The Awesome Science of Chinonomics

There seems to be hysteria these days around AI and algorithm-based consumption. The algorithmic economy  threatens to bring to the realm of the tangible that totem of economic dogma called the "invisible hand." Computers are finally linking --through big data-- individuals' behavior with algorithms that sort them, allowing machines to predict reactions: the "invisible hand" materializes(!). Nothing like predicting human conduct to be able to make money. That damned watch I dared to search for 3 weeks ago in a moment of stupid leisure has haunted me everywhere I go on the internet. Please, stop it Google. I'm not buying it. The idea that we are just soft machines  is a fascinating one. It feeds the collective dread of an algorithmically-dominated Armageddon, making people fret about a time in the not-so-distant future when we will decide nothing for ourselves, and when everything will be dictated by an algorithm --surreptitiously creating the illusion of  ...

We hear it all the time: the Internet is becoming more and more important in our lives. We read news on it, we socialize , shop, bank , and get an increasing share of our entertainment from it. A whole parallel cyber-universe coexists with the brick-and-mortar (often more boring) reality we brave every morning we step out of our beds. The Wachowsky brothers were not that crazy after all. We choose to live in a computer-generated reality -- a "Matrix" called Internet. Our Facebook self is nothing but our own residual self image --the "Neo" version of ourselves. One would think the parallelisms between cyberspace and real life should extend to many more areas. If there is a marketplace in cyberspace -where you can get anywhere from a prostitute to a Bentley- and a bunch of social networks where humans interact -some even find their soul mates-, the same natural/legal rights and social institutions that underpin growth and stability in the brick-and-mortar world ...