Here we go again. And again. And, well, again. As social media users move on from planning a Naruto run attack on Area 51 (perhaps training for a Naruto run is too difficult), users are now consumed by the FaceApp. Users download the app, which is currently #1 in the iOS AppStore, and take a selfie; the app then ages the face.
This is not a new technology; facial recognition technology has been able to apply aging features to an image for quite some time. What is concerning, for everyone, not just users of the app, is the confusing terms of service agreement and the fact that the user of the app can age pictures which are not their own. That’s right—you can be aged without your consent. This may sound funny, sure, but what does that mean for your digital DNA when someone creates that data without your consent. At Computers and Writing Conference this year, I sat on a panel with Lindsey Kim, a graduate students at the University of South Carolina, whose presentation focused on the structure of the language in user agreements as creating black boxes. It was a truly fascinating presentation. In the FaceApp user agreement, users retain the rights to their user content. What that means, though, for users, is not that they own the digital photo that they have taken—selfies used to predict future appearance—no, what users own are their actual faces. The way that I read this is very clear: the company has just told the user that the user will continue to own their face after using the app. How can a user, in this case a person, a human, not own their face? This is what Kim, and so many other scholars are talking about when they confront the confusing jargon comprising user agreements. I for one chose not to use the app, but my friend recently aged pictures of our friends, including me, without my consent. At first I was a bit upset because I knew what this data could be (would be) used for by who knows who. I didn’t know exactly what to do. It seemed like too minor of an offense to confront him, but what about future infractions of people manufacturing my digital DNA without my consent? People talk so often about digital footprints, a stoic and useful metaphor, for sure, for how we present our digital lives. This apt metaphor works because it is about individualism and uniqueness, but it does not account for imposters who do not concern themselves with the consent of fellow users or their fellow humans. Now is the time to reconsider the way we conceptualize consent in our user agreements. We would be smart to turn to Kim and other scholars as we reconsider what user agreements might look like in the future.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Charles WoodsPhD student focusing on Rhetoric, Composition, and Technical Communication at Illinois State University. Archives
October 2019
Categories |