By Rodrigo de Benito Sanz (January 26, 2009) (Reading 1)

Humans are sometimes computer-like and computers try to behave like humans. In our industrial highly organized culture, some values such as efficiency or discipline are much appreciated. These values are directly related with the way machines do their work. Of course, there are other features, like creativity or experience that are inherent to the human being and are have become important qualities to encourage and improve in “technological beings”. The postmodern era is the era of hybrids. As such, computers become more and more human (and viceversa). However this fact is not only related to the improvement of technology by itself. Besides, human-centrism has always exist. Men and women project fears and desires on non-human beings (from a pet to a toy). As technology becomes more sophisticated with the increase of interactivity the limits between alive and inert, things and humans blurs.

Basic technology can be used as a persuasive tool. Among the many virtues of computers in this duty, I would remark the inmediate access to big amounts of data. Information is power, and there’s no way to compete with speed of computers gathering it, even when all this information is created by humans. The Internet has become very persuasive in general terms: trust, is drastically increased. Skeptical users have become a minority and virtual spaces are considered safer, friendlier, cozier. Each individual looks for answers in this collective mind and even automatically generated content (by an algorythem) enjoys the effects of this “aura”.

Technology is a great media/tool for persuasion. Some fields are yet to be improved, like the emotional impact and strength of human to human interaction in some specific situations, but the ability of technology to deal with feelings directly is not far.