TLDR: Techbros in SF are wearing AI pins that record everything everyone says around them.
“My general sense is that we should assume we are being recorded at all times,” said Clara Brenner, a partner at venture capital firm Urban Innovation Fund. “Of course, this is a horrible way to live your life.”
Damn right it is. Every day one step closer to dystopia. Fuck this shit.
I’m not saying use technology to extend a person’s biological memory. I’m saying use technology to keep a record of a person’s life (obviously I know the privacy implications of doing this in actual practice in the year 2025, which is why I prefaced my comment with “In a techno utopia”).
You, personally, will still forget things and be capable of nostalgia.
I think it’s pretty uncontroversial to say that people like to have pictures. They collect pictures of vacations that they enjoyed, pictures of their children when they were X age, pictures of dead relatives and pictures of themselves with friends. Because people enjoy revisiting memories. When video cameras became more ubiquitous, people took videos of vacations they enjoyed, videos of their children’s first steps, videos of themselves. There are entire markets for services which let you store and retrieve every picture that you’ve ever taken.
At the same time everyone has a story where they wish they had recorded some event. For example, a baby’s first steps that a spouse missed because they were at work or some unexpected spectacular event. Or even mundane things like ‘Where did I leave my phone?’. Having the ability to keep a record of memories, in video or in some hypothetical full-sensory recording, of every moment is something that people would be interested in.
Perhaps this is just a matter of taste, because I would absolutely do this.