A photograph taken nearly 20 years ago on the stunning island of Iona -
A fabulous memory from last year in Scotland which has already been published on this blog -
And an almost forgotten little bit of pure Americana, photographed at the Botanic Gardens in St Louis, Missouri, many many years ago -
None of the photographs have any tags or keywords. None have anything in their file name which relates to a postbox. This is just a sample, there were many others.
My operating system has not just searched for file names but clearly is actively scanning the file content. I am really not sure whether this is a good thing or not, and if it is happening on my little desktop machine, what the hell is happening on state-of-the-art systems running all sorts of incredibly clever recognitition software?
It is also extremely likely that I am the very last person in blogland to realise this happens . . .
I think the internet is a wonderful thing - however did we find out stuff, or even communicate, before? But I also think it's very scary - everything we write or do online is scanned and we then get adverts for things similar to what we've looked at or mentioned. And that's only one scary thing. I prefer not to think about it all.
ReplyDeleteVery true Sue, unless you are battened down with a VPN and a TOR browser I suspect every single internet thought you and I have has been captured somewhere.
DeleteWhich, given that there are major world/planetary problems which need to be sorted, strikes me as a vast waste of intellect and resources.
Search engines can be so complicated, finding the right words to get to where you want, is often here more by luck than anything else.
ReplyDeleteYou are so right - Google is your friend IF you ask the right question.
DeleteI know this post was not exactly what you had in mind when you opened your computer this morning however I absolutely delight in your random photo archive and stories - made my day! xx and suppose the rather tenuous link is post 'box' and seeing that google has been 'trained' to find things, it found you three POST related items 😖
ReplyDeleteHmm, now you have mentioned it, it's obvious just how much you would enjoy all three of those random pictures, xx Of course, the Glenelg picture had me looking through my own holiday archive and strengthened my resolve to get back there!
DeleteWhat a nice trip down memory lane, even if not what you expected to find. I too think the net is both good and evil, but it is such an integral part of life today. I would not want to be without it, for how would I ever have been able to follow the little blue van?
ReplyDeleteExactly Sue, our lives would be so different without the technology that we have become so used to. When misused, like anything, it can be terrible but it can also do such good things.
DeleteWhat gorgeous photos even if they weren't hat you were expecting.
ReplyDeleteYou lost me on Mac, I'm afraid. I'm such a Luddite it's untrue! xxx
Don't worry Vix, there are times when I find Luddite a very attractive alternative!
DeleteAll you missed was my having a muse/grumble about the ability of my personal computer to not only look at file names but look inside, at the contents of each file (whether that be a word or a picture), and correctly identify what it contained. Which meant I then deliberately went off to search for dog, beach, van and all sorts of other terms which make me smile and then thoroughly enjoyed the vast amount of time I 'wasted' scanning through the results. Lovely way to dig up rarely visited pictures on my hard drive, xx