data to better inform you decisions going forward, or will you dismiss it? How do you process information that contradicts everything you’ve been told to believe your whole life?

“It became very clear to me sitting out there today that every decision I've made in my entire life has been wrong. My life is the complete opposite of everything I want it to be. Every instinct I have, in every aspect of life, be it something to wear, something to eat - it's all been wrong.” – George Costanza (Seinfeld)

In every corner of the world we see people engaged in behaviors which are clearly not in their best interest. From the farms of Kansas to the streets of Detroit to the muddy tent cities of Port Au Prince to the slums of Mumbai we see people voting against their own economic best interests, procreating beyond their means, forgoing education and living amongst their own waste. Despite generations of acquired human knowledge and endless amounts of data demonstrating the self-destructive results of these types of behaviors, people seem determined to continue to engage in them to their own detriment, and often to their demise.

"The more I practice, the luckier I get." – Golfer, Arnold Palmer … or Gary Player (depending on which website you believe)

If content is king, then data is God. In digital media and marketing we capture and study behavioral data to better understand consumers in order to get a better idea of how to market goods and services to them. We observe how they interact with information we put in front of them in order to learn about their preferences and build context around our understanding of them as individuals. Relevance to the life of the consumer is the lifeblood of successful digital outreach. Without good data none of this is possible. Without good data we have no context for understanding the consumer and therefore no way of knowing what is relevant to their lives. 


Several years ago I was having lunch in a coffee shop in Bangkok. In front of me was a cup of coffee, cream, a spoon and a napkin. There was just one piece missing from the puzzle. I called the waitress over and asked for “namtan”. Thai is a tonal language, which means that how you say a word, your tone and inflection, determines its meaning. So a word that might look the same a westerner actually has five often very different meanings depending on how you pronounce it. I apparently pronounced “namtan” incorrectly, drawing a blank look of total incomprehension. The waitress was unable to see past her immediate, limited understanding and intuit that what I was asking for was sugar. Imagine walking into a pizza shop in New York and asking for a slice of “beezzuh” and getting blank stares.


A few years back I was at a picnic on the beach in Connecticut when a friend arrived and announced to everyone that Russia had just invaded Georgia, and expressed concern that they might soon be coming north to Connecticut. Put aside for a moment the outlandish and preposterous idea that Russia would invade the United States … the fact that this person thought that we could enjoy a picnic on the beach as the United States was being invaded by Russia demonstrates a catastrophic failure of contextual understanding of the world and how things work. This was the result of not having enough data to be able to process this news event properly.

Farmer Ted: You know, I'm getting input here that I'm reading as relatively hostile. Samantha: Go to hell. Farmer Ted: Very hostile!(Sixteen Candles)

The beautiful thing about data is that, good or bad, it is always educational. Even negative feedback gives us insight into the world around us. Traveling the world one comes across numerous, often hilarious and inexplicable examples of the results of ignored data by souvenir peddlers. On a recent trip to Sri Lanka I was fascinated to find vendors waiting for tourists at the entrances to various attractions and temples, places that usually involved climbing numerous steps in intense heat to reach, selling (or attempting to sell) large, heavy, unwieldy items like (no exaggeration) brass nautical compasses, lanterns, oil paintings, large wooden sculptures and huge chunks of quartz rocks. There was not a bottle of water, an ice cream or even a moist towlette anywhere in sight. The last time I visited Cambodia’s infamous Tuosleng Genocide Museum I was surprised to find that the front display case of the gift shop was stocked full of feminine sanitary napkins. On several occasions I have been approached on the beaches of Cambodia by vendors offering shoe shines. At many tourist attractions you will still see people attempting to sell postcards to travelers with digital cameras who have just emerged from the location featured on the postcards. Many shops still sell 35mm camera film. I don’t even know where to buy a 35mm camera anymore. These people must hear “no” so often that you’d think they’d give up and try another line of work, or at least take the time to actually consider what product or service might be relevant to their target customer within the context of the situation. No such luck.


At another coffee shop several weeks ago, this time in Vietnam, my waitress brought me something I did not order. When I informed her that this was not what I had ordered she told me matter-of-factly that I could not return it. She was wrong. I did return it. I found out later that the store’s policy is to dock employee pay for the value of the mistaken order. In Vietnam that means that just one or two misplaced orders could wipe out an entire day’s paycheck. I’ve made mistakes before that have cost me a lot more than a day’s wages. I learned from those mistakes and do my best to not repeat them. If I had accepted her mistake she would never have realized that she had made the mistake, nor would she have had to pay a price for it. She would have learned nothing from her error. Consequences are what help us to learn and avoid unsuccessful behaviors. We can only learn from our mistakes if we’re aware that we’ve made them, and we won’t fully understand their magnitude unless we pay a penalty for them. This is part of the process of learning and growing. We’ve all stuck a finger in an electric socket at some point in our lives. Few of us have done it twice.

“If my answers frighten you then you should cease asking scary questions.” – Jules (Pulp Fiction)

The danger of data, of course, is that it forces you to look the truth in the face and see things, including yourself, for what they actually are rather than what you wished they were. Be prepared, you might not always like what you see. The good news is that even the bad news is good news, because it’s yet another opportunity to learn and become better. It further enriches your context. It broadens your understanding and puts a little better focus on the world around you. The only question remaining is will you actually take time read the data … and will you act on it? Or will you keep doing what you’ve always done, just because that’s the way you’ve always done it. As they say, the truth will set you free. But only if you let it.

Wifi? Because I said so.

Originally published in East & West Magazine
June, 2010


Nothing is free. I get that. "Free" gift with purchase, "free” welcome cocktail at check in, "free" health care, "free" love, “free” wifi. It’s not free; it's built into the price. If it were really free they’d be losing money. When it comes to being wired I don’t care. Charge me for it. Just don’t talk to me about it.


Just as those kitschy American roadside motels touting “Free Cable TV” belie decades of signage neglect, so the ubiquitous “Free Wifi” signs, too, are starting to look quaint ... relics of an old and dying paradigm.


The digital divide is not just an economic gap between the technological haves and the have nots, but a divergence of thinking. Or, more accurately, a failure of divergent thinking. Many people are not getting on board with new technology and, by extension, the new ways of looking at and interacting with the world that are the inevitable consequence of so much change so quickly. They have chosen to ignore or even reject technology outright, oblivious to the fact that their failure to embrace the digital age can (and likely will) create some degree of adversity in their lives … and, more importantly, in mine.


Recently while checking in to hotel in Bali I asked the receptionist for their wifi password, as I always do. He informed me that they had (what I imagine they considered to be) a very high-tech, customized wifi system, complete with a branded sign-in page and scratch-off access cards available for sale for $1 per hour in 30 minute increments. I know what it costs to set up a small wireless network. It isn’t free, but it’s pretty close. In any case, it’s certainly not enough to bother me about on my vacation. Nickel-and-diming me over internet access when you already got a 5000% markup on those Peanut M&Ms is just tacky.


That was annoying enough, but I bit my tongue, paid for the card, scratched it off, logged on for 10 minutes, logged off and went to dinner. When I tried to log in again later the system rejected my code. I went again to the front desk to inquire. After a solid seven minutes we discovered that the problem was that I had logged off. Once you log off, you see, your code expires, no matter how much time is left on that card. For a split second I think I might have actually believed that Ashton Kutcher was about to jump out of a plant, pointing and laughing at me.


Needless to say I voiced my displeasure with their system in some detail.


The result? During my entire stay the hotel gave me as many access cards as I asked for - wait for it – free of charge. In the end the obstacle course they constructed ended up costing them, not me. I tried to explain to the manager that if he simply added an extra dollar to every room for every night’s stay that he could offset his internet access costs and possibly even make a little extra, and not a single guest would ever notice the difference, nor would they even care if they did. In addition, he would save all of the costs of printing cards, the hassle of collecting the money and IT management fees. Not to mention the added benefit of your guests not rolling their eyes at you in disgust as you make them jump hurdles for something they consider as ordinary and routine as flushing the toilet.


To this Balinese hotelier and his staff wifi is a western luxury item and another potential revenue channel to be exploited, but to his guests it is merely one of many expected amenities, like shampoo, or a door. It’s a part of their daily, and sometimes hourly, lives. Last month US News & World Report released a list of things that Americans say they cannot live without. The top three? Portable computers, high-speed internet access and smart phones. Education was fourth. Notice they didn’t just say “computers” or “internet access” or “phones”. We’re way past that. We not only expect these things, but we expect them to be light, fast and powerful. These are not aspirations anymore … these are the basics, the bare acceptable minimum. In a related story the same publication released a list of the top 21 things that Americans say they are willing to give up. The disposables, according to Americans, ranged from cable tv to a home phone (do people still have those?) to privacy to newspapers and magazines, health care and even comfort itself! What is absent from the list? Anything to do with getting and/or being online. We take being wired for granted, but for a large part of the world’s population it’s an exotic and unattainable oddity … just another foreign land that they will never have the opportunity to explore.


This digital disconnect does of course have bigger implications than my ability to access Facebook poolside. Information technology has the capacity to literally improve and save lives. Imagine the laborer in a developing country who toils in intense heat twelve hours a day for a few dollars. Now imagine him with even the most basic computer skills and he has suddenly moved into a much more comfortable life, with a bigger paycheck where he is surrounded by colleagues from whom he can learn new skills and share information. Learning builds on learning, success breeds success. In many parts of the developing world even a little knowledge can open doors to opportunities which may seem small to us, but to that man those few extra dollars a month represent a significant improvement in his quality of life.


But you can’t play the game if you don’t speak the language. And you’ll never learn the language if you don’t embrace the culture and begin to think in new ways.


King Chulalongkorn (Rama V), arguably Thailand’s most revered monarch (publically Thais will tell you that the current king is their favorite because they have to, and because he is a pretty great guy), was an insatiable and deliberate student of foreign cultures and traveled extensively to Europe and the British colonies in Asia to observe the habits, customs and methods of the west. He saw that big changes were happening and knew that Thailand had better change too if they were going to have any meaningful role in this new world. His relentless pursuit of political, social and educational reforms is largely credited for the modernization of Thailand in the nineteenth century, and for the fact that Thailand was never colonized by a western power (although Thais do now use a fork and spoon in lieu of chopsticks, thanks to him). He understood the inherent power of knowledge and of adopting new ideas and different ways of doing things. He was what we call an “early adopter”. He embraced the new and different. He immersed himself in learning. He understood that keeping up with the times was not just a fun hobby, but an existential imperative.


Unfortunately Rama V’s zeal for the culture of technology is not as pervasive today as some of us would like. From the taxi driver who instinctively turns on the car light to read my (illuminated) Blackberry screen, to the waitress hovering a precariously-overloaded tray of drinks over a customer’s laptop, to my sister’s boss asking her to “please forward that to my home email address", to my mother turning off her cell phone when she’s not talking on it, some people still interact with the new in old ways. Just a few short years ago a good friend of mine was trying to figure out the best way to get me some photos she had taken with a digital camera for a piece she was writing. Her proposed solution was to go to the local drug store and have them printed and mailed to me in New York, where I could then scan them for the website. Fortunately she’s pretty.


But I reserve my most intense scorn for those who understand and use technology but still, for whatever reasons, revert to old habits. Just flipping through the channels last night I caught a scene in some B movie in which someone was taking pictures with a digital camera which, of course, uses no film. But they dubbed in the sound of a motor drive to (I can only assume) get the point across that this was a professional photographer with a modern camera. And a modern professional camera (we are accustomed to believe) makes that iconic, sexy whirring noise. (No it doesn’t).


One of my favorite targets for ridicule in this category is the Backpacker iPod DJ. You know the guy: a scrawny, pierced European with dreadlocks and a tattoo in Sanskrit wearing $3 fisherman’s pants and a Red Bull tank top, standing smugly on stage behind a shiny new Macbook with the prerequisite oversize headphones pushed purposefully up against one ear. In the absence of actual turntables he tweaks dials, moves levers, pokes at flashing buttons and adjusts knobs with one hand while fist-pumping the sky with the other. Dude, we all know that song … we bought it from the same bootleg shop up the road that you did and it sounds exactly the same. Your little dog-and-pony show is a fraud. You’re not a DJ … you’re a Trustafarian with a laptop and a Peter Pan complex. Now press play and get off the stage.


I understand that some people are averse to change, especially radical change. Some people like to jump and some like to tiptoe to the edge and think about things a while. It’s all good. Anyway, watching people fumble and trip over technology can be very entertaining when it’s not hurting anyone or messing up my vacation. But when it comes to my attitude on being wired I defer to the King …

You can burn my house, steal my car, drink my liquor from an old fruit jar. Do anything that you want to do, but uh-uh, honey, lay off of my … internet.

It’s true that incorporating new technologies into our daily lives can sometimes be a challenge and a struggle. Not so with wifi. Not anymore. We’ve mastered it. It’s everywhere. Wifi is technological sausage. It’s easy to make, inexpensive and very satisfying … and I want it. But I don’t need to watch it being made. Just bring it to me hot and put it on my bill. And please don’t yap at me about “taking a vacation from the internet” and “relaxing”. This is relaxing, dammit! I don't want to be less wired. I want to be more wired ... but wirelessly.