I felt during the whole movie that there was this message that all we need to stand up for what is happening in regards to invasion of privacy which I found really interesting because I always considered, even throughout my other reflection regarding the topic, is that the issue we have regarding the privacy and data can be always solved through strict regulation that guides the companies and platforms’ algorithms. However, the movie got me thinking that what if the ones that have the authority of creating these rules are not interested about the subject enough. I felt that all the key things in the movie was there to direct the reader into questioning two main things which are our willingness to share online data and the actions we don’t take against anyone who invade our privacy. This idea of it being a movie also was logical because by creating a movie, it will have press and this press will catch the media attention which is one of the strongest ways to get people to talk about subject.
The idea of creating an online persona that is almost an digital version of you is something that is extremely highlighted in the movie especially when the main case of Cambridge Analytica was presented. The research company presented people with personality questioner via Facebook which allowed them to create data that helps them campaign for Trump based on the predictable patterns they get from the online personas. This is extremely dangerous in so many ways as in this case it helped in a political way which means that the data cannot be used only for the marketing strategies but can also be used in political and even worse ways.
I think that the movie helps us start taking about fundamental elements in regard to Surveillance capitalism and under this word lies a lot of questions that we are still not sure of its answers. It also helps raise the idea of how these platforms like Facebook become something that we cannot live without and how we should start looking at them as public platforms with rules to follow which rely align with some of the discussion that we had in class. Something that I will really think about is how to communicate in positive way to reach these rules and regulations that can help confine the algorithms generated by the companies and platforms.
