Randomly surfing through YouTube I watched a video of a very popular YouTuber who goes by the name sxephil. A very interesting guy who updates us with all kinds of different news. What caught my attention was the site he mentioned, face detection. The creator by the name of Marko Dugonjic came up with this idea, project, experiment  “Realtime Responsive Typography” which detects your face and tracks your eyes while you are reading. It tracks your eyes through your webcam on your computer and it adjusts the font based on your distance. Of course it is done with your permission, but people do not always rationalize accurately, do they? This is an article by Eric Limer, “You’ll Never Squint Again With This Automatically Resizing Font”, he is the one who introduces us to this project.

The conception is to make it easier for people to read whatever it is on their screen, without hurting their eyes. Creepy? I think so, but at the same time, the skeptical side of me argues that it is brilliant , mind-blowing and interesting. What do you guys think? Are you comfortable with the idea that while you are working on your computer the camera tracks all of your moves in order to “help” you, or “trail” you?

We discussed in class about web personalization with sites selling your information to advertisement companies, with google personalizing you news, but this may even be crossing the boundaries to our privacy. It is very frightening and exciting to think of the future, of the capability the computer has.

I started reading chapter 4 of “The Filter Bubble,” and literally 2 pages into the chapter, I read something that I found very interesting, something that I can relate to. Mark Zuckerberg, Founder and CEO of Facebook interviewed with the author of the book “The Facebook Effect” David Kirkpatrick, in which they spoke about how Facebook, which is currently the largest social media network and holds the dominant share of that market in terms of users, has significanlty influenced the very nature of identity. Zuckerberg believes that people will no longer maintain numerous images of themselves through various social media outlets. In the book, he says that having more than one identity demonstrates a lack of integrity, and that people are starting to move away from it.

Later on in the chapter, Pariser mentions something that the COO of Facebook, Sheryl Sandberg, says when speaking at an event during New York Ads Week. Sandberg says that “People dont want something targeted to the whole world — they want something that reflects what they see and know.” Pariser believes that Facebook’s ultimate goal is to have users reflect their true identities through their profiles, to the extent where other websites are able to incorporate users’ data through facebook alone.

I can relate to this. Being that I am currently on a hunt for a competitive internship, I try my best to make my facebook page look as “professional” and “polished” as I can possibly make it. But it doesn’t necessarly capture my true identity, it only demonstrates the professional side. So does this mean that I lack integrity? And what does this mean when others tailor their pages based on similar motives? If there are people out there creating different identities for themselves, how does this affect the way people acquire information through personalization?