My Thoughts on the Short Films 'The Machine is Us/ing Us' and 'Epic 2014'

 

‘The Machine Us/ing Us’ is a short viral video that explores the relationship between humans and the internet. It starts with someone writing on a blank piece of paper and then shifts a document on a computer. The video claims that users of the internet have become co-creators of content on it, blurring the line between producers and consumers. The title of the video also suggests a mutualistic relationship, we (humans) use the machine (internet) by providing it data and it evolves using it. I appreciated how it portrays the internet as a collaborative thing that people share and add on to rather than something created for them. 

‘Epic (2014)’ is a short film by Robin Sloan and Matt Thompson that explores a dystopian future. The video starts with real events from the World Wide Web being created in 1989 to the rise of Gmail in 2004. However, this is when the film stops mirroring reality. In one of the predictions, Google and Amazon (‘Googlezon’) join together to create a monopoly on media and news. 

Googlezon is a system that searches all content sources and splices together content to each individual user after profiling them. 

Both ‘The Machine is Us/ing Us” and Epic (2014) explores the impact of the internet on humans but from different and contrasting perspectives. ‘The Machine is Us/ing Us’ is more optimistic and celebrates Web 2.0 while Epic (2014) is more pessimistic and a cautionary tale of corporate controls and algorithmic media consumption.