Doctors Without Borders works because doctors can triage the ill, and put them on a course to getting better. They’re solving immediate problems, and when they leave, the doctors know they made a difference. A programmer’s relationship to her product is different: it takes time and maintenance to have the desired effect.
My other plea to you is that you take your role in society responsibly. Just as responsible journalists have a code of ethics, so should you. It should never be your goal to analyze data to make a point, but rather to analyze it to tell the truth. As we’ve discovered in this book, we all come with our own biases—some we don’t even know we have. But you must try as hard as you can to not let your own agenda supersede the truth.
The CEO of my publisher, O’Reilly Media, Tim O’Reilly, has a guiding principle that I think applies here: work on stuff that matters. Please, don’t let your entire career be about figuring out new ways to deliver advertisements. Even if it pays the bills, find an additional outlet to use your skills to make a difference.
The greatest scribes have always done so, whether it was Imhotep and the construction of the Pyramid of Djoser, Martin Luther and his 95 Theses, or Google’s self-driving car, our information technology is powerful stuff. You can do amazing things if you, as O’Reilly says, take the long view, and create more value than you capture.
You can even run for Congress. While many sneer at the idea of the nerdy caricatures of developers that they know, the fact is that software engineers are often great communicators. And while cynical developers may be repulsed at the idea of working for such an organization, there’s so much value they can add.
Developers are great at using technology to connect directly with people in ways that others cannot, and at helping constituents connect with one another. With a developer who understands the guts of the Web in a leadership spot inside Congress, Congress could start communicating more effectively online. And as this developer became more successful, the rest of Congress may very well follow suit.
The government’s problems are becoming increasingly technical—or the problems we’re facing have technology tied to them in some way. For instance, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 isn’t just a 1000+ page bill that’s now a law, it’s also a technical specification for Recovery.gov—and it’s written by people who don’t know how to write specifications. Worse, unlike a poorly informed client or boss, if you don’t adhere to this client’s wishes, you don’t just lose money—you may be breaking the law. Thus, Recovery.gov was built to spec, but hasn’t been particularly effective at bringing people into the process.
It’s every crooked consultant’s dream to have a client who views what they sell as a form of mysticism, and that’s precisely what’s happening around our muncipal, state, and federal governments. A few developers in Congress could reign in the spending and help their peer representatives appropriate taxpayer funds. Today, there is exactly one developer who has written software professionally who has also been elected to Congress: Rep. Steve Scalise of Louisana. If a revitalization of government technology is going to happen smartly and wisely, we need some developers inside Congress to help lead the way.
Of course, you don’t have to (and probably shouldn’t) start in federal politics. Join your local civic association first, and find new ways to help your local community. You’ll discover plenty of opportunity and many open arms there. But again, don’t wait for someone’s permission, unless it absolutely requires their adoption and sponsorship in order to work.
Finally, for those of you who aren’t engineers, know that the most vital thing after basic literacy for the education of yourself and your children is digital literacy and STEM education: Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math. History shows us that perhaps a century from now saying “I’m not an Internet person” may be much like saying “I don’t know how to read.” Organizations like CodeNow are helping transform our concepts of literacy by making sure computer science education is accessible to everyone who wants it, and is constantly looking for volunteer engineers who can help teach classes. While it’s not the key to solving all of our problems and differences, those skills, combined with the ability to communicate, give us the greatest ability to see the truth.
Appendix B. Further Reading
People
The concept of an information diet is a relatively new one, and the thoughts and ideas in this book come from research and interviews with scores of people. In addition to pointing you towards the research papers and books I’ve read and recommend to further your study, it’s also important to follow the people who are leading this field, who are studying how the mind works, the economics of information, and the ever-changing face of our news media.
As much of our scientific research still sits behind paywalls, interacting directly with the scientists who use social media has an added payoff: you’ll gain exposure to their work without having to subscribe to the various scientific publication services. In the spirit of infoveganism, I advise you to connect directly with these researchers and scientists.
Matt Cutts is the head of the web-spam team at Google, the person with the job of managing Panda, and maintaining Google’s delicate search relationship with content farms. He’s been called “Google’s Greenspan.”
http://twitter.com/mattcutts
http://mattcutts.com
Dr. Iacaboni’s insight on the consequences of neuroplasticity and how we affect each other is tremendously important to follow.
http://twitter.com/marcoiacoboni
http://iacoboni.bmap.ucla.edu/
Dr. Kanai’s research links our brain’s structure to our political affiliations. His continued interests are around our perception of time, the neuroscience behind our attention, and distractibility.
http://twitter.com/kanair
http://www.icn.ucl.ac.uk/Research-Groups/awareness-group/group-members/MemberDetails.php?Title=Dr&FirstName=Ryota&LastName=Kanai
Dr. Nyhan’s work on measuring the effectiveness of messaging on the public and the outcomes of our information consumption is leading the field. Read his papers and engage with him online. He’s responsive and smart.
http://twitter.com/BrendanNyhan
http://www.brendan-nyhan.com
Robert Proctor invented the term agnotology, and was the inspiration for Chapter 7.
http://www.stanford.edu/dept/HPS/proctor.html
Julian Sanchez is the person who brought the idea of epistemic closure into the modern political dialog. He’s a writer for Reason magazine and the CATO institute.
http://twitter.com/normative
Linda Stone’s research on conscious computing, email apnea, and our attention spans is amazing to watch. Follow her work at:
https://twitter.com/LindaStone
http://lindastone.net
John Tierney is a science columnist for the New York Times and, along with Roy Baumeister, is the author of Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength.