Are We Ready for Post Scarcity? Part 2

It's easy to romanticize scarcity when looking to address the problems that arise as it fades from the eyes of humankind.  Recent bouts in popular culture of "paleo-nostalgia" show us just how absurd our longing for "the good old days" can get.  But the good old days were never as good as we pretend they were.  The fifties had Jim Crow laws.  Pre-industrial society was awash in the filth of both the horses that pulled carriages and the humans that rode in them.  Why I should have to point out the scourges of humanity in medieval, bronze age, or stone age days is beyond me, but I'll mention crusades and inquisitions, the slavery that built the pyramids, and war among rival tribes of cave men just to be safe.

I bring this up because it's important to note that I'm not advocating we avoid creating a post scarcity world.  Precisely the opposite, I want to acknowledge that we're in the middle of doing so, and embrace the change.  To do that though, we need to be wary and accepting of the consequences.  Some of those may be unimaginable and have to be addressed as they come.  Others are more predictable, especially when we consider history.

I mentioned the abundance of food in part one.  Now consider farming, the production of that food.  Farming is remarkably different in the modern world, and it's so efficient that we can produce so much food that our primary concerns don't regard abundance.  We take abundance of food for granted, instead seeking better quality and solutions for what to do with the excess.  This has come at a price, though.

The great depression featured, "Farming communities and rural areas suffer[ing] as crop prices fell by approximately 60%." (wikipedia, citing three other sources)  The abundance and efficiency of farming is so staggering that only through heavy subsidies is agriculture profitable today.  These subsidies are so severe that Lawrence Lessig in his book Republic, Lost titles his chapter on government farming subsidies, "Why don't we have free markets?"  We recoil at the realization that government is deciding what food gets grown, and yet this might be important and beneficial to society, since we all like to eat.  Surely subsidizing agriculture is better than milk being spilled into gutters while thousands only a few hundred miles away starved, a characteristic image of the depression?

Food is one thing, it's physical and tangible.  We're all familiar with it and easily understand what it means.  Information is quite another, yet it's the next thing whose scarcity is being obliterated.  Personal computing and the internet have done a pretty good job already, once again changing the problems from availability to find-ability of information of high enough quality and relevance.

What have humans done with this?  We haven't become a society of well read polyglots that understand the conflicts between relativity and quantum mechanics as we might hope.  We're very well entertained, though.  Entertainment is just a form of information, after all.  A textbook has roughly the same form as a storybook.  With Netflix, Hulu, & Youtube,  for videos alone we can spend our entire day being entertained for probably not quite $100 a month.

This doesn't (necessarily) mean we're stupid or shallow, though.  Many of the most popular shows are sharply written character and political dramas like House of Cards, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, and Game of Thrones.  The recent revival of Carl Sagan's Cosmos series did well.  It could be argued more people are writing than ever before thanks to blogging sites like what you're reading now and maybe even social media.

OK, I'll admit I might not be buying the idea that the lack of scarcity in entertainment is improving us as a people either, but on the other hand I'm not going to dismiss it outright.  A stronger example might be video games.  The juggernaut game Minecraft is almost exclusively a creative tool rather than a traditional game.  Gaming has a strong community of "modding," or learning some basic (or in some cases extremely complex) programming tools used in a game to create a variant of that game. These variants span anything between the original game with a failure message changed from, "You died." to "Thanks, Obama!" to entirely new games built on the same graphics and gameplay engine.

In both food and entertainment we do see demand for quality now that availability is so high.  People grow from just being happy to have something to eat to wanting something that is organic, gluten-free, or maybe even something actually important.  People start paying attention to what their food is over whether or not it's there.  Likewise in entertainment we are demanding quality more and more.  We are seeking entertainment that we can, as Kevin Spacey says, "engage with...with a passion and an intimacy that a blockbuster movie could only dream of."

Bertrand Russell writes in his essay In Praise of Idleness about the odd disconnect that exists between our valuation of production and consumption.  While we admire productivity we don't highly value consumption.  Those who earn money have prestige, but not those eager to spend it.  He points out the oddity of this, particularly when we only earn money is by others' spending of it.  "We think too much of production, and too little of consumption. One result is that we attach too little importance to enjoyment and simple happiness, and that we do not judge production by the pleasure that it gives to the consumer."

Russell also alludes to the caste and class scaffolds that these attitudes seem to stem from.  He even goes so far to argue that the traditional work ethic arose largely as a tool of slave-owners and autocrats to keep their populations  content with their tyrannical rule.  If this is starting to sound like Marxist thinking to you then you're actually very clever.  A serious point of departure I must take to this essay is his praise given to the (only ten years old at the time of writing) Russian revolution and newly formed USSR.

We all know how that experiment turned out, so how can I possibly be suggesting that going at it again is a going to be a good thing?  The short answer is that I'm not.  I am arguing that an economy with abundance for humanity requiring very little input of labor from humanity is on the horizon, or even just finishing its arrival and is starting to settle in.  One of my great concerns is the way this could create a dictatorship masquerading as efforts to provide equally for all men like existed in communist Russia.  I'll delve into this a little more in part 3.

Are We Ready for Post Scarcity? Part 1

The abundance of the modern day is staggering.  Food alone is now requiring few man hours and producing vast amounts of product.  In about 25 years the personal computer has gone from a relatively cutting edge office device to a ubiquitous handheld one.  The amazing advances in technology will only cascade into more, and these will bring amazing blessings, conveniences, and boons to humankind.  These are gifts we should be prepared to freely receive, but like a gift of chocolate that will make us sick if eaten to quickly or heavy book that will require much reading and concentration we need to be receive these with caution and adroitness.

Let's go back to food.  One of the interesting points of contention between my brothers, me, and our grandmother is our approach and mentalities surrounding food.  Our grandma, growing up in a family that suffered through and being born shortly after the great depression, views food as a precious and scarce resource.  She often views food in terms of availability, enjoying buffets and inexpensive diners and being anxious over throwing away uneaten scraps or spoiling produce.  My brothers, and even my parents, live in the modern age and see food as abundant.  We don't like to waste food, but recognize that when the bread gets moldy it should be thrown out because it only costs a dollar or two (ten minutes of work at minimum wage) to get another loaf.  We live devoid of the "clean your plate" ethic so common in past generations.

Thank heavens for that too, as obesity and overeating are a greater health risk to us than malnutrition (though I am skeptical of the magnitude of this risk).  It's actually odd to think about health risks arising because nourishment is so easy to obtain.  Taking anatomy and physiology I've learned hundreds of ways in which a deficiency of calcium, iodine, glucose, iron, or any other number of dietary intakes cause problems.  It's bizarre to think of problems coming about simply because we have so much of those things we need and love that we run out places to put it and spend so much time and energy to keeping it all together.

Food is only the beginning of this, though.  Technology is more and more in in the reach of anyone who'd like it.  Entertainment and education is more available than ever with the internet.  And these are just the commodities being made abundant with modern technology.  Go even slightly futuristic and we have productive capabilities exploding via robotics, precious metals or gems having their scarcity destroyed by advanced chemical and materials engineering techniques, and even thought or creativity flooding the market in ways never before seen thanks to better distribution systems, or even AI and other futuristic computing creating new art.

The challenges presented by this can be staggering though.  The central one is likely motivation.  Survival and status have been the principle motivators of a person in the past.  That might have meant being the mightiest hunter in the tribe that's always well fed or the most influential business magnate on wall street who always had some opportunity waiting, but the principles been the same.  Many of us have said something like, "I really don't want to go to work today but they won't pay me if I don't so I guess I had better," and we've probably even said that with some frequency.  If we reach post scarcity we theoretically won't ever need to get paid, so what will keep us getting out of bed in the morning and off the streets?  I'll be investigating this and other ideas of a post-scarcity society and economy in part 2.

Thirty Years

Yesterday was my thirtieth birthday. As I leave my thirtieth year of life and enter my thirty-first I reflect on the passed year.  Year thirty feels as if I've been a plane that's waited at the gate, taxied up the runway, and taken off for a new destination.  Here's the highlights:

• Working at inthinc : I continued my job at inthinc technology solutions for the first part of the year.  This time taught me once again the importance of good management.  Our last manager was very skilled at keeping the support team of which I was a part happy and feeling valued within the company.  During the first part of the year we had no manager and a number of internal conflicts arose within the team as well as numerous difficulties arising from a lack of effective interfacing with the rest of the company.  Our new manager, when hired, eventually turned out to make promises like a politician, fail to inform us about and connect us effectively with the rest of the company, and make the talent feel undervalued. I was the third person to leave the team as the burden on our team increased and feelings of valuation decreased.  After leaving the company I continued to hear of hardships and found the company was losing money and talent at an alarming rate, though it seems to have stabilized at this point. I have a number of good friends from my time there, but am happy to have gone.
• Returning to University : Leaving inthinc prompted an overall career change.  I had noticed that the career trajectory in technical support would take significant time to advance and might not lead to a place I really wanted to be.  Looking at what field might be related to my previous scholastic experience in physics I found that radiology is something that would probably take about as much time to train in as it would to advance in my current work, had similar job demands at higher pay, and ultimately would be more fulfilling and interesting.  I enrolled at Weber State University and started attending classes. I was reminded how much I appreciated the university atmosphere and learning new material.
• Entering Medicine : Preparing to enter the field of radiography I've been learning about the medical field generally as well.  I trained as a phlebotomist and am making arrangements to test for my limited x-ray machine operator's license.  I have been fascinated by the challenges and nature of the medical field. There's an intriguing intimacy to healthcare that makes me feel a great deal of responsibility toward patients. I never thought that biochemistry would hold any interest for me but after studying it (in part at least) for a semester I've completely turned the corner and am engaged by protein structures and metabolic pathways.  There's clearly a lot to learn and do in this field and I'm eager to continue exploring it in year thirty one of life and beyond.

Happy Friday!

I hear this exclamation every now and again, and it must be getting popular enough to have reached the public mind in general, because I just heard it on an advertisement for an internet talk show.  While I enjoy finally hitting the weekend like so many others, I'm not fond of the phrase.  Is Friday now a weekly holiday?  If so, what are we celebrating?  The answer to the second question unnerves me.

The specialized celebratory greeting definitely shows us that Friday's become some sort of weekly holiday. Holidays are nice and I think we should take whatever opportunities to celebrate that we have so that doesn't have to be a bad thing.  The question is what we're celebrating, and unfortunately the answer is straightforward.  We're happy collectively to see the end of the work week.  The fact that we're happy enough in our collective consciousness to hallow (the word holiday is derived from holy day) our escape from working each week reveals how deeply we must hate our work, and that's a much deeper problem.

Why do we hate work so much that we rejoice the way we do over the weekly liberation from it? What makes our work so unrewarding that we rejoice in such a way once it's over?  Many people today argue that that's the nature of work, that if we enjoyed something it would be play.  Mark Twain posits the idea that, "Work consists of whatever a body is OBLIGED to do, and that Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do."  This holds some truth, but I also feel there's something crucially missing.  We go to our jobs and trudge through the days so that they'll give us the money to pay our bills.  Sadly, this seems to be the way the world is, but it doesn't have to be so.

As discussed a little here and in Jane McGonigal's fine work Reality is Broken the world (or the US at least) is facing a (really weird) crisis.  It's a crisis of engagement.  Our entertainment has so far outstripped education, possibly face to face social interaction, and definitely work that we're having trouble caring about these things and being happy when we're involved in them anymore.  It pales that poorly to the things that entertain us.

Think about how sad it is that for so many people taking care of a virtual farm (Farmville) is more interesting and engaging than what they do normally in life.  Farming is at least traditionally viewed as a venture quintessentially representative of working hard just to subsist, and yet with the tools available to modern game designers and some imagination it's become a lot more exciting and fun that we'd rather do that than listen to a lecture in school or (for one working in retail, let's say) help someone find something in a store.

I've often worked retail, so let me use that as an example.  One of the problems is how easily we feel unrecognized in work these days.  Perhaps confounding the problem further is the "trophies for breathing" culture that's also creeping in, but it is pretty easy to feel unappreciated since the people we help we only interact with for a few minutes and our bosses are just there to tell us what we're supposed to do next.  A simple initiative a company could do to offset this for retail employees is a simple incentive system of giving employees points when they do things to further company goals (upselling, excellent customer service, efficient work during high traffic periods, etc.).  Ideally, these points would eventually be redeemable for monetary or otherwise physical rewards, but just having a consistent recognition I feel would improve the workplace.  Employees would be rewarded for sticking with a company and working hard toward company goals by having a "lifetime score" with the company that would constantly increase.

Though this seems like it would be a momentous burden on management (and, indeed, takes a degree of skill to pay close enough attention to reward points often enough, without giving away points just for breathing and making them meaningful, but also not being too stingy and creating dynamics of teacher's pet/boss's friend through the point system), it could also be a great way to simply frame managerial goals.  We're trying to increase net sales, double points for upselling this week!  The most important thing at widgets and such is customer service, examples of excellent customer service always receive at least ten points!  We know this is a stressful job, so working through the lunch rush of the day earns you 5 points!  Think of the last three phrases without the point framework in place.  You might have even heard similar things from management, but do they ring less hollow when there's a concrete form of recognition attached?

The weekend will always be nice, and we'll probably always be glad to do something else than our job for a day or two (though even this is debatable, ask the enthusiast/addict to whichever Facebook game/Online MMORPG if they've ever tweaked just a little on a vacation because they weren't "harvesting their crops" or "missing out on XP"), but it doesn't have to be a glorious liberation from the nigh on slavery of our weekly work.  We can engage people in the things they do every day if we only choose to believe that all work is worthy of engagement and make an effort to make it involving instead of just hoping that money we pay will keep our employees there.

Despite all I've said, I like the idea of a weekly holiday.  After all that's the idea of the Sabbath, and I find a great deal of worth in that.  I've even heard that, perhaps similarly to "Happy Friday" it was common among the ancient Jews to greet each other with "Shalom Sabbat" (Peaceful Sabbath).  The difference I see is that the Sabbath is deliberate and a focused effort.  It's a day we take and set apart to focus on holy things and to rest from what wearies us in the world.  It's devoting ourselves to something, rather than a reflection of the fact that we've become woefully not devoted to what we do everyday.  The holy is something that I would like us to celebrate on a weekly basis, our lack of interest in much of our day to day lives is not.

A Stab at Tech Journalism: Microsoft Surface Pricing

The price of Microsoft's new Surface tablet was recently revealed (or leaked, I'm not sure how official it was) to be $499, and the device was released today.  That's $499 without the highly touted keyboard cover and the smallest amount of storage. I'm not going to say this is a bad price point, the Surface has many features which the iPad doesn't come near to offering (like USB ports) at about the same price.  The problem for Microsoft, though, is that this may not fit the reason why people buy tablets.

Buying a tablet or a new smartphone is buying into an entire ecosystem.  Apple's "there's an app for that" marketing campaign demonstrates that people care what a device can do. Not necessarily what it's capable-hardware wise especially-of doing, but what they're setup and already ready to do. There might be many in the Linux community that enjoy writing their own software, but when it comes to consumer electronics they're a minority.  A new tablet or smartphone needs to be competitive in the app market. Google was playing catch up with android but managed to rapidly increase their available apps by creating an open market.

"But surely Microsoft doesn't have that problem, there's years worth of windows programs, right?" some of you may be saying. The answer is, wrong.  At least not on this Surface.  The other one does. The five hundred dollar Surface is the one running windows RT, which only runs the "modern" (I really wish Microsoft had showed some spine and stood by the metro moniker) style apps. These apps are full screen, launched from a grid, and ultimately not that different from the way every other tablet and smartphone operating system works.  And there's isn't that many of them.  The Surface RT includes Office 2013 when you buy it. If your an office fanatic this could sell the Surface, but I don't think that's what people are using tablets for.

Tablets aren't for productivity, they're generally recreational. Maybe Microsoft is tapping into the market in a new way, but if they're not they're selling a product for the same price with a weaker app selection.  How will windows RT do for running movies from amazon? Netflix? Youtube? Hulu? How well will windows work to play music from your favorite service? If the answer to any of these isn't as well or better than their competitors it's a tick against Microsoft and the Surface.

The other Surface, the Surface Pro, will be better as it'll be running a full fledged version of windows 8.  But this confusion is what could be truly deadly for Microsoft.  An average consumer walks into buy their Surface, figures they'll get the cheapest one because they're just using if for fun, and then is locked in with a device that doesn't run windows like they're used to.  They'll be aggravated and angry. They'll say, "Why's it called windows if it's not really windows!?"  And then if they can't find "an app for that" thing they want to do it'll further strain their patience with their brand new Surface.  They probably won't be happy if they go back to Microsoft store saying their new Surface can't do what they thought it could and an associate replies with, "Oh to do that you need the Surface Pro."

The only thing I can tell for sure is that Microsoft is taking a gamble with the Surface.  It might work out great, creating a really mobile, tablet style device that also works great for productivity and business applications.  The Surface might just end up being your real "all in one" device.  The other distinct possibility, though, is that the Surface ends up angering consumers.  With Microsoft behind in the mobile market and facing stiff competition from Apple and Google in winning the hearts and minds of future users things could be very bad if this gamble doesn't pay off.

What to write when nothing comes to mind

So I like to post at least once a month, and here I am sitting on about an hour left to August and I still haven't written a thing.  There's lots to write about, I can always launch into another mathematics and society rant, or if I'm watching my blood pressure something about computer science and beauty has been ruminating lately.  A friend put forth the interesting idea lately that computer literacy is the new literacy, and I'd like to write on that but felt oddly compelled to do some research before doing anything with that idea.  I'm engaged now and should have lots of ideas and feelings about relationships, love, and weddings.  I've even thought about doing some amateur tech journalism, but the most interesting thing I can think of now the big moves Microsoft is making, and since I'm currently working for them I'd prefer not to get into NDA territory, even though I probably wouldn't say anything that hasn't yet been said on most other tech news outlets.

So, plenty of interesting things to write, but just can't bring myself to put the words down.  Why?  Well, writing is hard.  It takes a mental effort to organize ideas and thought, and even more if an idea isn't quite yet fully formed and needs additional thought to be complete.  I got home tonight, ate some snacks for dinner while putting on some TV shows I wanted to catch up with, and then started thinking about writing.  But I wasn't really thinking about writing, I was thinking about the show I was watching, and I'm only finally banging this out by pausing the show and focusing on writing.

My mom is a six time published (and that's just the novels) author, so I've picked up a thing or two about writing.  One thing about it, which I suspect extends to any art in general, is that the most important thing is to sit down and do it.  While the romantic thought of waiting for inspiration to strike and then whipping up a masterpiece overnight in a frenzy of artistic furor may be appealing, it's just not reflective of reality.  The Sistine Chapel ceiling was painted because the pope offered a large commission, and Michelangelo signed it "Michelangelo, a sculptor" to express his feelings that he didn't consider himself a painter and would rather be working on his statue of Moses.  The Sistine ceiling is well known as one of the greatest pieces of art in the world, and I've always liked the thought that Michelangelo didn't even want to paint it.  I think we can learn a lot about how we can do great work even when we really don't want to do it.

Have I learned how to be happy at a job?

This question occurred to me earlier and I've been wondering ever since. There's a whole bunch of people moving to a different jobs where I'm working and I've been browsing other jobs as well.  It's possible this is perfectly reasonable and the place I work now is just a horrid place to work, but I've come upon another possibility: I haven't learned how to settle in and enjoy a workplace.

It's not that hard to believe. I haven't had a really long term job since high school. I've popped in and out of on campus work and temporary summer positions. And for most of the last year I've worked hard continually looking for a full time job, so I'm already in the habit of searching out opportunities.  Even in all those years of schooling much of the experience was putting in the time at one class and then excitedly looking at the course catalog to see on to which class I would move.  All in all, it does seem that I lack any recent life experience in finding a way to say, "I like where I am now, no hurry in finding something else."

Of course there's nothing wrong with a little ambition and trying to improve one's position in life. It's actually a great virtue, trying to better oneself.  I worry that I may be being all to quick to give up a good thing, though. I live very close to where I work and would almost certainly have to give up the short 20 minute walk to work in favor of either buying a car or finding public transportation options. Both of these possibilities are more costly and neither provides the modicum of exercise that I enjoy with walking.

Putting aside these practical considerations, though, I have a greater unease that I'm finding gratitude and satisfaction difficult.  Which I shouldn't because I have much for which to be grateful, even in the narrow field of my career.  My job went through quickly, allowing me to set myself up in Salt Lake near my beloved.  I think I should make more, but then again when is that ever not true and I make enough to live quite confortably and make good progress paying off my debts.  I'm providing a service that does help people and hopefully makes others' days just a little better.  I get to talk to people from all around the world.  While there's plenty to complain about, there's also plenty to appreciate.

It's interesting to consider how we learn to be happy with a job, and moreso how we do so without becoming complacent or stagnant with our position.  I look back and I see a life spent working hard to get to the next level and move on to the next thing, and while in many ways I plan to continue doing this, I also want to make sure I can simply enjoy the situation I'm in as long as it's not one in desperate need of change.

The Journey of a Thousand Miles...

...begins with a single step, as the proverb goes. This is true, but it's the time of year where you may be noticing something else. Two weeks ago you may have resolved to do something important over the course of this year. It may have been something big, a journey of a thousand miles per se. Hopefully you took the first step toward that around the same time, but now is the time when something starts to break your stride. That step taken oh so enthusiastically two weeks is taken less frequently. Maybe it's been replaced with something else. Maybe you just don't feel like you have the energy to keep taking it over and over anymore, but that's my point here. OK, metaphor aside I'll state my point clearly. Great things come from small and simple ones, but it's by a continual repetition of them.

Taking the perennial example of New Years resolutions, losing weight, we'll clearly get the picture. My mom talks about the "fake exercisers" at the beginning of each year. Those people who invade her Gym every January. She has nothing against people exercising, rather she's annoyed knowing her spot in the kickboxing class she loyally attends will be taken by someone who'll disappear after six weeks (to be generous). Their thousand mile journey is certainly a worth taking, but they don't actually take it. They take the first step, sure, but quit after a few hundred.

Since I am a mathematician, let's look at how many steps are in a thousand miles. 1,000 miles is 1,609 km. I am a tall guy with long legs and feel OK saying my stride is probably around one meter. Thus I would have to take one million six hundred and nine thousand steps. Realizing this it seems staggering, impossible. That first step is essentially meaningless. However, if I am diligent in taking steps, if I take one step every five seconds, let's say. I can walk almost four journeys of thousand miles over one year. Taking one step every fifteen seconds I can still walk a thousand miles over the course of a year and have a little bit of time left over to, I don't know, eat and sleep.

In summary, to reach a goal-to journey a thousand miles-one must be persistent. Consistency is far more important than enthusiasm. While the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, it's only finished by the willingness and discipline to keep taking steps.