Paul Starr
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processes o personalization, however,
can be used to modify behavior and
beliefs. This is the core concern o
Zubo’s book: the creation o a largely
covert system o power and domination.MAKE THEM DANCE
From extracting data and making
predictions, the technology Ärms have
gone on to intervening in the real
world. After all, what better way to
improve predictions than to guide how
people act? The industry term for
shaping behavior is “actuation.” In
pursuit o actuation, Zubo writes, the
technology Ärms “nudge, tune, herd,
manipulate, and modify behavior in
speciÄc directions by executing actions
as subtle as inserting a speciÄc phrase
into your Facebook news feed, timing
the appearance o a BUY button on your
phone, or shutting down your car engine
when an insurance payment is late.”
Evidence o the industry’s capacity
to modify behavior on a mass scale
comes from two studies conducted by
Facebook. During the 2010 U.S. con-
gressional elections, the company’s
researchers ran a randomized, con-
trolled experiment on 61 million users.
Users were split up into three groups.
Two groups were shown information
about voting (such as the location o
polling places) at the top o their
Facebook news feeds; users in one o
these groups also received a social
message containing up to six pictures o
Facebook friends who had already voted.
The third group received no special
voting information. The intervention
had a signiÄcant eect on those who
received the social message: the research-
ers estimated that the experiment led to
340,000 additional votes being cast. In aFacebook, Microsoft, and the big
telecommunications companies—also
face the same expansionary imperatives.
Step by step, the industry has expanded
both the scope o surveillance (by
migrating from the virtual into the real
world) and the depth o surveillance
(by plumbing the interiors o individu-
als’ lives and accumulating data on their
personalities, moods, and emotions).
The surveillance industry has not
faced much resistance because users like
its personalized information and free
products. Indeed, they like them so
much that they readily agree to oner-
ous, one-sided terms o service. When
the FaceApp controversy blew up, many
people who had used the app were
surprised to learn that they had agreed
to give the company “a perpetual,
irrevocable, nonexclusive, royalty-free,
worldwide, fully-paid, transferable
sub-licensable license to use, reproduce,
modify, adapt, publish, translate, create
derivative works from, distribute,
publicly perform and display your User
Content and any name, username or
likeness provided in connection with
your User Content in all media formats
and channels now known or later
developed, without compensation to
you.” But this wasn’t some devious
Russian formulation. As Wired pointed
out, Facebook has just as onerous terms
o service.
Even i Congress enacts legislation
barring companies from imposing such
extreme terms, it is unlikely to resolve
the problems Zubo raises. Most
people are probably willing to accept
the use o data to personalize their
services and display advertising predicted
to be o interest to them, and Congress
is unlikely to stop that. The same