esports-cover

<div class="at-above-post-homepage addthis_tool" data-url="https://blog.lareviewofbooks.org/essays/contact-tracing-esports-surveillance-society/"></div>The growing approval of contact tracing to prevent the spread of COVID-19 will likely have cascading effects. Many hesitations over increasing surveillance are being leapfrogged as technologies previously chastised for invading privacy are now gaining praise. The shift from the title “patient tacking” to “contact tracing” in the past several months already reflects how sensitivities are changing in form.
Reports applauding South Korea’s handling of the virus cannot but include an earnest nod to government surveillance. The online publication and text-message alerts detailing the location trails of people who test positive for COVID-19 have been so effective that familiar discussions over privacy issues are all but moot. Faced with existential threat of a fast-spreading pandemic suddenly letting Big Brother know about a trip to the store or a walk in the park seems almost trivial. Certain freedom of speech issues notwithstanding, even the Chinese Social Credit System, which Western media has railed against for years, doesn’t seem — at least some of its tracking elements aspects — so bad now.
Apple and Google have taken the cues and are now fully onboard as well. The fierce competitors are teaming up for the greater good. They are cooperating on a COVID-19 tracking app that will allow Apple and Android phones to communicate with one another. Described, most cautiously, as an “Exposure Notification system in service of privacy-preserving contact tracing,” their app allows the nascent surveillance technologies already embedded in nearly every smart phone to be unleashed for anyone who downloads it. Information about the proximity of confirmed COVID-19 patients will be automatically shared, helping people to take extra precautions against potential exposures, or learning if they may have already been exposed.
In addition to not being state-run, the Apple-Google COVID-19 contact tracing project boasts special privacy features. The app will have metadata encryption, a time cap on recorded history, and utilize cryptography algorithms — in other words, it will be really hard to figure out the identity of its users. In South Korea tracking includes telling hints of patient’s identity — such as age, gender, nationality, and even neighborhood of residence — that have allowed private citizens to accurately deduce people’s names. While public shaming is a serious problem, the South Korean government argues that including humanizing data may actually help people take the alerts more seriously.
The trend towards accepting increased surveillance is actually already well underway. Many of today’s budding technologies simply require surveilling human behavior. Recommendation and personalization algorithms power nearly the entire Internet. Without surveillance and user profiles, everyday giants such as Google, Amazon, Netflix, and nearly any online service simply could not operate. Everything from preventing credit-card fraud to cancer treatment also rely on using “big data” and comparing an individual’s data to their nearest (data) neighbor’s. Advancements in self-driving cars, AI, and even certain areas of medicine are almost entirely surveillance based as well. In many of these spaces companies claim anonymity is strictly upheld, and while skeptics have serious privacy concerns, there are fast-growing trends where high degrees of surveillance and zero anonymity dominate.
One such area is Esports.
For anyone who doesn’t already know: Esports is popular. Hugely popular. The industry generated over $120 billion in 2018 and is only growing. Twitch, a dedicated platform for streaming video games, gets around 15 million unique viewers a day, and over 140 million a month. And that’s just Twitch. There’s also Mixer, and Youtube and Facebook have dedicated videogame streaming venues as well, each garnering millions of daily viewers. This mounting trend has already rippled far into more traditional “sports” arenas as well. ESPN reports on Esports, talented gamers can get scholarships to colleges, and cash pools for championships are in the tens of millions of dollars. Top streamers, who are not always the best players but dedicated “content creators,” make millions. Through paid endorsements, viewer’s donations, and platform earnings, the video-game streamer known as “Ninja” is estimated at around $500,000/month.
The surveillance in Esports is nearly total. Streamers and professional players often record their games — including conversations they have with other players or teammates, and have a separate camera on their keyboard. These online games are actually already saved by the parent company, and often open for anyone to view (this is how cheaters are frequently caught). The details completely eclipse “playbacks” for even the most minutely recorded “real” sports. A “drone” view can move freely throughout the recorded game, zooming in or out, moving through walls, peeking from any angle, watching at any speed — forward or backward, all the while seeing the names of players, as well as their inventory, and exact keystrokes. Surveillance is the bread and butter of Esports. For the professionals who engage in Esports, it is an inescapable element of their lives. But while the technology is new, this constancy of surveillance is not. Until relatively recently in human history most people were subject to near constant surveillance.
Before the anonymity of modern cities and suburbs most people lived in relatively small communities. Typically, as is still true of many small communities today, everyone knew a lot about everyone else. Daily activities — including where you went for a walk, who you talked to, or what goods you might have traded or purchased — could be widely known. None of these were considered “private” in the way they often are now. Anything that happened in the public sphere was inherently public. And this sphere often extended even into the way family members treated one another “behind closed doors.”
George Orwell accurately predicted, and encouraged, worries over technology-based surveillance in his iconic Nineteen Eight-Four. But Orwell’s world was full of “gritty dust” smells of “boiled cabbage and old rag mats,” constant electricity shortages, and a persistent lack of razors. It sounded more like a post-apocalyptic relief zone than our world of smartphones, Amazon’s 24-hour delivery, Uber rides/eats, and Disney+. Today surveillance technologies are not only widely embraced, many are all-but necessary for functioning in most parts of the world. They are integral to how the world operates and is connected. Remember, the same technologies that helped COVID-19 to spread all over the world are the ones allowing schools, business, governments, and individuals to function during widespread quarantine and “stay-at-home” orders. Without the internet people likely would not travel as much, and it is doubtful that COVID-19 would have spread as quickly as it did. And yet the internet is now more important than ever for keeping people working, fed, and sane. Internet-based connectivity, with surveillance in tow, both exasperates and alleviates the pandemic.
As we come to grips with the fact that this time next year restaurants, grocery stores, retail shops, schools, travel, and even family gatherings might still be subject to a “new norm” issues of privacy shouldn’t be forgotten. But they shouldn’t be over emphasized either. In our world of growing reliance on technology and social media, where even the category “sports” is highly surveillance-based, lines between public and private are increasingly blurred. Parring back the private sphere to deal with a pandemic is not necessarily a bad thing. The current crisis asks us to face these changes in new way. And we should do so recognizing the social, historical, and cultural limits of a sometimes-blind faith in whatever we mean by “privacy.”
After all, an entire movement, one that challenges centuries of intuitional disenfranchisement, just might begin from a May 25th iPhone video.
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Top image: <a href="https://galyonkin.com/">Sergey Galyonkin</a>, licensed under <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/deed.en">CC BY 2.0</a>
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Contact Tracing, Esports, and Surveillance Society

trump-cover

<div class="at-above-post-homepage addthis_tool" data-url="https://blog.lareviewofbooks.org/essays/donald-trump-covid-19-politics-profiles/"></div>Even as COVID-19 grinds economies to a trickle and upsets the constant go-go-go productivity of everyday life, Trump still dominates media coverage. Unsurprisingly, the same headlines are being rehashed: “Trump is an immoral narcissist,” “Trump is a populist whose promises are unfulfilled and accounts untrue,” and “Trump does not understand the presidency.” The shifts in content are almost predictable. Rallies for white power are now anti-lockdown — both based, accurately or not, on Trump’s own provocations. The fact checkers who focused on Trumps unfulfilled promises about the economy, the Wall, or his cabinet now dive into his pledges for handling COVID-19. Once again contradictory statements, misinformation, and unrealized plans abound. Most recently his clashes with medical experts and governors — in particular his claim of “absolute power” — have stoked skepticism over his understanding of the American political system. It is only more fodder for those who previously questioned the constitutional basis for setting up detention camps, mass ICE deportations, and “Muslim” travel bans.
While the whole story may very well have already jumped the shark for some, the number of “likes” the president receives has been relatively consistent. It seems that every day we’re given new evidence for the claims that the president is disrespectful towards women and minorities, exhibits the tell-tale signs of narcissism, and otherwise exploits the politics of populism — and yet all of this has done little to change his followers’ minds. What many thought was merely a façade meant to win the nomination of the increasingly radical Republican Party continued well through his campaign — and then the election, and then his swearing into office, and then, of course, his actual presidency. At each and every step, critics hoped he might change. They were wrong. It never happened. The Donald Trump that branded everything from properties to steaks to the pretend firings on his game show The Apprentice is the same Donald Trump we now have as the 45th President of the United States. At no point did he start acting more presidential. The seemingly cemented legacy of the ever-cool and collected Obama has been overshadowed by the identity of his successor: an impulsive businessman who brought his personal brand to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
More importantly, Trump brought with him an entire arsenal of profiles that reshaped the American political scene. The discourse he dominates is a “politics of profiles.” This means everything is treated according to profiles, and operates on familiar yet often misappreciated mechanisms.
Profile-based concepts and logic already dominate everything from the economy to academia, advertising to everyday social interactions — but it bares itself most fully on social media. Trump can be understood accordingly: he is first and foremost a content-creator and influencer. People like, follow, and vote for his profile, and for the profile of his policies.
The growing dominance of online profiles has its roots in the sort of “branding” that Trump has been perpetually engaged in — a branding that came to prominence after advertisers convinced companies that selling an image was as or more important than their actual products or services. Nowadays brands aren’t just for companies; almost every aspect of society, from countries and universities to individuals, are expected to brand themselves. The idea of a personal brand hearkens back not just to ownership (as is the case with branding livestock, for instance), but to one’s social identity. Indeed, brands themselves are rooted in reputation. Modern day brands differ from reputations in that they are largely self-constructed and presented primarily to people personally unknown to the brand’s creator. Profiles develop with even more complexity. The continual updates required by profiles rely on a deep understanding of the audience, that audience’s own perspective on others, and dynamic responses to feedback.
Trump is, first and foremost, a curator of his own profile. Everything, including his presidential policies, is done to serve the curation of his profile. Like a judge on America’s Got Talent, or an Instagram influencer, Trump sees himself and his policies through “second-order observation.” In other words, he views not the thing itself, nor how it is viewed by the audience, but rather how he thinks the audience might think other people would think. This is also the way everything from a house to a car or smartphone is valued. Not in terms of its actual materials, or how much someone would pay for it, but how much someone thinks others think (still) others would pay. The audience or “others” are not simply “public opinion,” they are the “general peer.” The general peer are those who share one’s own basic views and are interested in the same topics. For Trump the general peer is primarily radical Republicans, but he reaches out to as many groups as possible. His profile — again, including the actual policies he encourages — is highly responsive to his general peer through constantly monitoring their reactions. Rallies serve many functions, one being “crowd sourcing” or engaging in real life social validation feedback loops. It is here that Trump can actually hear what slogans and attitudes go over well. It is also where those who seek to align their own profile with Trump’s can display their Trump-affinity profile to others.
Trump expertly harnesses the logic of profiles to dominate political discourse. Through nicknames, he “profiles” all the major players: himself, the political system (“swamp”), the media (“fake news”), political parties, individual opponents and allies, companies, countries, and even viruses. (There’s even <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_nicknames_used_by_Donald_Trump">a Wikipedia page on it</a>.) Whether or not his profiling accurately reflects his self-proclaimed stable genius, Joe Biden’s alertness, or the “Chinese virus” is of little importance. His populist strategies and narcissistic compulsions are all in service of a greater profile-based strategy. Pledges to “Make America Great Again,” “Build the Wall,” and “Drain the Swamp” are, first and foremost, indicators of a certain profile. They are certainly not indicative of any policy prescriptions. As long as the general peer is served, as long as things look good through a second-order lens, as long as he is accumulating validation in the form of “likes,” the Trump profile is successful. And this is what he offers to his supporters.
Associating with Trump’s profile is, like posting about global warming or wearing Nike shoes, a way for people to cultivate their own profiles. Trump’s promises do not need to be factual supported to be perceived as real — in much the same way that Nike running shoes do not have to make you “Just Do It.” Of course, funding needs to go to the Wall, and some construction on it is a bonus (Nike running shoes are, by the way, great for running), but having a cabinet that could well go down as the swampiest in history or employing risky short-term economic measures do not invalidate the slogans defining Trump’s profile. Slogans are by nature resistant to invalidation because they are entirely self-referential — outside of themselves and the brand they are advertising, they do not mean anything. The presentation itself, along with the commitment to continue to update the profile, are what matter most. Nike does its best to reassure consumers that its shoes are not only cool now, but will be tomorrow as well.
Many Trump followers may be unable to identify the exact point when America was great, much less what made it great in the first place, but that was never actually the point. His followers’ goal is to boost their own profiles by associating Trump’s. They want to be seen as identifying with the project of Making American Great Again. The Wall functions along similar lines, and now we encounter the same mechanism in Trump’s far more dangerous (anti-)response to COVID-19: a response that includes his clashes with state governments and many other major American institutions. Reporting that the facts do not support his claims or that his promises are unfulfilled only feeds into the profile of main-stream media that Trump setup: It’s all fake and corrupt.
But is that really true? It doesn’t matter. Trump made the profile and the general peer agrees.
Recognizing the importance of profiles for Trump doesn’t mean that news outlets should stop reporting news or fact-checkers should stop doing their job. Some people do take what he says seriously and support him for his supposed honesty or authenticity — which is why “drinking bleach” was such a hot Google search after April 24, 2020. However, repeatedly arguing that Trump is a narcissist, a populist, or both doesn’t seem to be getting very far. The profile he has curated says nothing about not being a narcissist or populist — in fact, he often celebrates related traits. Even if Trump is these things, he is also something more: he is a profile. The politics he expertly employs is the politics of profiles, or “profilicity.”
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Photo: Max Goldberg, CC BY 2.0
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Donald Trump, COVID-19, and the Politics of Profiles

The Dean of Shandong: Confessions of a Minor Bureaucrat at a Chinese University

Paul J. D’Ambrosio is a professor of Chinese philosophy at East China Normal University in Shanghai, China, where he also serves as dean of the Intercultural Center. He mainly writes on Daoism, medieval Chinese thought, contemporary profile-based identity formation, and the relationship between humans and AI/algorithms.

Paul J. D’Ambrosio

An Insider’s Look at China’s Outside Reality: On Daniel Bell’s “The Dean of Shandong”

"You can't ignore politics, no matter how much you'd like to." — Molly Ivins

Politics

"Never be afraid to sit awhile and think." — Lorraine Hansberry

Philosophy &amp; Religion

Artificial Communication: How Algorithms Produce Social Intelligence

Intelligent or Communicative?: On Elena Esposito’s “Artificial Communication”

"The nineteenth century believed in science but the twentieth century does not." — Gertrude Stein

Science &amp; Technology

The Uncontrollability of the World

Control Everything: On Hartmut Rosa’s “The Uncontrollability of the World”

Feline Philosophy: Cats and the Meaning of Life

Cats and the Good Life

The Tyranny of Merit

My Successes (and Failures) Are All Mine?

The Proliferation of Profilicity

"For a long time now I haven't been I."
— Fernando Pessoa, The Book of Disquiet

Around the World

Ways of Heaven

Ultra Soft Power

"You always admire what you really don't understand."
— Blaise Pascal

Religion

<h4>David E. Cooper is professor of philosophy emeritus at Durham University, England. He has been a visiting professor in several countries, including the United States, Canada, South Africa, Malta, and Sri Lanka. He has also been the chair or president of several learned societies, including the Mind Association, the Aristotelian Society, and the Friedrich Nietzsche Society. The most recent of his many books are Senses of Mystery: Engaging with Nature and the Meaning of Life (2017) and Animals and Misanthropy (2018). Professor Cooper is also the author of several novels and short stories. He lives with his wife in Northumberland, England.</h4>

David E. Cooper

Hans-Georg Moeller is professor of Philosophy at the University of Macau. His research focuses on Social and Political Thought and on Chinese and Comparative Philosophy. He is author of Genuine Pretending: On the Philosophy of the Zhuangzi (with Paul D’Ambrosio), The Radical Luhmann, The Philosophy of the Daodejing, and The Moral Fool: A Case for Amorality, all published by Columbia University Press, and contributes to the YouTube podcast The Issue is Not the Issue with Dan Sarafinas.

Hans-Georg Moeller

Decoding the “Zhuangzi”: A Debate on Hans-Georg Moeller and Paul J. D’Ambrosio’s “Genuine Pretending”

Paul J. D’Ambrosio is a professor of Chinese philosophy at East China Normal University in Shanghai, China, where he also serves as dean of the Intercultural Center. He mainly writes on Daoism, medieval Chinese thought, contemporary profile-based identity formation, and the relationship between humans and AI/algorithms.