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VOLUME XLIII NUMBER 12 DECEMBER 2019

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2 The Book Review / December 2019 C o n t e n t s Sam Pitroda Osama Manzar In Conversation 7 Kazim Rizvi Make, Think, Imagine: Engineering the Future of Civilization by John Browne 9 Arun Maira Where Will Man Take Us? : The Bold Story of the Man Technology is Creating by Atul Jalan 11 Editors Karishma Mehrotra The Big Nine: How the Tech Titans & Their Thinking Machines Chandra Chari Uma Iyengar Could Warp Humanity by Amy Webb 12 Consultant Editor Adnan Farooqui Marc Prensky Forward Without Fear: Towards Humanity’s ‘Symbiotic Guest Editor Osama Manzar Human- Machine Hybrid’ Future 14 Deepak Maheshwari The Globotics Upheaval: Globalization, Robotics and the Editorial Advisory Board Future of Work by Richard Baldwin 16 Romila Thapar Ritu Menon Mala Bhargava The Fourth Age: Smart Robots, Conscious Computers, and the Chitra Narayanan Future of Humanity by Byron Reese 17 T.C.A. Srinivasa Raghavan Mini Krishnan Manoj Kumar Jena A Human’s Guide to Machine Intelligence: How Algorithms are Shaping Our Lives and How We Can Stay in Control by Kartik Hosanagar 18 Subscription Rates Pankaj Pachauri The Politics of Digital India: Between Local Compulsions and Transnational Single Issue: R100 Pressures by Pradip Ninan Thomas 21 Annual Subscription (12 Issues) Ajit Phadnis Dissent on Aadhaar: Big Data Meets Big Brother by Reetika Individual: R1500 / $75 / £50 Khera 22 Institutional: R2500 / $100 / £60 (inclusive of bank charges and postage) Ravi Venkatesan The Technology Trap: Capital, Labor and Power in the Age of Automation by Carl Benedikt Frey 23 Life Donors: R10,000 and above Aasim Khan Permanent Record by Edward Snowden 24

Advertisement Manager Amir Ullah Khan Satya Prakash and Atif Ahmed Privacy 3.0: Unlocking Our Data-Driven Future by Rahul Matthan 26 [email protected] Sonia Jorge The Direction of Digital Equality 27 Website MANAGEMENT Seema Chishti A World Without “Whom”: The Essential Guide to Language in the Digital Empowerment Foundation Buzzfeed Age by Emmy J. Favilla 30 [email protected] Sania Farooqui The Model Thinker: What You Need to Know to Make Data Work for You by Scott. E. Page 31 Computer inputs, design and layout Sevanti Ninan Automating the News: How Algorithms are Rewriting the Media Ravi Kumar Yadav by Nicholas Diakopoulos 33 Digital Empowerment Foundation Ravi Guria India Misinformed: The True Story by Pratik Sinha, Dr Sumaiya Shaikh and Arjun Sidharth 34 Please Address All Mail To: The Book Review Literary Trust Dushyant Arora Zucked: Waking Up to the Facebook Catastrophe by Roger Mcnamee 35 239, Vasant Enclave Mahtab Alam The Real Face of Facebook in India: How Social Media have Become a New Delhi 110 057 Propaganda Weapon and Disseminator of Misinformation and Falsehood Telephone: by Cyril Sam and Paranjoy Guha Thakurta 36 91-11-41034635 9278089024 / 9811702695 Nitish Verghese Future Politics: Living Together in a World Transformed by Tech by Jamie Susskind 37

Website: Udita Chaturvedi How to Win an Indian Election: What Political Parties don’t Want www.thebookreviewindia.org You to Know by Shivam Shankar Singh 39 Ali Ahmad Army of None: Autonomous Weapons and the Future of War email: by Paul Scharre 40 [email protected] [email protected] Ravi Guria The Great Hack: Directed by Karim Amer and Jehane Noujaim 41 Madanmohan Rao Chasing Innovation: Making Entrepreneurial Citizens in Modern Advisory Board Founder Members India by Lilly Irani 44 K.R. Narayanan S. Gopal Amitabh Singhal Digital Transformation: Build your Organization’s Future for the Nikhil Chakravartty Innovation Age by Lindsay Herbert 46 Raja Ramanna Meenakshi Mukherjee Christie Maria James Mentoring 2.0: A Practitioner’s Guide to Changing Lives K.N. Raj by Sunil Unny Guptan 48 Sakshi Abrol Information Systems: Debates, Applications and Impacts edited by Priya Seetharaman and Jocelyn Cranefield 49

Cover Illustration: Designed by Sharada Kerkar, Digital Empowerment Foundation

The Book Review is a non-political, ideologically non-partisan journal which tries to reflect all shades of intellectual opinions and ideas. The views of the reviewers and authors writing for the journal are their own. All reviews and articles published in The Book Review are exclusive to the journal and may not be reprinted without the prior permission of the editors.

Published by Chandra Chari for The Book Review Literary Trust, 239 Vasant Enclave, New Delhi 110057. Printed at National Printers, B-56, Naraina Industrial Area Phase-II, New Delhi 110028 Story of Digital Shift from Village India

hakti Singh is a young man in his later half of mid-twenties who lives in a small village of Chohtan block in the district of Barmer in Rajasthan State of India. Barmer, which Sis arid, a desert, is also one of the largest districts of India besides being highly under developed. People in this district eke out their lives with enormous amount of difficulties. Six years ago, Shakti joined Digital Empowerment Foundation (DEF) as his first job. He had no idea what he wanted to do and had no clue what his job responsibilities will be. Sometime in early 2014, we were trying to establish hundreds of centres across the country in remote areas and at village level, where almost nothing existed, certainly not any kind of digital infrastructure. Our objective was to establish public spaces with digital infrastructure and Internet connectivity where people from the villages could walk in to access information, get digital literacy and skills, talk to someone who could help in accessing online forms and get them filled to get entitlements under government welfare schemes for thousands of people who had no clue how to get them. Osama Manzar is the founder and director of Digital Empowerment It became clear that millions of people who may not be part of the connected world and Foundation (DEF) may not have any means to be connected to this digital world started depending on the digital ecosystem. This was so, because, even to get hold of their ration for the month, a poor person had to go through a biometric machine based identification check which very much depends on connectivity and would allow permission to the entitlement only when the digital database would confirm their identity. Unfortunately, many a times the database would not match, connectivity may not work, machine may malfunction or the agent behind the machine may also play foul­­­—all of them or any of them could result in the poor man returning without his ration and his family may starve to death. Shakti’s job was to be trained to master the know-how of digital tools, how he could use them, how he could mobilize the villagers and help them understand that he is the man who could be instrumental in enabling people with access to the world of information, entitlements, opportunities, knowledge and rights through the digital doorways. Shakti learnt fast and developed empathy and in the last six years has earned such a reputation in and around his village council that people started pressurizing him to contest for village council election because ‘it is he who has genuinely served the people, so much so, that not a single household left in the village council that is unserved.’ One classic example that Shakti Singh narrates is that there was this old lady in her 90s who had not received her old age pension for a couple of decades. She approached Shakti Singh and narrated her story. After a lot of enquiries and following the trails of the old lady’s application, he found that her pension was disbursed by the local government all these years and was also received—but someone at the local post office who was supposed to deliver her cheques continued to avail himself by forging papers and signing for the old lady. Once the investigation was completed and was proven, the guilty begged for forgiveness and returned all the money to the old lady which was almost in six digits. While the situation in the villages of Barmer has not changed much and people are still largely poor, the situation of connectivity and mobile penetration has increased. Most of the young population have started owning smartphones. While the purpose of owning a smartphone may not be compulsive enough to buy, it is seen and observed that the ownership of mobile is a social phenomenon and not having one would be seen oddly. Aspiring to buy a smartphone now has become a priority. However, the ownership of a smartphone or mobile is also showing trends of the patriarchal system prevalent in India; where the men are usually the first owners of mobile phones, women have to wait or they get hold of it only as second user or leftover user or a user under necessity. Shakti Singh has now new worries: he himself is an ardent user of a smartphone and uses the mobile very effectively to not only serve his local villagers through critical information access but also reports to DEF on all projects using audio, video, camera, WhatsApp, emails, and so on. He, however, does not like it that the local youth is hooked on smartphones without any productivity. Shakti Singh earlier this year came to New Delhi to undergo rigorous training in what is misinformation, fakenews, who spreads it and how to combat them. He complained that in his village, people have no work, without knowing how to effectively use connectivity 4 The Book Review / December 2019 Empowering people and mobile phones, they are caught in the web of spreading of information without knowing if it was right or wrong. They believe @ the edge of information everything they see on their smartphones and spread it further without realizing it could be misinformation. What in effect Shakti wanted to articulate was that ‘people do not have critical thinking even if they are using the most modern tool to access and consume information.’ Shakti also highlights that most of the new users of mobiles do not know how to read and write but now they are finding 50,000 easy access to audio, visual and pictorial forms of content, to which artisans they are hooked without literacy as a barrier. Shakti Singh is worried digitally that new users of connectivity through mobile is becoming a tool for empowered the miscreants, politicians, and exploiters to reach out to people with narratives that people at large may not have the capacity to fathom 23 states and as a result may indulge in violence. districts Shakti Singh went through a long rigorous training to understand 126 the world of connectivity, pervasiveness of mobiles, importance of critical thinking, what is misinformation and fakenews, what disinformation means, how to identify misinformation and fakenews, how to differentiate between authentic video and tampered ones, what’s deep fake, and so on. Shakti Singh, after empowering people 10,000 digital 4,000,000 through access to information for over five years, now has a task to innovations women digitally work with another set of people in the same villages on how to treat documented included information that they get and what is required to be a responsible user of a connected device. Recently, Shakti Singh has started understanding the deeper nuances of the connected world. He called me the other day and 600 digital said, ‘Sir, I am now an avid user of smartphone and I use almost resource all functionalities of my phone. I realize that everything that I am centres set up doing on phone is being tracked and recorded and it is also analysing 6,000 NGOs my activity and behaviour and accordingly making suggestions as digitally enabled if this small little digital device is a part of me and sitting inside 500,000 my body and mind.’ I said that it is correct, but does that bother availed you, I asked him as if I didn’t know the implications. Shakti Singh entitlement became poignant, and then uttered at length, ‘What I understand is that while my digital device is acquiring all my information and 1000 Digital apparently giving me all helpful details, I am worried that by reading and recording too much of intricate information, it is actually, Panchayats gradually, guiding and influencing my further behaviour, rather than I being in control of how I would like to use the device for my own 7,500,000 usage without being controlled and motivated.’ digitally empowered He started highlighting everything from digital incisiveness, to privacy and security, to how algorithms and artificial intelligence are taking control over human behaviour and intelligence. To know more about us ‘But Sir, I am not worried much that we have entered into visit www.defindia.org the digital age of total datafication, but my worry is that every component that is collecting information of the masses is controlled Follow @defindia on social media by some private entity. Having so much centralized control and ownership of data, it would leave us with no option but slavery, death of democracy, and boti-fixation of the human being.’ Shakti Singh concluded that ‘we are moving towards death of human rights, death of democracy, and proliferation of slavery and autocracy.’ Is that what the ‘Digital Shift’ we are talking about? Let’s explore. The Book Review / December 2019 5 technology age

Illustration: Designed by Sharada Kerkar, Digital Empowerment Foundation

6 The Book Review / December 2019 Sam Pitroda

In Conversation with Osama Manzar

For the very first time in human history, a Great Grand Event happened––the grand event of ‘Being ‘interconnected’ with each other. Due to this event today, we are all connected, the way we were never connected before. For all of us it is the biggest event in the history of the human being––and we are all interconnected with each other because of this transformation in the world which is—DIGITAL SHIFT. ‘ t all didn’t happen in one Osama Manzar: Is it a disruption of the story that was originally being written through connectivity go, it happened slowly and it content? Itook years and years. Sam Pitroda: Yes, of course it is, as it is controlled by a bunch of intellectual people or so called The story of connectivity entrepreneurs, who have their own targets of money making, like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, in the era of Telecom initially WhatsApp, Google etc. But soon people are going to realize the difference between things that are revolved around telephones and important and unimportant for them. The importance must be given to the community, the people who it took almost 115 years for us to belong to the community, the district, the issues and the localization of these things in terms of context. reach a billion phones. You don’t live in the world that really doesn’t exist, but that’s actually what the young generation is Earlier, we were connected affected by. by old telephones but at a very high cost and then came the era OM: What about people who are still not connected? of mobile telephony that reduced SP: That’s true that a lot of people from poor communities are still not connected, but don’t look at the cost. This resulted in a rapid them as half not connected. Even if few people in a village are connected, then it is a good start, each and increase in the number of phones everyone is not connected but the community is connected. An old man may not be connected, but a in millions of users proving, young man is connected. He knows exactly what to do, how to operate, and he carries that message. He ‘Affordability, scalability, and shows them little songs and little pictures, and seven people sit around him and say look, this is what is sustainability go hand in hand. happening. As, if it is not affordable, it is not scalable; if it is not scalable, it is OM: Is the human being also like a data, which is being used for monetization? not sustainable.’ SP: Yes, we have reached to a point from connectivity to content to value of data. So, human beings are Then came the era of also treated like data. the Internet which not only connected people but connected OM: What should actually be derived from data? people with content. It connected SP: It is important to know that from this data, how you derive knowledge; from that knowledge, how people with data, video, text, do you derive wisdom; from that wisdom, how do you derive action. We have created a world, which graphics, animations, movies and looks from top to bottom, not from bottom to top. You will see a lot of news about top people, top songs, etc., and all this could be businesses. These are the people that control most of the wealth in the world, but the world is not all shared with the world in one go. about them, it is actually formed by the communities. So the connectivity, content and context really give The era of smartphones that you the opportunity to have a look at the world from bottom to top. followed should actually have been an asset, but it really has OM: Is connectivity controlled by a few people? complicated the world whereas SP: We always thought it is going to be a democratic connectivity, controlled by the masses that are it should really have been a connected. However, it turned out to be connectivity which is actually controlled by a few people but story of the development of the that will change for sure. community, but it became a story of personalization. This OM: Does the world need to be redesigned? happened because of the business SP: May be, it’s a weird idea, but yes, it does need to be redesigned. The world was redesigned last after model, which is actually based on World War II by the US. At that time the design was based on 5 things: ‘clicks’. * Democracy So this business model in * Human Rights social media is creating a huge * Capitalism amount of turmoil in the way * Consumption we use information, share * Military information, educate people, and It was made by the US who wanted their idea to go global. But now, the digital shift needs to make a interact with people. change in the way we have been governing and doing things.

The Book Review / December 2019 7 OM: Any idea for a new design of the world? SP: The new design may include a voting system on the mobile phone. * Highly secured * I can vote at any point of time The Book Review Literary Trust * Based on issues, I can vote. The Book Review Literary Trust set up in October 1989 You can be vocal about your issues. For sure, it will take democracy to disseminate information about advances in knowledge further in the future. So, everything is going to be decentralized, and books, is a non-political, ideologically non-partisan education is being decentralized, health services are going to be organization, and seeks to reflect all shades of intellectual decentralized, politics is going to be decentralized, voting is going opinions and ideas. to be decentralized because communication empowers you as an individual to decentralize every part of your activity. Objectives • Publication of the monthly magazine The Book Review OM: Are we passing through a phase of aberration? • The running of such other magazines/publications; SP: We are passing through a phase of aberration, which will • Organizing exhibitions of books; improvise at a later stage. We have to be self-learners. You don’t need • Organizing seminars on themes of relevance to the a degree to learn. Whatever you want to learn, you can learn on the objectives of the Trust; Internet. It will be outcome oriented. The world is facing great digital • Providing financial assistance for publishers to publish transformation, which is having an impact on everything whether it seminal works in several disciplines at subsidized prices; is transport, education, health or living. Some are good and may be • Awarding scholarships, prizes for meritorious research some are bad, but some day we will be able to figure out what to use, and publication; and what not to use. • Undertaking publication, sale and distribution of books; • Running freelance or syndicated columns in newspapers, OM: Where is the world is going in the next ten years? magazines and the like. SP: The world needs to adopt the Gandhian way of life, which will The Book Review be based on four things: The Book Review, India’s first review journal in English, * Truth was started in 1976 by Chitra Narayanan, Uma Iyengar and * Trust Chandra Chari: * Love * Courage • To promote Indian publications and Indian authors, As the information will all be open, no one can hide the facts. including those in the Indian languages; • To encourage and develop high-quality translations of OM: Survive and make humanity survive? works in the Indian languages SP: We live in an era of abundance and not scarcity but we are • To develop a culture of critical in-depth reviews, producing things for people who can afford not for the people leveraging the expertise of the best in a given field who need. Basic necessities like food, transport, education can be • To promote awareness of studies in special areas of easily made available to all of us in future and that will be possible concern by publishing special issues on Gender, Indian with the technology and the technological revolution like big data, Languages, Children’s Books, South Asia, International data analysis and the digital transformation. We will have enough Relations, Politics, History, Media Studies resources, but we will need to know the right way to use it and make other people know by using this ‘Digital Shift’ in the right way.

Sam Pitroda is the inventor of ‘Electronic Diary’, in 1975, which was one of the first hand-held computing devices in the world; he is holder of several patents, entrepreneur, development thinker, and policy maker who has spent 50 years in information and communications technology (ICT) and related global and national developments. The Book Review Literary

Book News Book News Book News Book News Trust thanks Digital Information Communication Technology and Empowerment Foundation Poverty Alleviation: Promoting Good Governance in the Developing World (Routledge Explorations (DEF) for the sponsorship in Development Studies) by Jack J. Barry puts forward policy recommendations that aim of this issue. to mitigate the complex digital divide by employing governance as the primary actor. The book argues that access to the internet can help alleviate poverty, improve development outcomes, and is now vital for realizing many human rights. Routledge, 2018, pp. 246, £ 115.00 8 The Book Review / December 2019 Towards A Better gravity in the book is trust and privacy, Society does not need a which are topics no book on technology would be complete without addressing. Future “ wave of technology that There is a fine line we balance everyday in Kazim Rizvi can be used to commit mass terms of trading our privacy and personal data for the services offered to us by genocide; it needs automation Make, Think, Imagine: Engineering the businesses and the state. The onus should Future of Civilization which will help in bridging be on companies, and not on users, to uphold the tenets of user safety and privacy. By John Browne gaps in healthcare which can Pegasus Books, 2019, pp. 416, $23.16 With the paranoia about robots replacing ultimately save and improve human intimacy, the book reminds us about how robots will not replace human lives. The book ends on the rowne urges the relationships—but supplement and enhance reader to believe note, which pushes the reader them. The research undertaken in the book in a better future is thorough, and academics from different B to develop patience and at the beginning of walks of life have been interviewed to his work. His lens of reflect, to design strong, well- opine on issues which touch human lives. looking at engineering References to movies such as 2001: A Space thought-out regulation and and technology allows Odyssey help to bridge the gap between one to have hope that reduce damage as much as science-fiction and how much of it we can technology will solve more problems rather expect to play a role in our future. However, possible. than create bigger challenges, and the only with great power comes responsibility—and determinant is pragmatism. He reiterates to a transition and not a death sentence for that is where the role of regulation comes in. that we do not need to fall into binaries of ” For instance, society does not need a wave of the economy. The process of making and pessimism and optimism, but believe that creating keeps our creativity alive and lets technology that can be used to commit mass we can set up institutions which promote us apply our learning, be it open-source genocide; it needs automation which will accountability and account for consequences. software which is equally accessible to all or help in bridging gaps in healthcare which 3D printing which is based on the principles can ultimately save and improve lives. The of innovation developed by society over book ends on the note which pushes the thousands of years. reader to develop patience and reflect, to Delving into the complexity of thought, design strong, well-thought-out regulation Browne discusses how computers facilitate and reduce damage as much as possible. In solutions to complex thought experiments— order to drive the point of belief and hope initially when personal computers permeated further, Browne ends with how our focus homes, people were worried that they would should be on the gift of imagination we have, and how we should constantly strive to replace jobs. However, law is one profession dream of a better world. where practitioners have actually enhanced their vocation with the creation of more Kazim Rizvi is a public policy entrepreneur and opportunities. With the advent of Artificial founder of an emerging policy think-think, The Intelligence (AI), the scope of problem- Dialogue. solving became even more vast—with machine learning being applied to the most granular areas of life. These advancements Book News Book News are likely to become bigger and better as the years roll by, entering into every sphere of Hello World: How It highlights how inventions which were life—medicine, education, military—there is to be Human in the created painstakingly years ago and marketed no limit to the application of AI. However, Age of the Machine as luxuries are now everyday household the book remains true to empower the by Hannah Fry takes items for us. It is refreshing to see a book reader to face issues of ‘black boxes’—where us on a tour of the which doesn’t put down technology as algorithms remain opaque and users do not good, the bad and the downright ugly apocalyptic, and readers do not have to be understand their functioning. of the algorithms constantly marked with worry about how It is important to address these issues, that surround us. technology giants are trying to misuse their especially when AI is embedded in the She lifts the lid on data. Inventions and engineering have been functioning of policies—worrisome their inner workings, around since neolithic times, and our ideas ‘terminators’ are not the problem at hand, demonstrates are only as good as the use cases that we lack of diversity and bias in technology is. their power, exposes their limitations, devise for them. One of the biggest concerns This point brought out by the book is highly and examines whether they really are an raised with the advancement of technology is relevant to developing technology, because improvement on the humans they are the loss of jobs, and the disruption brought technology is a tool in the hands of people— replacing. about in the marketspace. However, the how society chooses to wield them, and who book reassures the reader of the fact that uses them, makes the ultimate difference. Transworld Digital, 2018, pp. 320, one must think of such processes as akin Another theme which has been given R699.00 The Book Review / December 2019 9 robotics and Ai

Illustration: Designed by Sharada Kerkar, Digital Empowerment Foundation

10 The Book Review / December 2019 Technology’s humans can in a variety of fields and themselves warm in cold climates. However, games. However, AI is not good at making fire also had the ability to destroy. Therefore, Emerging Power ‘judgments’ as Ajay Agrawal, Joshua Gans, humans had to develop the wisdom about and Avi Goldfarb explain in their book how to use fire, and to design regulations Arun Maira Prediction Machines. to prevent fire hazards. The development of ‘Judgement’ is a composite of two technology to release the energy within tiny WHERE WILL MAN TAKE US? : THE BOLD STORY OF abilities: making decisions when all the atoms promised clean and unlimited energy. THE MAN TECHNOLOGY IS CREATING information required to make a ‘rational’ It also provided humans enormous energy By Atul Jalan decision is not known; also, the ability to to obliterate cities. We are still struggling Amazon Asia-Pacific, 2019, pp. 300,R 320.00 choose what is the ‘good’ thing to do rather to prevent the misuse of nuclear energy. than only what would be the ‘smart’ thing Technologies merely provide new means. to do. Thus, judgement has an ethical The ethical question is to what use should tul Jalan’s component to it too. AGI and ASI may they be put? When technologies are very book, with the make computers smarter than humans. But new, we cannot foresee their consequences, Aintriguing title can computers learn how to take ethical Where Will Man Take Us? and we must learn how to regulate their use. is a thought-provoking Those who discover a powerful exploration of where new technology want to own the new technology could take technology’s power, to use it for their own us. It raises the perennial purposes, and to prevent others from using question of, ‘Who’ are ‘We’? And, what it. Nuclear nonproliferation treaties are makes humans ‘human’, and distinct from a means for countries that have nuclear machines. It shows how man can degenerate technology preventing others from having it into technology if advances in AI are not too. IPR (Intellectual Property Rights) is a regulated. way for businesses to monopolize the use of I found Jalan’s account of the state- new technologies to make more profits. It is of-the-art of ‘technology’ very useful. He inevitable that as Industry 4.0 (AI, robotics, expands the scope of technology beyond social media, etc.) advances, humanity will digital communication technologies and AI have to struggle with civilizational questions to include nano-technology and genetics. of who will be allowed to own these new Combinations of these new technologies, technologies and for what purposes they not AI alone, are creating possibilities of will be used. The technology of governance transforming industries and human life. must advance much faster now than the Jalan also explains the present stage of technology of AI. development of AI, which is at the stage of I was attracted to Jalan’s book by its ANI (Artificial Narrow Intelligence), with title and by its contents. It goes beyond machines exceeding human intelligence in the impacts of technology on businesses, narrow tasks, and with the ability to beat economies, and jobs which many other humans in complex games of chess and Go. books that want to alarm and excite readers He says AI may now be entering the realm of about AI’s potential are restricted to. Jalan’s AGI (ArtificialG eneral Intelligence) where decisions? Agrawal and his co-authors book is more interesting because it also has computers will become generally as smart explain how state of the art AI computers chapters on the impact of AI on democracy, as humans. And he foresees possibilities of learn to learn by observing how humans AI developing further into ASI (Artificial take decisions in complex situations. Super Intelligence), when computers will be Thus computers merely emulate the value Atul Jalan expands the scope smarter than humans. judgements and ethical biases of the humans The tantalizing question is, in what they learn from, and they can never be “ of technology beyond digital sort of intelligence will AI exceed human ethically better than the humans whose communication technologies capabilities? And is this the only form of actions they observe. intelligence human beings have? AI may Jalan’s account of technology’s emerging and AI to include nano- exceed human capabilities in rational power raises big questions about what we technology and genetics. intelligence. But what about emotional want to make of ourselves as humans and intelligence, and spiritual intelligence? what sort of society we want to live in. The Combinations of these new Rational intelligence is founded on the first one he poses is, who will be in charge technologies, not AI alone, ability to examine data and to compute in the future—man or machine? However, rationally logical decisions. Ability to the more urgent question is, which humans are creating possibilities of compute digital data far exceeds human will be in charge of the technologies being transforming industries and capabilities, and with quantum computing in developed? New technologies can transform the offing, they may increase exponentially. human existence. The discovery of the means human life. Thus, state-of-the-art AI is getting better of creating fire, thousands of years ago, at making ‘predictions’ in advance, which was transformational. It enabled humans to eat greater varieties of food, and to keep ” enables it to make smarter decisions than The Book Review / December 2019 11 religion, happiness, love, and sex! Path to Optimistic she extends the premise, arguing that While Jalan raises good questions, I think machines don’t think like all of us: he finally falls short of the promise of his AI Future ‘Thinking machines ... need a purpose and intriguing title. To answer the question of a goal. Eventually they develop a sense of where man will take us, rather than where Karishma Mehrotra judgement ... Each soul is a manifestation machines are taking us if man does not of God’s vision and intent; it was made and intercede, we must inquire into what the THE BIG NINE: HOW THE TECH TITANS & THEIR bestowed by a singular creator. Thinking essence of man is. Technology is reaching THINKING MACHINES COULD WARP HUMANITY machines have creators too—they are the the point where it can provide individuals By Amy Webb new gods of AI, and they are mostly male, a composite picture of themselves from all Public Affairs, 2019, pp. 337, R1375.00 predominantly live in America, Western the data about their actions that ubiquitous Europe, and China, and are tied in some way to the Big Nine.’ devices can now gather. n an eye-opening and Jalan is enamoured by the possibility of timely analysis of the big data analysis providing me a model of Iworld’s two divergent ‘Me’ to explain who I am. He says, ‘Our technological paths, the digital future begins with this realization— renowned futurist Amy that more than me, my data defines me.’ In Webb in The Big Nine: other words, I am an object, which can be How the Tech Titans & observed from the outside to tell me who I Their Thinking Machines am. On the other hand, Rene Descartes said, Could Warp Humanity ‘I think, therefore I am’. In other words, it charts out the potential scenarios for an is the ability to observe, and to ask questions Artificial Intelligence future, pitting the about what we observe, that makes us United States and China in direct opposition human. Therefore, I must discover myself to each other. Her balanced critique of inside out by listening to myself, not outside nine major technology companies of the only from what others can observe. world—Google, Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Jalan has a narrow, albeit popular, view of Microsoft, Tencent, Baidu, and Alibaba— religion. Religions have dogmatic, ritualistic presents a cautionary tale to champion an traditions, in which god is some superior ethical blueprint for AI development. being to whom man is beholden. But, as Early on, the book’s most gripping Webb’s fresh take on the computer- Aldous Huxley explained beautifully in analogy circles around AI’s mastery over human dilemma is honest but not belittling, professional Go player, Fan Hui. After three The Perennial Philosophy, all religions have with the perfect vocabulary to describe the rounds of playing the centuries-old Chinese mystical and spiritual traditions too, which new-age phenomenon of a few rulers. game Go with a computer, ‘[r]eeling from enjoin humans to reflect on their place in The ‘made by the few, and thus emulates frustration, Hui had to excuse himself for the universe, and to look inside themselves the few’ foundation allows Webb to detangle a walk outside so that he could regain his for virtue, love, and happiness. This is the the misaligned and homogenous values composure and finish the match. Yet again, of these few. In the US, they are driven wisdom that Buddhism, Sufism, the Vedas, stress had gotten the better of a great human by the market, not by democratic ideals. and Taoism point towards. They say that thinker—while AI was unencumbered to Technologists, completely lacking diversity, you cannot outsource your discovery of ruthlessly pursue its goal. That brings us whose motivation to build fast and ask for yourself to others. You must experience it to a perplexing new philosophical question forgiveness later is seen in far too many yourself to know who you are. for our modern era of AI. In order for AI recent examples, notwithstanding the now- Humans have a long tradition of systems to win—to accomplish the goals infamous Cambridge Analytica scandal. worshipping great power. They have we’ve created for them—do humans have While the in-depth depictions of worshipped fire and the sun for centuries. to lose in ways that are both trivial and those in the West paint Americans as Many have now begun to worship profound?’ well-intentioned, Webb’s exploration of technology. Technology worshippers dismiss Webb’s three-pronged layout of an Chinese values often comes off as shallow others who want to harness technology as optimistic, a pragmatic, and a catastrophic backward. Whereas, these deeply thinking potential future gives us three probable Amy Webb’s balanced critique others don’t want to become dogmatic paths to answer this question of human- and ritualistic about any god, not even limiting AI. In doing so, she successfully “ of nine major technology problematizes the small group of people who technology. They will not let go of the companies of the world— perennial quest to discover what it means to have amassed disproportionate decision- be human. making power in the process (the AI’s tribe google, Facebook, Apple, of the Big Nine technology companies) and In conclusion, I would recommend Amazon, microsoft, Tencent, Jalan’s book. While his answers may shows their two global faces—American and not satisfy everyone, his book does raise Chinese. Baidu, and Alibaba—presents By exposing the biases and inordinate profound questions and it made me think. a cautionary tale to champion concentration of power of the AI’s tribe, Arun Maira is a management consultant and a she cushions the critique in an ancient an ethical blueprint for AI former member of the Planning Commission of philosophical conundrum: ‘Can machines development. India. think?’ While Webb’s answer is affirmative, 12 The Book Review / December 2019 ” and stereotypical, and while she may say from authoritarian regimes, and to be but knowledge workers are out of work. she doesn’t consider the Chinese model as decentralized. Humans crave human connection, nanobots ‘evil’, the book falls into easy vilification In its essence, Webb envisions a world enter our body reeking havoc like automatic rather than a genuine dive into the country’s where AI is optimized for empathy, not the abortions, and the world is nothing like we government-driven AI strategy. In essence, market. could have imagined. Webb’s map of the world draws a US Webb plots a timeline of roughly The dystopian portrayal would leave us image of government and companies not seventy years in which we will achieve not depressed without Webb’s most fruitful, last working together well enough towards just Artificial General Intelligence (AGI, as chapter, where she outlines concrete steps democratic goals and another Chinese image opposed to Artificial Narrow Intelligence, or to achieve the optimistic scenario. Her most of government and companies working ANI) but also an explosion of unpredictable concrete takeaways include an international together too much towards undemocratic Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI). body Global Alliance on Intelligence goals. Development of evolutionary algorithms Augmentation (GAIA) based in Montreal On top of the surface level understanding and recursive self-improvement allow AI to that develops a Human Values Atlas and of China, one has to wonder if Webb dilutes keep generating new combinations to solve an Advanced Cyber Security Center (like the close relationship America’s deep state problems in expounding ways, without the World Health Organization) that has with US Big Tech. If leaked top-secret human input or understanding. develops sentinel AIs to test the implications programmes are not enough evidence, In an optimistic scenario, the US of AI. These steps are aimed to maintain America’s government-led trade negotiations government funds AI so it can be developed interoperability and citizen ownership of with other countries, including India, are for societal goals, not profit. Individuals own data, to slow down the progress of AI by clear extensions of American corporate their Personal Data Record (PDR), enjoy design, to get governments to genuinely concerns. In addition, although outside the conveniences of predictive decision- understand AI and the Chinese threat to the scope of the book, Webb nonchalantly making, trust those in power to surveil them, world order, and to integrate questions about categorizes India as leaning towards the and don’t mind limited human interaction. ethics into hiring and teaching. Chinese model—a disputable claim given AI is not judged in comparison to human While Webb’s book presents an all- the complexity of ongoing political- intelligence, but in its own vertical, and its encompassing ethical guide sheet, there is technological development in India. With development is constrained for safety. not so much as one needs to be convinced this in mind, Webb’s portrayal ultimately Pragmatically, what could happen is that we can get there. Webb says regulations does accurately describe the US as a country that US ignores China’s development, are usually too specific and become with far more moving parts in varying continuing to focus on sexy AI. Without outdated, but how will the ethical standards directions than the well-charted Chinese clean data, Wall Street pressures companies be enforced? ‘The Big Nine aren’t the development path. to release products before they are ready and villains in this story, in fact they are our best And, Webb is undoubtedly correct that customers still expect perfection. Individuals hope for the future.’, she states. It leaves one US Big Tech—what she calls G-MAFIA— have difficulty porting their PDR between to wonder: even with increased government makes decisions and therefore, makes AI companies, trapping them in a two OS funding and less Wall Street pressures, is the that is optimized for the market, instead of systems of Google and Applezon (Apple goodwill of the G-MAFIA enough of a force to humanitarian values. With little government and Amazon merged). Rich people pay for achieve an optimistic AI future? funding and no forethought in planning, their privacy, and a ‘digital caste system’ Karishma Mehrotra is an Indian-American G-MAFIA has to succumb to the pressure emerges. AI’s nudging tactics for our better journalist who moved to India to explore the tech of the latest earnings call and the hype of health devolves into nagging. Companies are beat from a social/political angle. Currently she is a the next conference showcase, instead of financially forced to cooperate with China, technology reporter for The Indian Express. viewing AI as a public good. Even more, a Facebook’s failed business is sold bit by bit lack of ethics in education and hiring further to China, along with our data, and China Book News Book News perpetuate the problem. repurposes Baidu’s brain-machine interface To negotiate what optimizing for for the military to occupy the US, turning AI Superpowers: humanitarian values looks like, Webb has it into the ‘Digitally Occupied States of China, Silicon two bullet point lists on pages which a America’. All the while, China is caricatured Valley, and the New reader will inevitably keep flipping back to as inherently evil, and the US is deemed World Order by as AI continues to make headlines. One, sloppy, with backfiring laws and little Kai-Fu Lee reveals midway through the book are the questions coordination. that China has AI’s tribes should be asking themselves, And that was not the worst scenario. In suddenly caught and another, is there a ‘The Human Values the truly catastrophic path, US retreats in up to the US at Atlas’ or code of ethics that AI development worldwide influence, while China has made an astonishingly should follow. This well thought out list its way to Latin America. Again, Americans rapid and includes questioning AI’s motivations for are not malicious but just unaware, unexpected pace. humanity, the overlooked biases of the brainwashed by the political cycle and In AI Superpowers, developers, citizen’s ability to interrogate Sunday morning talk shows. A transactional Kai-fu Lee AI’s path, how to view AI in comparison relationship between G-MAFIA and the argues powerfully that because of these to human intelligence, and AI’s interaction government is not in the national interest, unprecedented developments in AI, dramatic with human emotion. The Human Values while China is able to hack into G-MAFIA changes will be happening much sooner than many of us expected. Atlas urges the Big Nine to prioritize safety devices, sowing distrust between the over speed, to be transparent, to own American populace and their companies. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2019, pp. 272, their responsibility, to protect themselves Blue workers unexpectedly keep their jobs, R3499.00 The Book Review / December 2019 13 Forward Without Fear: Towards Humanity’s ‘Symbiotic Human-Machine Hybrid’ Future

By Marc Prensky

o One Knows Exactly What’s Coming— vs. ‘artificial’ intelligence, ‘human skills vs. machine skills’, ‘human yet we can spot in advance a lot of the judgment vs. machine judgment’, ‘a “people-centered” economy vs. Ndirections we are headed. And we can a “technology-centered” economy’, and ‘The [Human] Race Against also see why those directions are potentially the Machine’. Most of this is really, I believe, just a negative reaction hugely positive for humanity—to be welcomed, to change. And while the fears are understandable, I think they are rather than feared. It is important, therefore, to not only unwarranted, but actually harmful to us and to our future address the rising fear from many adults that our generations. technology-filled future will somehow be bad—or worse than today Change is something that humans typically resist and find hard to or the past. That is a perspective with which I strongly disagree. deal with. This resistance to change is one of humans’ least positive Certainly, today, there is much writing and movie-making about characteristics, although, to our credit, we almost always eventually dystopian futures. As one of those creators puts it, ‘That’s what makes do find a way. We might call ourselves a ‘painfully adaptive’ species. for adventure plots.’ And there are some things—both short-term and Today we are witnessing a similar reaction to that which occurred long term—that actually are, and will be, bad for us. We can’t know after every big change in human history—the grasping at the past by all of them in in advance, but like tobacco, we will eventually find those who were privileged in the previous times. While some today them and fix them—and we are getting better at doing this faster. I couch their anti-technology opinions in the language of ‘preserving believe even planetary degradation or destruction will eventually be our humanity’ or ‘freedom’, it mostly comes down to the age- addressed as the situation becomes dire enough for those with the old fight between the haves and the have nots—because ‘helping means to do it actually to begin to care. humanity’ argues only in technology’s favour. Who can bemoan What concerns me more is people who worry that, somehow, at a ‘less disease’, ‘universal free power’, ‘good shelter and food for all,’ far more basic level, our ‘humanity’ will soon disappear as the digital ‘universal connectedness’, or even space travel? All that—and more— world increasingly takes on a larger role in our future. Some worry is what technology is bringing us. about our ‘loss of control’. Some worry about our ‘loss of privacy’. Some might ask ‘At what cost?’ but the unstoppable reality is Some worry about the loss of ‘basic skills’ or behaviours like ‘looking that we are all becoming ‘Symbiotic Human-Machine Hybrids’—to people in the eye.’ almost everyone’s benefit. Some Silicon Valley executives are sending We hear the words ‘human’ and ‘people’ a lot in this discourse, their own kids to non-technology ‘Steiner’ schools—as widely usually in contrast to ‘machines’. We hear about ‘human intelligence reported—because they believe, I think, that this will enable their

14 The Book Review / December 2019 already hyper-technology-infused kids to be better hybrids. Most Already, machines are better at a great many things formerly kids, however, know that to become successful hybrids in their future considered only the province of humans. These include reading, world they will need a lot more of the new technology than the old accessing information, researching, translating, much non-fiction skills—although some of those ‘old skills’ are certainly part of the new writing, collaborating, learning, agility and grit. hybrid mix. In other spheres we are already in transition towards machines Humans have been evolving and changing forever, and the being better than people. These include many kinds of critical memories we pass down of previous times are all heavily edited, thinking, systems thinking, project management, connecting ideas, redacted and interpreted—typically way over—positively. In the and some forms of relating, fiction writing, art and music—and even short time we each individually get to live, each of us sees, at best, formal debating. (For an eye-opener, see IBM’s Project Debater at only the forward tip of human evolution—which may lead some to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_yy0dnIc58.) Although there is the conclusion that the best of all times is the best for all times. Yet still human creation and genius, much of the music we hear today as we are all better off welcoming, rather than fearing, more evolution, background loops is already written by machines. and investing deeply in the new Symbiotic Human-Machine Hybrid So what will our ‘humanity’ become? I believe we will see the rise that is coming—even if getting there may at times be painful or in importance of the traits that machines are least good at—at least difficult. currently. These include dreaming, imagining, feeling, respecting, Humans are only a speck on a speck in the vastness of the universe empathy, ethics, compassion, speaking, persuading, creativity, we are even aware of. Anything we can do to affect nature is far less uniqueness, and particularly accomplishing. These are skills our than nature’s power to affect us. Yet one way humans are special is youth should be working hard at developing. The kids are already that we do have a great deal more power than other creatures to affect hard at work at technology integration—bonding with their devices, things on our planet. Humans have reached many ‘peaks’ of progress embedding chips into their bodies, and testing technologies that (to use the term of historian Will Durant), including speech, taming monitor and share their thoughts. While this may be discomfiting to of fire, conquest of animals, agriculture, social organization, morality, some, I believe there is no cause for general alarm. It is, potentially, a ‘new renaissance’—a flourishing of formerly under-appreciated, but tools, science, education and writing and print. For the totality of essentially human traits in all of us. humans on this earth, life has steadily improved over time. But it is Education professor Yong Zhao titled one of his books Never important to remember that our current developmental stage is only Send a Human to Do a Machine’s Job. If all we want is more of what that—a stage—and that our current evolution is only better for some. we have, we can get it by building machines. If we want things to All of these previous ‘peaks of progress’ caused massive upheavals be better than before, we should work on creating great Symbiotic and redefinitions of our humanity. And now we are entering a new Human-Machine Hybrids. There is no reason to fear this—it’s era, based on computing power. Our machines have already become precisely what’s needed to make progress. so powerful—and will become so much more powerful even in our children’s lives—that another big upheaval, and re-definition Marc Prensky is an award-winning, internationally-acclaimed speaker in over of humanity is already in progress. We are already seeing massive forty countries and author of seven books in the field of education. Coiner of ‘generational attitude change not only toward technology, but toward the term ‘Digital Native’, he has taught at all levels, from elementary to college. Marc is the founder of The Global Future Education Foundation and ARISE-NET. privacy, property, personal relationships, security, sexuality, power, WORLD, the Accomplishment-based Real-World-Impact Student Empowerment kids, violence, god, justice, money, love, government, and even time network, devoted to developing and spreading young people’s empowerment and space. to better their world, and uniting all those who are working to help.

The Book Review / December 2019 15 Coming Soon: To begin with, Baldwin calls the current revolution as the third and not the fourth Future of Work v/s. one by lumping together the developments from steam engine through electricity, Future Workers railroads, automobiles, chemicals, etc., into a rather longitudinal one, followed by the Deepak Maheshwari second one by way of computing in 1973. And yes, he dates the onset of the third THE GLOBOTICS UPHEAVAL: GLOBALIZATION, revolution to 2016-17 timeframe. ROBOTICS AND THE FUTURE OF WORK According to Baldwin, we are currently By Richard Baldwin witnessing two distinct yet mutually Oxford University Press, 2019, pp. 304, $29.95 reinforcing trends. Firstly, we’re seeing the emergence of telerobots, the author’s hile the term term for a new type of globalization in Industry which white collar service jobs in developed W4.0 did countries are being replaced by humans arguably emerge by way in developing countries—mostly in Asia, of a High-Tech strategy with relatively lower wages. He calls this report developed under the emergence of ‘Remote Intelligence’ the aegis of the German (RI). Secondly, we’re seeing the rapid Government in 2013, development, deployment and fusion of it came into the general technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI) parlance only when Professor Klaus Schwab, and robotics at an accelerated pace. While predicting that the future is founder of the World Economic Forum, Neither globalization nor automation is fraught with risks especially when it comes published his seminal book The Fourth new per se. However, the fusion of these two to determine what jobs technology would Industrial Revolution in 2016. The popular simultaneous trends, viz., globalization in the replace, he distils certain skills that are highly belief is that the first one started with the form of RI and robotics in the form of AI is unlikely for the machines to master. These steam engine around 1700, the second one leading to the phenomenon of ‘globotics’. As include social cognition, ability to solve with electricity, railroads and telecom in the a result, a majority of workers in developed ‘black box problems’ (taking responsibility nineteenth century and the third one with countries are losing jobs or seeing stagnant for the decisions taken), caring, sharing, computing around 1960-70 while the fourth wages; and, their frustration and fury understanding, creating, empathizing, one began in the early 2010s. manifested in outcomes like Brexit and the innovating and managing interpersonal Ever since, and aided by new emergence of a new political narrative in the relationships. developments such as autonomous vehicles, US, both in the year 2016. Baldwin urges policymakers not to chatbots, facial recognition, deep fakes and The twin trends of globotics are succumb to futile attempts at saving the high fidelity of real-time machine translation feeding off each other but also gaining majority of the existing jobs. Instead, he on the go, policymakers and business leaders from the rapid advances in the underlying calls for a societal response by being ready around the world are worried about the Information and Communication to master these skills that would continue future of mankind, more so in terms of what Technology (ICT) best explained through to be in demand (at times, even more so it means for the future of work. four laws named after Moore (computing than today) in the foreseeable future. In the What type of skills in the future would aka data processing power doubles every ultimate analysis, there is a clarion call to be be needed and rewarded? And, pray, what eighteen months), Gilder (network proactive to be future-ready rather than just would become redundant? bandwidth aka data transmission capacity keep waiting for the future to arrive. And, But haven’t we been here earlier at the doubles every six months), Metcalfe (value of he does this with finesse through a series of time of the first, second and third industrial a network grows with more people or nodes scenarios and synthesis of multiple studies revolutions? —and if it is really different joining the network, even as the cost of on the subject. this time, how and why? How are the digital joining falls) and Vairan (digital components The book is well structured and flows technologies impacting society? Last but are free while digital products are highly well and the roller coaster ride invites the not the least, how should humanity prepare valuable). reader to numerous useful, and appreciably itself for the evolving future that is both Baldwin avers that every industrial simplified, charts and tables to cull out some ‘inhumanly fast’ and ‘unbelievably unfair’? revolution goes through four phases: fascinating trends. In addition, the prose at Richard Baldwin, a well-known Transformation, Upheaval, Backlash and times mimics poetry, well almost. Sample researcher and Professor of International finally, Resolution. And, just like the earlier these: Economics at the Graduate Institute three industrial revolutions, the ensuing ‘At the end of the 1970s, the docks of International and Developmental globotics revolution is no exception to this were shuttered. The area was left to Economics in Geneva, delves into these phenomenon. weeds, wildlife and winos.’ profound questions in this fascinating While we are currently going through ‘Thin edge of wedge’. book that analyses the issues, challenges the upheaval and backlash around globotics and opportunities at the interface of and await the eventual resolution, Baldwin Chapter and section headings are also technological development, role of human urges humankind to take cognizance of the inviting in nature, as can be seen in ‘Helping skills and workers within the respective implications and be proactive in preparing Brains, Replacing Brawns’ and ‘New political economy of the day and place. itself to soften the blow. Backlash, New Shelterism’. 16 The Book Review / December 2019 worldview or a rather limited exposure to What the Brave New Baldwin avers that every ground realities in much of the developing “ industrial revolution goes world, the result is the same in as much that World Will Mean the book presents both the challenges and through four phases: opportunities essentially from the viewpoints Mala Bhargava Transformation, Upheaval, of developed countries. While it goes to great lengths in identifying challenges for THE FOURTH AGE: SMART ROBOTS, CONSCIOUS Backlash and finally, the aging and rich economies in the West as COMPUTERS, AND THE FUTURE OF HUMANITY Resolution. And, just like well as in Japan, there’s not much analysis By Byron Reese of the potential demographic dividend for Emily Bestler Books, 2018, pp. 336, R599.00 the earlier three industrial countries like India. Or for that matter, what revolutions, the ensuing are the pitfalls they should avoid even as they ore than at any globotics revolution have their own ambitions and aspersions in time before in the imminent future? Africa is mentioned history, we are is no exception to this M just once, that too just in passing. questioning the impact phenomenon. Secondly, futurologist Alvin Toffler of technology on our (author of the trilogy Future Shock, The lives, society, and even Third Wave and Powershift) as well as Nobel human existence itself. Whether ‘globotics’” would become as Laureate Paul Krugman, Baldwin’s doctoral Technology is changing popular as ‘Future Shock’, ‘The Tipping guide and co-author of several books, are life as we know it at such Point’, and ‘The Black Swan’ or for that conspicuous by their absence amidst scores a breakneck speed that it leaves us reeling matter ‘Bottom of the Pyramid’, the book of numerous citations from political leaders, from the disruption and need to understand is admittedly replete with some interesting, scientists, technologists, futurologists, what each new advancement will mean for and often intriguing, quotes such as: consultants and of course, economists. our future: there is a surfeit of predictions ‘The radical mismatch between the speed Thirdly, the role of ethical considerations but of course no one knows for certain. In of job displacement and the speed of job in the realm of AI has been barely The Fourth Age: Smart Robots, Conscious replacement is the real problem.’ mentioned except while analysing the ‘black Computers, and the Future of Humanity, ‘[R]evolutions are never just one thing.’ Byron Reese takes us back in time to put box problem’ even as this issue has been ‘[P]rogress is a process, not an event.’ technology in perspective as we know it gaining a lot of attention as can be seen ‘Technology eliminated many jobs but few today. by organizations like OECD and IEEE as occupations.’ Don’t let the double-barrel title of this well as countries like Singapore, Denmark, ‘[G]lobalization is always a push-pull pair.’ book deceive you into thinking that this ‘Infinity is, after all, a concept not a Sweden and India. is another technical deep-dive into today’s number.’ Overall, this book depicts the spectrum emerging technologies. It is first of all ‘[C]communism only survived by becoming of issues emerging from the complex extremely entertaining, and second of all more like capitalism while capitalism and rapid interactions of technological meant for everyone, not necessarily in that survived only by become [sic] more like innovations, political economy and the order. What the author does is to travel back communism.’ innate human nature in a highly fragile and forth in time to deconstruct the core “Globots will do what they can do. We’ll do crucible of humanity. The last paragraph of beliefs that undergird the various views on the work that globots can’t do.’ the book sums it all up quite well (and, it’s robots, jobs, AI, and consciousness. The ‘Growth mean(s) change and change no spoiler alert!): ‘[I]t is critical to realize book is a guide to the thorny issues that mean(s) pain.’ that the pace of progress is not set by some undergird the opinions and precautions ‘Change is difficult, when it comes fast and abstract law of nature. We can control the that experts so passionately and confidently seems unfair.’ speed of disruption; we have the tools. It’s avow will ‘make the world a better place’. There have been no claims made that the our choice.’ Baldwin sees the resolution of With stories and examples from history, manuscript was successfully reviewed by an the ensuing challenges in a brighter future as research and just everyday life, this book AI editor. Apart from other proof errors, a more humane, more urbane and more local makes you laugh out loud at the wit it is competent AI system also would have hinted where humans leverage their interpersonal generously sprinkled with throughout. You that Narendra Modi was yet to become and creative skills along with the will find yourself wanting to mark passages the Prime Minister of India when his technological innovations that are driven by and sentences for discussion with others. holographic images were used in the 2014 data, algorithms and Artificial Intelligence. The goal of this book is to help the reader election campaign. In fact, he dubs AI ‘Almost Intelligent’. understand his own beliefs and from then on The academic brilliance of Baldwin Even as it is not clearly laid out how understand the claims of technologists. It is a shines through the book and he does draw we’d land up in this bright future, the brisk walk through 100,000 years of human upon his Ivy League education as well as vision is indeed captivating, enticing and history, discussing big questions along the way, and exploring the future to come. distinguished research career that included full of potential. The million, trillion-dollar The questions the book grapples with a brief yet important role in the US question is: Are we willing to embrace and aren’t about transistors, neurons and Administration. However, three aspects in realize it? particular are rather disappointing in this algorithms. They are about the nature of otherwise fascinating book. Firstly, whether Deepak Maheshwari heads Government Affairs reality, humanity, and the mind. According it is due to either a bias in the author’s in India, Symantec. to Reese, confusion happens when we The Book Review / December 2019 17 General Artificial Intelligence, The Inherent “ where a computer system Unpredictability of is versatile and adaptable, Algorithms mimicking humans, doesn’t exist. ‘They (computers) simply Manoj Kumar Jena

do what they have been A HUMAN’S GUIDE TO MACHINE INTELLIGENCE: programmed to do. The words HOW ALGORITHMS ARE SHAPING OUR LIVES AND HOW WE CAN STAY IN CONTROL they output mean nothing to By Kartik Hosanagar Viking, 2019, pp. 272, $27.00/ R1919.00 them...

they think nothing,” they are as dead as fried artik Hosanagar’s chicken,’ writes Reese. book A Human The possibility of coming up with this KGuide to Machine Intelligence explores an sort of AI however, is what frightens human important dimension beings, as it can eventually outsmart them begin with ‘What jobs will robots take from of technology in recent and even find them irrelevant. At this humans?’ instead of ‘What are humans?’ He times. Hosanagar is a point, there is no knowing whether humans believes that until we answer that second Professor of Technology will actually be able to create General AI. question, we cannot meaningfully address and Digital Business Contrary to what people think, Narrow AI the first. Studies who critically engages to fathom the This is a five-part book, exploring five cannot just grow to become General AI. rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI) based on ages, the fifth being the one to come. Reese Narrow AI has limitless applications but algorithms. writes in short pithy chapters focusing because the understanding of its difference The book is shaped in the background of on boiling various topics down to basic from General AI is so poor, it fear-paralyses two chatbots Xaiolce and Tay. Xiaolce is a questions and several possible answers to people into not wanting to use it and chat bot created in the avatar of an eighteen- have the reader re-examining long-held suggesting we switch off everything. Reese year-old girl by Microsoft Company to beliefs. In the first part, Reese systematically also explores robotics and automation and entertain people with stories, jokes and and quickly goes through human history, to questions on whether it is true that 47% of casual conversation that was launched in find important developments—such as the all human jobs are going to disappear very China in 2014. She was a cute personality discovery of fire—and shows us how we have soon. and attracted 40 million friends on WeChat always demonized technology from the start Although the author claims he does not and Weibo. After the success of Xaiolce, and right through to the present times in really write this book to tell us what he Microsoft launched Tay in USA in 2016, which we have prominent people in the field believes or what his opinion is, in the end, and suddenly within twenty-four hours of technology all believing different things. Byron Reese is an unapologetic optimist. He it had close to 100,000 interactions with Reese devotes a good chunk of this believes that the earth is a pretty good place other users. Its tweet, announcing ‘Hello book to exploring AI, which he believes is a to be, ignoring the horrific impact of climate World’ soon turned into extremely racist, difficult term to truly define, having two big change in his predictions. He believes that fascist and sexist tweets. The algorithm that problems—the word artificial and the word technology will actually help humanity rid controlled the bot did something that no intelligence. What we know of as AI today itself of poverty, hunger, ignorance and war one in its programming team expected it to is actually ‘Narrow AI’ designed to address rather than be the catalyst for the doom do—it took on a life of its own. Microsoft a specific task. For example, the spam filter that many envisage for the planet. Unlike suddenly shut down the project website. in your Inbox, which looks for specific other futurists, Reese thinks technology will Now, the question is, how could two similar terms and sets aside the mail in a different actually bring about a golden age of sorts. algorithms designed by the same company category, is a simple use case of Narrow Already technology has increased our life behave so differently––inspiring love and AI. A neural network that sifts through expectancy, enhanced standard of living, affection in the case of Xaiolce, and hostile thousands of images to compare with and it multiplies what people can do, so it is prejudice in the case of Tay? one image and then tells us how close the baffling that we look at technology through a In this context, Hosanagar’s concern is picture is to a particular medical diagnosis negative narrative that shows a bleak future. to comprehend how Artificial Intelligence too is a use of Narrow AI. Even the more Quoting Steve Wozniak the author writes, represented a certain kind of opportunity for sophisticated AI uses we see today actually ‘All of a sudden, we’ve lost a lot of control. human progress and also unpredictability fall into this category. General Artificial We can’t turn off our Internet; we can’t turn and threat. And hence, ‘What steps should Intelligence, where a computer system is off our smartphones; we can’t turn off our be taken by the end users?’ Therefore, this versatile and adaptable, mimicking humans, computers. You used to ask a smart person book addresses three questions. Firstly, doesn’t exist. ‘They (computers) simply do what causes algorithms to behave so a question. Now whom do you ask? It starts what they have been programmed to do. The unpredictably, in biased and potentially with g-o, and it’s not God.’ words they output mean nothing to them. harmful ways? Secondly, if algorithms can They have no idea if they are talking about Mala Bhargava is a veteran technology journalist be irrational and unpredictable, how do we coffee beans or cholera. They know nothing, writing on gadgets and digital living since 1995. decide when to use them? Thirdly, how do 18 The Book Review / December 2019 Hosanagar’s concern is to uses rules to determine which posts to show to the users and in which order. He “ comprehend how Artificial states, let people look inside the black box Intelligence represented a of algorithm, understand the thinking that is in play, which may pacify their mistrust, certain kind of opportunity hostility and fear. He also questions whether for human progress and also transparency is the major factor in fostering mistrust upon algorithms and suggests unpredictability and threat. ‘An Algorithmic Bill of Rights’ to limit algorithm’s powers and define the ways in ” which it can be held accountable. we as individuals, who use algorithms in our The author argues that the rise of AI personal or professional lives as a society, involves computers to do all the things shape the narrative of how algorithms impact that typically require human intelligence, us? which includes reasoning, understanding As Hosanagar admits, he is a firm believer language, navigating the visual world and in the immense potential of algorithmic manipulating objects. As modern algorithms decision-making and also trying to see how have incorporated more AI and machine algorithms can at times be surprisingly learning, their capabilities and their unpredictable, especially AI that enables footprints have expanded. They now touch autonomous decision-making. our lives everyday, from how we choose The book is divided into three parts products to purchase and movies to watch with ten chapters. Part one, ‘The Rogue (Netflix’s recommendations) to whom we Code’, which has two chapters, ‘Free Will Internet meant relatively easy access to large date or marry. in an Algorithmic World’ and ‘The Law of datasets that could be used to train machine Algorithms undoubtedly make our Unanticipated Consequences’. This part learning algorithms. It also highlights lives easier. At the same time they are also explores how much of our lives are shaped that as machines become more intelligent adversely affecting us in ways that are by the decisions we make online, whether and dynamic, they also become more beyond our control. They are constantly through searches on Google, connecting unpredictable. This suggests a fundamental changing through the data used to train with friends on Facebook, or shopping on conundrum in algorithm design. You can them, which is invariably having an impact Amazon. Algorithms exert a significant either create intelligent algorithm in highly on our individual choices, daily lives and on influence on precisely what and how much curated environments or expose them to the society. Kartik sums up that despite all we consume, whether it is consumer product messy real-world data to create resilient, but the concerns, modern AI- based algorithm is in Amazon, movies on Netflix or posts also unpredictable algorithms. Kartik calls here to stay. and articles on Facebook. The algorithms this predictability-resilience paradox. are not just selecting the media we see ‘The Psychology of Algorithms’, Manoj Kumar Jena is Associate Professor at the on social networks, but are also silently Center for the Study of Social Systems, School of interestingly captures the analysis of nature determining the network itself to keep Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New and nurture dialogue. Hosanagar argues that track of who we allow into our personal Delhi. the twin forces of nature and nurture also and professional lives. It also addresses the help to explain the behaviour of algorithms. issue of unanticipated consequences, such He further states that the social media echo Book News Book News as Google’s Autocomplete Keyword tool, to chamber (all unintended consequences stress on the point that most of us take the That Will Never ‘Autocomplete’ algorithm for granted and of algorithmic decisions) is a result of a Work: The Birth that we are hardly conscious of the feature complex cocktail of nature and nurture of of Netflix and the when we use Google. algorithms, and the manner in which people Amazing Life of Part two on ‘Algorithmic Thinking’ interact with them, while data, algorithm an Idea by Marc has four chapters. It covers ‘Omelet and people play a significant role in Randolph, Co- Recipes for Computer: How Algorithms determining the outcomes of the algorithmic Founder and First are Programmed’; ‘Algorithms Become systems. CEO of Netflix, is Intelligent: A Brief History of Artificial Part Three, ‘Taming the Code’, has the inside story of Intelligence’; ‘Machine Learning and the four chapters: ‘In Algorithms We Trust’; an iconic company. Predictability-Resilience Paradox’; ‘The ‘Which is to be Master: Algorithm or User’; Full of counter- Psychology of Algorithms’. It focuses on ‘Inside Block Box’; and ‘An Algorithmic intuitive concepts the inner workings of algorithms and how Bill of Rights’. Part three focuses on the and written in they come up with those often quirky and idea of trust and destruct. Kartik argues binge-worthy prose, it answers some of our sometimes brilliant recommendations, how the newsfeed experience in Facebook most fundamental questions about taking and how simple design choices can have itself was emotionally inconsistent; it did that leap of faith in business or in life: unintended results. It also highlights that not reflect genuine social interaction with How do you begin? How do you weather disappointment and failure? How do you one way to create digital neighbourhoods a friend. Instead, the experience was more is by organizing webpages by category. It like watching a movie in which lots of deal with success? What even is success? also initiates discussion on historiography dreams had been packed into the available Endeavour, South Asia edition Hachette, of Artificial Intelligence. The advent of the time. Facebook newsfeed algorithm already 2019, pp. 219, R699.00 The Book Review / December 2019 19 privacy & surveillance

Illustration: Designed by Sharada Kerkar, Digital Empowerment Foundation

20 The Book Review / December 2019 Effects of Digital and Kashmir—the only Muslim majority area—is a case in point. Another socially India combustive issue simmering is the National Registry of Citizens (NRC) being prepared Pankaj Pachauri in the North Eastern States of the country, which has led to sectarian tensions, and THE POLITICS OF DIGITAL INDIA: BETWEEN LOCAL controversial detentions of citizens. COMPULSIONS AND TRANSNATIONAL PRESSURES The author raises a red flag here about By Pradip Ninan Thomas India’s weak privacy laws, which help the Oxford University Press, 2019, pp. 248, R883.00 governments and organizations close to the political leadership in power to misuse mass data. ny sincere Another major issue raised by the book is academic work about the future of India’s agriculture. With on India’s digital A operational necessity. Some of them big data and artificial intelligence available, eco-system faces two have achieved a superstar status among agricultural landscape and crop patterns can major risks: first, the now be digitized and global grain, fruit and digital landscape changes Indian youth and are patronized by the top Indian leadership publicly. Thomas vegetable production anticipated turning faster than you can India’s agrarian economy into a giant lab. deploy your research forcefully highlights the threats of Indian reliance on US companies while developing The book provides a rare peep into the seedy tools, and secondly, business of seed farming and the global your observations and nation-wide governance architecture for a population, which is complex, vast and push towards genetically modified crops by conclusions are outdated by the time your multinationals. This can destabilize Indian hard work hits the book stores. varied. He illustrates how the Indian political leadership—brazenly supported by agriculture practices, which sustain nearly As an economic slowdown adversely two-thirds of the population. Agriculture impacts India’s rural economy, tele-density government agencies like the NITI Aayog in the garb of advancing economic reforms—is in India is more than a means of livelihood; in the villages is already showing signs of it is a way of life and a complex mosaic of receding. This is the big ‘bottom of the pushing the digital agenda down the throat of a country where 60% people are still caste-based system still thriving on political pyramid’, which spawned many business patronage. Any sudden disruption here dreams, and plans of multinationals and dependent on agricultural economy and more than 40% are disconnected. Worse, can lead to a violent social backlash and Indian companies alike. migration of large sections of communities, In addition, stung by international 60% rural women still do not have access to any connectivity. which can be disastrous. But in the name of reaction to its authoritarian clamp down on modernization and agricultural reforms, the communications in the State of Jammu and In theory, it may sound like a scholarly exercise in studying digital macroeconomics, government is ignoring early smoke signals Kashmir, the Central Government has told of looming distress in the hinterland. the Supreme Court that the social media but in practice, it has already begun to show disastrous consequences. Aaadhaar The book provides what we need most is a ‘possible threat to democratic polity’, in India today—A2K. Access to knowledge for example has now been linked to many warning the American tech behemoths who about the geopolitics of digitization; its government subsidies—from fertilizer are the largest players in the Indian digital connections to financial technology firms; distribution to bank accounts—as a result and social media based economy. their relations to international internet only those can benefit who are connected. So both the ‘Digital’ and ‘Politics’ governance; the shift in global order and its In the urban scenario, the government have changed since Pradip Ninan Thomas impact on geographies and societies—are all has begun to extend facilities on an undertook the research work and wrote subjects being discussed at global fora. The ‘Application Based Infrastructure’, so if you The Politics of Digital India: Between Local popular media is only skimming the surface are not connected you may not be able to Compulsions and Transnational Pressures. of these subjects within its limited remit use the government launched apps—from But the author adroitly avoids the two risks of commercial viability. Its focus is mainly police helplines to student scholarships. mentioned above due to his wide canvas and financial successes rather than the long-term This is a classic example of punishing the precision of his thought process. The book is ramifications of the effects of Digital India. dispossessed. like a ride where you get a good view of the In the book, Pradip Ninan Thomas The chapter on ‘The Expansion of milestones and where the road is headed. ignites several theories, which can be starting Politics of Control’ is a warning on how India is the largest digital market by points to further research and reportage. sectarian politics can dictate and destabilize volume in the world as the Chinese digital The Politics of Digital India needs a follow democratic institutions in the world’s largest market was developed, and lives, in a up in several directions to disseminate more democracy. The author cautions that the walled garden. As the global digital market and better understanding on these critical Hindu Right-Wing groups like the Bajrang is dominated by the US based companies, areas. The debates and discussions on the dal and Vishwa Hindu Parishad are pushing India’s government and private digital political economy of the future of Indian their religious agenda on governance tools properties are using American technological state described as ‘polymorphous’ within the like the bureaucracy and the judiciary. Since infrastructure and are vulnerable to misuse book can determine the future of the second these organizations now have sympathizers of the data stored in US servers. Most of largest population on the planet. these companies have now deployed Indian among the political leadership, they can engineers at the top of their decision-making use the data collected by the government Pankaj Pachauri is an Indian TV anchor and processes both in the US and in India as an from the citizens for partisan ends. The journalist. He is the founder and editor-in-chief of clampdown on communications in Jammu Gonews, India’s first app based TV News channel. The Book Review / December 2019 21 A Necessary Voice in the Face of a Juggernaut

Ajit Phadnis

DISSENT ON AADHAAR: BIG DATA MEETS BIG BROTHER Edited by Reetika Khera Orient BlackSwan, 2018, pp. 288, R475.00

hese are politically charged times and Teven in polarized scenarios such as this, there are few issues that into a collective expression of dissent. have stimulated more I must confess that I am not an expert on polarized conversations the subject of ‘identification’ projects. As a than the Unique Identity result, I will restrict my review to analysing (UID) project, better the arguments in the book primarily from known by the epithet of the standpoints of logical coherence and Aadhaar. On the one side is a seasoned army demonstrated evidence. I first present of technocrats led by Nandan Nilekani, a the areas of agreement and then go on to doyen of the IT industry, and on the other highlight my differences with the authors. side, is an equally revered constellation of First, I agree with the concern raised in social scientists, legal experts and policy the book that an aggressive push towards thinkers. At some levels, the battle of mandating Aadhaar for all social schemes Aadhaar represents a major site where inter- has led to some exclusion. No technology disciplinary intellectual differences between is error free and the process of realizing technology and the social sciences are being identification through biometric methods continually negotiated––albeit with a new may, by chance or at times even by sense of urgency amidst the explosion in power and pervasiveness of technology. This design, exclude some people, who would intellectual exchange is, of course, mired have otherwise been eligible for benefits. by claims that self-interested individuals The moot question, then, is what is the or organizations are engaged in driving or alternate recourse available for people that stalling the project, which offers another are excluded? As Jean Dreze and Anumeha layer of arguments and counterarguments. Yadav highlight, the government has been The multi-layered nature of argumentation largely silent on this issue. reveals the immense complexity of the Second, I agree that Aadhaar could open discourse around Aadhaar. up possibilities for state actors to harvest The book under review is a collection private information from citizens. The of essays by many intellectual luminaries arguments presented in the book suggest on the subject. It is, as the title suggests, an that the regulatory safeguards against unrestrained critique of the concept and this prospect are not adequate. While execution of Aadhaar, and the overarching the Supreme Court’s 2017 judgement voice reflected in the essays is that of dissent. gives some legal anchorage for a plausible Of course the dissent itself has different rebuttal of such possibilities, as Gautam shades; some authors recognize that the Bhatia points out, this guarantee may be project has given some benefit but raise more fragile than is usually regarded. One alarm over its real and hypothetical threats. suggestion for addressing this is to take a Others are more fervent in dissent as they leaf from the privacy protections embedded perceive that Aadhaar will bring us closer to in the US Social Security programmes as an Orwellian world of surveillance (notice detailed in Srujana Beg’s essay. Another idea the inclusion of ‘Big Brother’ in the title). is to implement a graded authentication However, amidst the varied gesticulations, mechanism, as proposed by Gus Hosein what is striking about the book, which I feel and Edgar Whitley, which limits the use of makes it an invaluable contribution, is the biometric authentication to functions that range of interdisciplinary perspectives (from have higher risks. More routine transactions law to policy to engineering) that coalesce such as marking attendance in schools could 22 The Book Review / December 2019 use lower order authentication protocols, Tragic Rerun of which would also limit the potential for recording of day-to-day transactions. the Industrial Third, I agree that the expanding scope of the programme needs to be carefully Revolution considered. MS Sriram’s essay traces the successive instances of scope creep that has Ravi Venkatesan percolated into the project. What started as a simple identity verification database has THE TECHNOLOGY TRAP: CAPITAL, LABOR AND POWER IN THE AGE OF AUTOMATION now turned into an anchor for linking of By Carl Benedikt Frey disparate databases. Which way it is likely Princeton University Press, 2019, pp. 480, $29.95 to go next is anybody’s guess, but further attempts to integrate more databases need to be made with careful consideration. e are now However, there are other arguments that well into do not quite convince me. First, the repeated Wthe ‘Fourth countries like India as Britain brutally assertions in some of the essays that Aadhaar Industrial Revolution’ colonized them. If these are factored in, the has led to virtually no efficiency increments which is bringing arithmetic is even more skewed.) is not, in my view, backed by substantive astonishing advances in Early factories were horrible, dangerous, evidence. Of course it is likely that the real many fields—information places to work in. Life expectancy in benefits of Aadhaar are lower than the claims technology, life-sciences, Manchester in 1850 was 32 years, well made by government data and politicians, materials, intelligent below the national average of 41 years. Men but I believe that to discredit all claims of machines and a fusion of machines, were on average shorter in 1850 than they benefit based on the argument that these information and biological systems. With were in 1760. This resulted in a backlash, gene editing, we now even have the ability claims seem exaggerated is to take the ‘the Luddite movement’, as workers to modify or even engineer new life forms. critique a little too far. mutinied and smashed machines between Whether all these possibilities will lead to The second point of divergence relates 1811 and1816. One reason that Britain empowerment and emancipation of many to the argument that if Aadhaar turns into pulled ahead of the rest of Europe is that more people or to more exploitation and a data harvesting project, it will necessarily it was more brutal in suppressing dissent. inequality is one of the central questions lead to curtailing of political dissent. Yes, In 1769 legislation was passed making the that face humanity. To answer this, Carl as more private information gets integrated destruction of machinery punishable by Frey, who directs the Future of Work within the government repository, it will death. In 1812 and 1813 more than 30 Programme at the Oxford Martin School, give governing politicians an upper hand Luddites were hung. Many other countries turns to history, specifically to the preceding over critics and opponents. However, for were slower in embracing labour-replacing this information advantage to translate into industrial revolutions. machines because of their disruptive force. an active instrument of repression would The book serves as an important In these countries including France and need other pieces to fall in place, such as reminder that while technological change Germany, medieval guilds successfully a subservient judiciary, complete absence may benefit many over the long run, ‘short resisted technologies that they perceived of data usage regulation and a public run’ adjustment costs can represent a as threatening their skills and wages. This acceptance for authoritarian methods. An lifetime for the majority of workers. The first is why Britain became so economically information harvesting Aadhaar may prove Industrial Revolution transformed the world dominant. to be one concrete step but is not necessarily by the mechanization of manufacturing and The central concern that runs through a natural route to an authoritarian incursion. agriculture. This resulted in an extraordinary The Technology Trap is that, unless we That said, I generally agree with the surge of wealth and living standards in are very careful, our latest technological authors that ex-ante safeguards, like those Britain, Western Europe and America. revolution may well turn out to be a tragic I mentioned earlier, are likely to be more However, very few of those who lived rerun of the Industrial Revolution. AI in effective than ex-post ones. through this massive economic upheaval particular is likely to result in a productivity In summary, the book presents a rigorous were beneficiaries. The machine-owning surge, just as we saw in the Industrial multidisciplinary critique of the Aadhaar industrialists grew, ‘rich on the misery of the Revolution. But the risk that the gains will project. Some of the cautions raised in mass of wage earners’. The introduction of be unequally distributed and will take a long the chapters are warranted and need to water frames, carding machines and spinning time to benefit all is very high. The short run be carefully examined. However, it is also Jennies eradicated many jobs, sucked child- can be a lifetime for some, with potentially necessary that the expression of caution does labour into the workforce and suppressed dire social and political consequences. not slide into indiscriminate criticism of the wages. Handloom weavers, once known as labour’s aristocrats, became the tragic losers. Frey argues that the reason we downplay project, even in areas where it may be giving ‘Three generations of working Englishmen the human cost of the First Industrial benefit. The government needs to be more were made worse off as technological Revolution is because of a very different and careful about where it wants to take Aadhaar, creativity was allowed to thrive. The full much happier experience of automation and intellectuals need to be ever so watchful. benefits of the Industrial Revolution experienced in 20th-century America (the Ajit Phadnis is a Faculty with the Humanities took more than a century to be realised.’ second and third industrial revolutions.) and Social Science Area of the Indian Institute of (Frey fails to account for the millions of The most significant difference between the Management, Indore. weavers and artisans thrown out of work in two eras was that technology was primarily The Book Review / December 2019 23 ‘labour-enabling’ during the American rarely been smaller.’ ‘The great reversal’ has Citizen and Subject century, whereas it had been mostly ‘labour- seen the percentage of men aged between replacing’ in earlier centuries. It is true that 25 and 54 who go to work in the morning some jobs, such as lamplighters and elevator plummet since the new millennium while Aasim Khan operators, were eliminated altogether. But opportunities for high school graduates electricity and the internal combustion (those without a university degree) have PERMANENT RECORD By Edward Snowden engine, the two main technologies of the diminished. Macmillan, 2019, pp. 352, R1476.00 20th century, helped improve material However, the book doesn’t adequately wellbeing for the majority of the working explore the reasons for the reversal. Why people. The first three-quarters of the 20th are we now looking at a tendency towards n the contemporary century are seen as the ‘greatest levelling labour-replacing technologies when we had world, information of all time’. Agricultural productivity a proliferation of labour-enabling ones for technology can nearly a century? The author’s premise is I was transformed by machinery freeing be argued to be the millions of workers from the land. The simplistic—whether workers lose their job major source of power mechanization of the household liberated to robots ultimately depends on ‘the societal and privilege. The millions of women from time-consuming distribution of political power’. What would weaponization of domestic chores and enabled them to have made it more robust is an explanation information in the 21st enter the formal workforce and increase of the political economy of inequality since century is a remarkable household incomes. The introduction of the 1980s—there is very little mention of achievement given the short span within running water, electricity, refrigerators and Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan which the change has occurred, and with washing machines cut the workweek of the and strict anti-union legislation, corporate it state power seems to be growing in leaps housewife by a massive 42 hours between governance and declining rates of income and bounds. Unlike the industrial age, 1900 and 1966. Technology had the added and corporate taxation. Also, the perverse however, no equivalent change is visible benefit of making work less hazardous and idea that firms are built to single-mindedly in the structure of society and words like physically demanding. It also led to better generate returns for shareholders which ‘disruption’ do not begin to capture the paying jobs. Between 1870 and 1980 hourly results in a vast imbalance of power between extent to which this change is contributing pay kept track with labour productivity. capital and labour. These factors point to to the capacity of the state in enhancing Higher unionization resulted in distribution why workers are not benefiting from an age control over the societies it governs. Recent of wealth and low inequality. The expansion of automation. attempts such as Shoshana Zuboff’s work on of secondary education enabled workers to The second weakness is that The surveillance capitalism, have tried to grapple perform higher value added jobs. One of the Technology Trap focuses on an Anglo- with it but these still seem inadequate to great achievements of the 20th century was American world. It doesn’t cover the offer a countervailing narrative. the creation of a prosperous middle class. perspective from China or India or For long the idea of surveillance society Alarmingly, in recent decades, this Japan where robots are seen as increasing has been used to describe the experience virtuous upwards circle has been thrown into productivity of an ageing population. Frey of advanced capitalism in the West, while reverse, and the middle class is shrinking. shies away from exploring a new form bourgeoisie capitalism is seen to hold sway Rather than globalization or immigration of colonialism this time by dominant on most other people. However, this binary as the primary culprit, Frey points to the technology companies rather than countries. is not useful, and a unified theory of digital computer revolution. ‘The computer What is in store for Africa, which is just power and marginality can help us avoid revolution more closely resembles the beginning a slow rise out of colonialism these binaries, and evaluate the forces experience of the Industrial Revolution,’ and poverty? Does autocratic China have in play. As Edward Snowden’s heartfelt he writes. Of Americans born in 1980 a significant advantage when it comes to autobiography in exile, shows, even within only half are better off than their parents. harnessing AI or gene editing compared to the West there is no clear demarcation The comparable figure for 1940 is 90 per democracies and what could this mean? between the state’s capacity to unleash terror cent. The number of robots in the US Gripping as this book is, it leaves you on the people and its welfare priorities. The increased by 50 per cent between 2008 and disappointed when it comes to potential compact of welfare state that emerged in the solutions. Frey is sceptical about ideas like 2016, each of them replacing about 3.3 post-War era, of which Snowden’s parents, Universal Basic Income and prefers life- jobs. He highlights a correlation between as he reminds us again and again in the long learning accounts, wage insurance those States with the highest robot density book, were the quintessential spokes in the and tax credits. His point on strengthening and those States that unexpectedly swung Weberian ideal state of post-War America. education and human capital is compelling. behind Donald Trump. ‘The trajectories of Written by someone who self-identifies Frey’s most important conclusion is that per capita output and people’s wages look as a Beltway insider, Permanent Record technology is not destiny. Neo-Luddite exceedingly similar. In America, labour provides us with enough clues to figure citizens and voters may yet stymie the rise productivity has grown eight times faster that power in the 21st century is no longer of the robots. ‘In a world where technology than hourly compensation since 1979. based on Weberian rationalism or Marxist creates few jobs and enormous wealth, Even as the American economy has become materialism, but includes, as Timothy the challenge is a distributional one,’ The much more productive, real wages have Mitchell has argued, forms of power that Technology Trap is a reminder that the future been stagnant, and more people are out make the modern state salient as well as of work depends on policy choices. It is well of work; consequently the labour share of elusive. worth reading. income has fallen. Corporate profits have At its heart, Permanent Record is a swept up an ever-greater share of national Ravi Venkatesan is the former Chairman of contemplation of these contradictions and income while the share going to workers has Microsoft India and Bank of Baroda. transformation in American polity. Even for 24 The Book Review / December 2019 the ego which reflects the public persona on individuals and societies. Permanent Record is a and the self, which is more intimate and As Snowden shows us, in the US, the “ contemplation of these inward oriented. First, we meet Edward collusion between the rich and the powerful or Ed, who is a quintessential American is today a direct threat to its democracy. But contradictions and millennial; ‘the boy’ as he calls him, with a are big data economies liable to functioning transformation in American knack for computers and impeccable family like this by default, is it even possible to relations dating back to those who founded think the case could be otherwise? The way polity. Even for a non- the Republic. How this boy ultimately powerful companies vie for government American reader, it is becomes Snowden, the face of world’s largest contracts and in turn are used by the state surveillance expose, is a story he recounts functionaries to exploit data seems intrinsic possible to relate to the in later chapters and underscores his life to the way big technology functions, sentiment that state-led as a member of the American Intelligence unless of course we regulate it. No amount Community (or IC as it is called by the of consumer action can shake off the development in the 21st insiders). Snowden’s rites of passage in the structural powers that accrue to the IT elites. century has been a case of IC are recounted with a sophisticated level of Libertarians, amongst whom one can count self-reflection, and eventually show us that Edward Snowden, don’t seem to care much stillbirth…. the homocontractus is as much a citizen as about collective action or party politics, in a subject, the contradiction between his two fact politics hardly gets a mention in the ” selves providing the drama and plot for the book; if anything, Democratic President a non-American reader, it is possible to relate Obama and his government come across as to the sentiment that state-led development big a villain as any other in history. One also in the 21st century has been a case of wonders about the politics of Snowden’s stillbirth, an idea that promised worldwide immediate family and friends such as the revival of freedom and equality but has journalist Glen Greenwald who supported instead become mired in distrust and disgust him in exposing the surveillance system. with growing inequality and strife. Policy In the real world, this becomes a problem analysts trying to piece together the impact because not everyone gets a chance to be a of information technologies tend to overlook genius coder like our author or has access this basic problem in their optimism about to brilliant international human rights digital ‘disruptions’; their portrayal of lawyers. There is and will always be need for IT as some kind of alien power that will collective action and organized politics to eventually pave the way for a better future bring about meaningful change. This should ignores the extent to which technology has not only mean voting or joining parties, but become embedded in the failures and limits if there are alternatives we don’t hear much of the state’s claim to legitimate public about them in the book. Permanent Record authority. The problem in the analytical core is no manifesto for social or political action, of disruption discourse is that it tends to it is just that, a recorded proof that not all is externalize the impact of technology, when well for democracy today. in reality technology and its unreliability to Aasim Khan is an Assistant Professor at the bring about impersonal rationalization in Department of Social Sciences and Humanities, political decision-making has been intrinsic IIIT-Delhi. to the current crisis. As this occasionally witty book Book News Book News demonstrates, even the most powerful states have become mired in failure to regulate story. Bad Blood: Secrets power and limit corruption. In the American As in any biography worth its value, and Lies in a Silicon variety of surveillance capitalism, corporate this conflict is resolved by showing us Valley Startup by power and state’s authority have become so how ‘the boy’ who became an ideal citizen John Carreyrou is deeply interconnected that one can call it the won, and the subject rebelled even when the full inside story ruling ideology. We gain this insight from the cost meant leaving his country and life of the breathtaking Permanent Record, as it shows the extent to behind, the subject is free only in exile. rise and shocking which contracting and sub-contracting at Besides the moral case Snowden builds collapse of the top of the American security apparatus through this book, we can also place Theranos, the one- has become detached from the promises his personal trajectory within a broader time multibillion- in its Constitution. At its heart, it is a context of technology and the issue of dollar biotech startup founded record of the making and unmaking of growing subjecthood in the digital era. The by Elizabeth homocontractus, a phrase that Snowden uses fundamental question to think about vis- Holmes—now the subject of the HBO to discuss the banality of being within the a-vis digital technologies is not disruption, documentary The Inventor—by the prize- American state security apparatus. but of the variety of ways in which societies winning journalist who first broke the story Like all biographers, this book gives us are being colonized, and the way in which and pursued it to the end. an intimate account of what WH Auden big data and very much like oil, a state once called the two sides of any individual, addicted to data, is creating its own effects Knopf, 2018, pp. 352, R1929.00 The Book Review / December 2019 25 The Idea of Privacy private spaces and thoughts. This was the initial trigger that paved the way for the creation of a legal framework on privacy and Amir Ullah Khan and Atif consent. The author explains the impact of Ahmed jurisprudence of privacy in England and the United States of America to law making in PRIVACY 3.0: UNLOCKING OUR DATA-DRIVEN India. FUTURE The third section 3.0 talks about the need By Rahul Matthan for a new approach to privacy laws now with HarperCollins, 2018, pp. 240, R599.00 digitization rendering the concept of privacy based on consent redundant. The author his seminal book underlines the fact that consent has today begins by pointing become a mere formality and is meaningless Tout that ancient in a digital age when most people downloading various Apps don’t even bother societies did not formally salient points were included in the report to read the laborious terms, conditions and acknowledge the concept submitted by the Sri Krishna Committee permissions they are asked for. The solution of privacy. The idea of and its inputs for the draft data protection therefore is not in repeatedly harping on privacy evolved as human bill. Law making in India has always been a the buyer beware premise, but in regulating civilization progressed and complex and difficult exercise to understand and auditing data collectors. Given the individual rights became and in relating the history of drafting of the asymmetry of information and awareness important. Gradually as privacy bill, the author gives the reader an between digital providers and consumers, time passed and cultures illuminating case study of the same. regulation must focus on the data aggregator grew in complexity, This book is a must read for anyone who has a disproportionately larger control privacy became an integral looking for an insight on a huge ongoing in the ways data can be sliced, aggregated, part of our moral system discussion in the country where privacy used and abused. and legal systems evolved is the focal point of several key legal The most insightful pages in the book to protect such privacy. debates. It will also guide substantial are those where we get to read the author’s This book provides a commercial decisions, notably among data view of government frameworks. Here is fascinating history of privacy law and the processing firms, the consulting sector, an insider who has on one hand worked intrusive role of technology in conflict with and pharmaceutical majors and for all who with the firms that deal with harsh data individual privacy. Matthan at once wears provide financial services. Both the private protection regulations in the European the hat of a historian, an anthropologist and companies and government agencies must Union and on the other has helped in the a philosopher and postulates that privacy is now address the issue of having to balance an idea both created and endangered by the drafting of a privacy bill in the second term the right to privacy with efficiency and advent of technology. of the UPA government. This section gives transparency. The book gives equal space On the Indian Constitution, Rahul the readers a comprehensive overview of to stringent advocates of privacy and those Matthan informs the reader that some of diverse perspectives on privacy, both at the who on the other extreme argue for complete the authors of the Constitution like BR national and the international level. The disclosure. The reader would have wanted Ambedkar clearly favoured a guaranteed book describes how complex and nuanced some more discussion on how the author right to privacy. However, this was voted discussions on privacy have been, as they sees the future roll out. The questions that down by various vocal sceptics who thought navigate several shareholder interests and remain unanswered are whether dominant that privacy as a right would unnecessarily witness territorial battles among all actors firms such as Google, Apple and Facebook shackle law enforcement agencies in a involved. The author talks of how Nandan could continue to fight against regulation newly formed state. BN Rau, an important Nilekani, Chairman of UIDAI, underscored and government oversight on data. The architect of the Indian Constitution viewed the need for protection of privacy and set in book could have also discussed the impact the right as a challenge to the administration motion the wheels to create one of the first of privacy laws on the government and of justice, placing undue burden on set of laws in this regard. its secrecy issues. Some discussion on the prosecuting officers. Starting with these The book goes on to argue that there Right to Information Act and its overlap arguments, the exclusion of the right to is a need to strike a healthy balance with privacy also would have been a great individual freedom has played a major role between privacy and disclosure, secrecy contribution to the debate that is going to in the interpretation of right to privacy in and transparency and individual versus go on for quite some time as we in India Indian jurisprudence. societal imperatives that are critical now grapple with questions about the basic The book is divided into three clear for the growth of the Indian economy. An structure of our Constitution, the manner in sections, Privacy 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0. They added feature of the book is the author’s reflect the phases in the evolution of the account of what happened during the which we will treat the subject of individual idea and the laws on privacy. 1.0 deals drafting of the privacy bill. It sheds light on rights, the growing size of an intrusive with the importance of the rise of private how policymaking gets stalled and indeed government and the ensuing debate on the spaces and individual thought, navigating paralysed. The author also writes about how primacy of the nation over the individual. through the anthropological roots of the often irrelevant turf wars shape the national Amir Ullah Khan teaches Economics at NALSAR concept of privacy, whereas 2.0 discusses agenda. The privacy bill that was drafted in Hyderabad. how the advent of technology in the form of amidst all these bottlenecks sadly never made Atif Ahmed is a budding lawyer studying at the the printing press and the camera invaded it to the Parliament. However, some of its National Law School in Cuttack. 26 The Book Review / December 2019 The Direction of Digital Equality

By Sonia Jorge

n today’s digital world, access is power. also critical. Our research shows that lack of digital skills and know- Internet access opens up a new world of how was a top barrier to access for women. Incorporating digital skills Iinformation and opportunities, and has training into primary and secondary school curricula and offering become such an integral part of our lives more opportunities for women and girls and other under-served that it has been said that to be offline today populations to learn these skills can both go a long way towards is to be silenced. Today, close to half the tackling this issue and empowering more to come online. world remains offline, unable to access the Without efforts to enable opportunities for access and use that information and opportunities that come focus specifically on women and other offline populations, we risk with an Internet connection. Their voices entrenching these inequalities and contributing to a more unbalanced are silenced in the digital world and as a result, their voices are also and unequal world. Making a quality Internet connection more missing from social, political and economic discourse offline. affordable for all must be a top priority. At A4AI, we are working to Connectivity has become so indispensable to modern life that in influence the policy needed to drive Internet costs down to a ‘1 for 2’ 2015, the United Nations set a new global goal as part of the new target, where 1GB of prepaid mobile data is available for 2% or less Sustainable Development Goals: universal, affordable Internet access of average monthly income, and to secure meaningful connectivity, for all by the year 2020. This ambitious goal, together with the goal where everyone has a quality connection enabling meaningful use. to enhance the use of ICT for women’s economic empowerment, As we take these efforts forward, it is also important to consider— underscores the importance of Internet access to global development and address, where possible—the range of cultural and social issues and empowerment, but the reality is that we still have a long way to that are preventing people from accessing and using the Internet. go in order to achieve this goal. In addition to the challenges of affordability and digital skills, As the digital revolution marches forward, with increasing hype women face out-dated gender norms that keep them from using the around all the possibilities and potentials, billions are being left Internet or an ICT device. Worryingly, we are also seeing a growing behind. This digital divide falls along gender and income lines— trend of people being digitally excluded for social and political women and the poor comprise the majority of those offline today. reasons. Increasing numbers of Internet shutdowns across the globe These populations are often already marginalized offline and, as a have contributed to this exclusion. These moves to silence critical result, arguably stand the most to benefit from the opportunities discussion don’t just have a chilling effect on rights to free speech associated with online access; instead, they are now seeing these and expression, they also have serious economic consequences: the offline inequalities replicated online. Brooking Institute has estimated that the Internet shutdown between The World Economic Forum has warned that growing global 2015-16 cost $2.4 billion in economic losses. inequality is one of the major threats facing our world today. While For these reasons and many more, it is critical that our work to Internet access has the power to upend this balance of power, today’s expand access and use of the Internet is grounded in a digital rights digital exclusion is instead reinforcing existing patterns of privilege perspective, and considers all the dimensions of both digital and and discrimination. offline rights. Our failure to address barriers to access and enable connectivity The fight for digital rights must continue—and perhaps becomes for these groups risks not only exacerbating existing inequalities, but even more critical—once people are online. As more and more of our also stunting global economic growth and undermining progress daily lives move online, we each leave a massive data trail in our wake. toward development goals. Women, in particular, feel the impact of Most of us do not know what digital traces we are creating, who have this digital divide. As I mentioned earlier, over half of today’s offline collected them or what they will be used for. Companies rely on this population are women—this means that more than 2 billion women data to personalize services and target ads that will be most relevant globally are not connected, unable to access health, educational, and to users, but this collection of data can also lead to unintended other resources and information available online. Web Foundation consequences when we are profiled in ways that are detrimental to research has found that women in poor, urban areas are up to 50% less likely to be online than men in the same communities and what’s worse is that recent research from the ITU and GSMA shows that the digital gender gap is actually growing wider. The World Economic Forum has warned that The barriers to access faced by women and other marginalized “ growing global inequality is one of the major populations are many and varied. Affordability remains one of the major obstacles to access, particularly for women, who, on an average, threats facing our world today. While Internet earn lower salaries than men. In the developing world, just IGB of mobile data can easily cost upwards of 20%of average income. For access has the power to upend this balance women and others earning lower salaries, the actual cost is much of power, today’s digital exclusion is instead higher. Driving prices down to a level at which access becomes affordable even for these populations will be critical to expand access, reinforcing existing patterns of privilege and bolster the digital economy, and advance global development. discrimination. Improving access to and availability of digital skills training for today’s offline populations and—women and girls in particular—is ” The Book Review / December 2019 27 our interests, or when governments around the world take advantage of our digital trails to extend the state surveillance apparatus to unprecedented levels. We have a right to know what is collected about us and what it will be used for. And we have a right to transparent explanations of how our personal data is processed, sold, and used to make decisions for and about us. All of us—government and public sector policymakers, tech companies and service providers, activists and civil society—must come together to develop policy and regulatory frameworks that protect us online, and which put a fair level of control back into the hands of the people. It is up to us to ensure that the digital revolution becomes a movement that empowers all. Failure to act means leaving billions behind; it means eroding consumer trust—a core foundation upon which the digital economy is built. In turn, this inaction threatens to stunt progress and undermine achievement of the global Sustainable Development Goals. At the Web Foundation and Alliance for Affordable Internet, we are working to tackle this challenge head on. We’re fighting for digital equality: a world where everyone—no matter your gender, no matter your income or your location—can benefit equally from the Internet, and use it to improve their lives. For us, this means working not only to expand affordable and meaningful access to everyone, everywhere, but also to ensure that the Internet remains truly open so that once people come online, they have the opportunity to access and use the information and tools needed to participate fully in civic life. To achieve these goals, we need to turn our knowledge into action. We know the issues, and we have a pretty good idea of what we must do to overcome these barriers to access, to enable power, accountability and opportunity for all. But we must do more. We must go beyond what we’ve done to date, to continue pushing the needle in the direction of digital equality, and to ensure that we continue to invest in long- term efforts that solve these issues and ensure that the impact of the digital revolution is as great and positive as it can be.

Sonia Jorge is an Executive Director with the Alliance for Affordable Internet (A4AI), and Head of Digital Inclusion Programmes at the Web Foundation. 28 The Book Review / December 2019 digital communication

Illustration: Designed by Sharada Kerkar, Digital Empowerment Foundation The Book Review / December 2019 29 Talk Revolution aeons old debate between the N dash and the M dash, and why they are different. Staying with the when comma and when parentheses Seema Chishti debate is a very rewarding experience. One did not expect the book to be anything A WORLD WITHOUT “WHOM”: THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO LANGUAGE IN THE BUZZFEED AGE other than unputdownable, and the author By Emmy J. Favilla has done a good job at holding the reader’s Bloomsbury, USA, 2017, pp. 400, $26.00 attention. The rise of social media and the accompanying feature of conveying anger, he great ‘Talk excitability and mood put added pressure on revolution’ which text. Text or language responded by often Tgripped India and allowing for stronger words, profanities now the world with the mobile being acceptable. And then came the hotly phone in the nineties debated emoji. First considered a bit puerile threatened to destroy or non-serious, it was now a new challenge reading and writing. It was for how we communicated via writing, and assumed that if writing a throwback to times gone by, the revival had defined how our heads were wired when of the line-drawing. It spoke to the human it was invented, the mobile phone would species’ oldest instincts and artwork—in unspool that. But technology is always tough cave drawings—and for Indians who are to anticipate, so with text messages and then familiar with western India, the magnificent the smartphone, suddenly written text was storytelling of Warli art, for instance. right back into our lives. So the challenge for a graphic, clear, The world now accesses news, views, simple kind of communication about very entertainment and intimacy on the phone complicated matters, all changing rapidly understand how to command attention win. and it has made the writing stage return and needing to be communicated at a fast There are good people who get that and evil with a bang. What is critical is that it is not pace made it imperative for language and the people who get that. You can’t whine about the same world as when pen met paper, the convention around usage to evolve quickly. your age. You have to master it.’ medium does define the message. After the Morse-code style of telegraphic Who(m) dare disagree with that? So when the BuzzFeed Copy Chief, and abbreviated conversation, the world Emmy J Favilla, writes a book speculating is moving slowly to a rulebook that Seema Chishti is Deputy Editor, The Indian on what the world would look like without accommodates more than just teens Express. ‘whom’, who will not be interested? The communicating on Snapchat. What the point of the book is to speak of the journey book under review offers, for instance, is a Book News Book News of language in a world she chooses to call the very clear guide on when to use abbreviations BuzzFeed Age. and when not to. Deoxyribose Nucleic Acid Brotopia: Breaking There are many books that look would be a bad idea, but ICMYI in broad Up the Boys’ Club engagingly at the comma, the semicolon, conversations may totally miss the point. of Silicon Valley is the death of the full stop and also language There are many people in the world of a powerful exposé etiquette. But this is not exactly Eats, Shoots communications that today still rue the new by Bloomberg TV and Leaves or about updating the Wren and times and the strain of adapting to new rules journalist Emily Martin. Forget different languages, even and methods. But a short look at the history Chang of how if one were to consider just English, the of literacy or technology will make it amply Silicon Valley got Internet and its immediacy ensures that we clear that technology has almost always led so sexist despite live in times when there is much more to the way. From the invention of the Radio its utopian ideals be said and understood instantly and across to Telegraph to Television, each phase had and how women cultures. One could be instantly speaking to its own times and generations adapted to are finally starting Istanbul and Sao Paolo and New Delhi. whatever worked. Stone tablets did not have to speak out News websites per force have several it good when printing became accessible and and fight back. For women in tech, Silicon pressures on them, which print newspapers newspapers or magazines were the new thing Valley is not a fantasyland where millions of do not. Online pieces are meant to be in town. dollars grow on trees. It’s a ‘Brotopia’, where not only understood instantly or across The Essential Guide to Language in the men hold all the cards and make all the populations but also make an impact and BuzzFeed Age is of course the coolest update rules. Interviews with Facebook COO Sheryl grip you from the very start. A print piece to the Dictionary and a style guide. But as Sandberg, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki, can afford to indulge the writer far beyond you go through this hugely engaging book, and former Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer-- what any online writer can be allowed. There the message it carries fundamentally is on who got their start at Google, where just one is such limited room for the online writer to the importance of being able to say it sharply in five engineers is a woman--reveal just how err, put the reader off, or god forbid, throw and smartly and make oneself heard. hard it is to crack the Silicon Ceiling. Emily in the wrong punctuation mark. To quote the TIME Editor at Large, Chang shows us how to fix this toxic culture The section on ‘Getting Things as Right Anand Giridharadas; ‘We are living in a new to bring down Brotopia, once and for all. as You Can’ has some delightful takes on the communications age in which people who Portfolio, 2018, pp. 320, R699.00 30 The Book Review / December 2019 Transforming Data to explain, evolve, or predict. This is where we are confronted with the disconnect, as a into Wisdom single model is highly unlikely to be able to predict patterns in international trade policy, Sania Farooqui trends in consumer products industry or adaptive responses within the brain. THE MODEL THINKER: WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW Where is the wisdom we have lost in TO MAKE DATA WORK FOR YOU knowledge? By Scott. E. Page – TS Eliot Basic Books, 2018, pp. 398, $32.00 The entire argument in this book is based on how models can transform data into wisdom. What we call data is raw, uncoded he Model Thinker events, experiences and phenomena. is a book about Births, deaths, market transactions, votes, Tmodels. Models music downloads, rainfall, soccer matches are not words, but and speciation events. Data can be long formal mathematical strings of zeros and ones, time stamps and representations that are linkages between pages. Data lack meaning, put together to help us organization or structure, writes Page. understand the world. Information is how we categorize the This book looks at how people can apply collected data. Page explains this by giving a many-model thinking approach to an example of how rain falling on your head understand these complex systems to find is data. Total rainfall for the month of July to bail out the multinational insurance solutions. We live in an era of big data; in Burlington, Vermont and Lake Ontario company, American International Group from our phones, to online shopping, to is information. Thus, making it pretty much (AIG). The Government chose to stabilize our social media pages, data is everywhere. clear that if data is the so-called new oil, we AIG because its failure during the financial It is collected, with or without our consent. are living in a state of abundant information. crisis would have had a devastating impact Our social data, as Scott Page elaborates in Knowledge is what organizes on their financial system and economy. If we his book, is about our economic, social and information, by often taking the form go back to 2008, this bailout did make the political phenomena, which documents only of a model. Economic models of market then Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke angry, moments or intervals in time. It rarely tells competition, sociological models of and the purpose of the bailout was not to the universal truth. Our economic, social networks, geological models of earthquakes, and political worlds are rarely stationary. ecological models of niche information and save AIG but to prop up the entire financial As impressive as the data may be, it is no psychological models of learning are all system. What Scott is pointing out to is that panacea; hence, we need models to make embedded knowledge. These models are able the choices made by the TARP were based sense. to explain and predict. on models. Do models make us smarter? Models vary The challenge is to reach a state where Scott explains how AIG occupied a in their assumptions and their structures. one is able to identify and apply the relevant central position in the network, because it What they do is create multiple artificial knowledge for a complex situation and the sold insurance to other firms. AIG promised worlds for our minds to explore. Models ability to do so is called wisdom. Wisdom to pay other firms if their assets lost value. however, share three common characteristics: requires the many-model thinking approach. If prices fell, then AIG owed those firms they simplify and strip away unnecessary Sometimes it consists of selecting the best money. By implication, if AIG failed, so too details; abstracting from reality; or creating model, sometimes by averaging models, or would other firms connected to AIG. What anew from whole cloth. They formalize by creating dialogue across models, exploring the Government went ahead and did was making precise definitions. By doing the their overlaps and differences, and then to stabilize AIG’s position, and by doing former two, what models help in achieving selecting the one that could work. Wisdom that it was able to prop up the market value is creating tractable spaces within which we is what helps us select the correct knowledge of other firms in the network also. This can work through logic, generate hypothesis, or model. should also explain why the Government let design solutions and fit data. The logic The Model Thinker explores the different Lehman Brothers fail, as it did not occupy a behind the many-model approach is built on types of models, from the embodiment central position in the network. the idea that we achieve wisdom through a approach that stresses realism to the analogy Scott avers, ‘We do know that the multiplicity of lenses, and how we can also approach that tries to capture the essence financial industry did not collapse as a result build these lattices of models to be able to of a process, system or phenomenon to the of Lehman’s failure. We also know that the confront the complexity of challenges. alternative reality approach. It purposely government earned a $23 billion profit on its Page feels that to rely on a single model does not represent or capture reality. loan to AIG. So we can infer that the policy is hubris; it invites disaster. He argues: we These models function as analytic and choices—based on many-model thinking need many models to make sense of complex computational playgrounds in which we are were not a failure.’ systems like politics, economy, international able to explore possibilities. Nothing is less real than realism. Details relations; or the brain exhibits ever-changing An interesting example given in the book are confusing. It is only by selection, by emergent structures and patterns that lie is the $182 billion financial assistance as elimination, by emphasis that we get to the real between the ordered and the random. By part of the ‘Troubled Asset Relief Program meaning of things. definition, complex phenomena are difficult (TARP)’ in 2008, by the Federal Reserve ––Georgia O’Keeffe The Book Review / December 2019 31 ways to be alert and to avoid failures, if not The Model Thinker completely but marginally, this book is a good read. “ explores the different types of models, from the Sania Farooqui is a New Delhi-based journalist and filmmaker. embodiment approach Book News Book News that stresses realism to Mindf*ck: the analogy approach Cambridge that tries to capture the Analytica and the Plot to Break essence of a process, system America by or phenomenon to the Christopher Wylie tells the alternative reality approach. inside story of the data mining ” and psychological While one may wonder how we go manipulation about choosing which model works for us, behind the election of Donald Trump this book breaks it down into examples of and the Brexit referendum, connecting case studies and formulas that were used Facebook, WikiLeaks, Russian intelligence, for that specific many-model thinking and international hackers. Wylie’s decision approach. It may seem we have to study to become a whistleblower prompted the many models to understand and master largest data-crime investigation in history. these complex systems, but the book puts His story is both exposé and dire warning it in simple, non-granular language, and about a sudden problem born of very new reminds the readers that if a particular model and powerful capabilities. approach is not working, then we must put Random House, 2019, South Asia edition it aside. The skills required to excel, as Page Hachette, pp. 288, $ 28.00/R599.00 writes in Chapter three (‘The Science of Many Models’), ‘one-to-many differ from Book News Book News mathematical and analytic talents, many people think of as necessary for being a What’s Your Digital good modeller. The process of one-to-many Business Model?: involves creativity. It is to ask—how many Six Questions to uses can I think of for a random walk?’ Help You Build the The book explains the different ways Next-Generation in which a many-model approach can be Enterprise by understood, through a scientific approach Peter Weill and using the Condorcet jury theorem and Stephanie Woerner the diversity prediction theorem, which provide a powerful makes quantifiable cases for the value of yet straightforward many models in helping us act, predict and framework that explain. The modelling of human actors, has been field- where people are modelled is based on either tested globally rule-based actors or rational actors. How with dozens of senior management teams. we choose to model people depends on the Based on years of study at the MIT Center context and our goals. Are we predicting or for Information Systems Research (CISR), explaining? The challenges that come with the authors find that digitization is moving the many-model approach to humans are companies’ business models on two realistic. Human behaviour occurs within dimensions: from value chains to digital the extremes of zero intelligence and full ecosystems, and from a fuzzy understanding rationality. Page argues, ‘it is therefore of the needs of end customers to a sharper more important to include multiple diverse one. Filled with straightforward self- models.’ assessments, motivating examples, and Page covers broader topics like long sharp financial analyses of where profits are tails, bell curve, linear models, concavity made, this smart book will help you tackle and convexity, models of value and power, the threats, leverage the opportunities, and and network models amongst many others. create winning digital strategies. For those who are looking to understand, Harvard Business Review Press, 2018, strategize and explore the world, to find pp. 256, R3999.00 32 The Book Review / December 2019 The Rise of production, which incorporates journalistic values. Computers have to learn journalistic Computational values if they are to have a greater role in the newsroom, and journalists have to augment Journalism their skill sets to also be able to programme computers effectively for journalistic Sevanti Ninan purposes. How does a data-mining algorithm AUTOMATING THE NEWS: HOW ALGORITHMS ARE detect a story lead in a large dataset? It has REWRITING THE MEDIA to be embedded with a clearly articulated By Nicholas Diakopoulos and mathematically precise notion of Harvard University Press, 2019, pp. 322, R1667.00 newsworthiness. And hacks will have to be able to write computer code to collect, analyse and present data. A data journalist, ocial media occupies who wants to scrape data from online enormous mind records of citizens, has to be able to write Sspace but it is only automated scripts that can crawl multiple creatures that can lend themselves to uses one relatively shallow websites. The book discusses six core data both benign and malign. The author manifestation of human- mining capabilities that news organizations describes how he created a bot for The New computer interaction. can use. York Times, which extracted comments Using Artificial The Panama Papers investigation was on articles and fed them into social media Intelligence in the news computer-aided in a different way. The promotion. industry as well as for Papers comprised 11.6 million leaked Algorithmic predictions of how an article multiple data collection applications in documents concerning offshore companies will perform are used by editors to decide society is going to be the way forward. and the individuals behind them. The how to promote them across platforms How many dimensions are there to using automation involved here was the use or on different social networks. There is automation for journalism? Several unfold in of optical character recognition (OCR) a lot on using metrics here, including the the course of this book. No wonder there is algorithms to convert the documents into choices digital editors make and the multiple an emerging discipline called Computational digital text indexed in databases, which made headlines newsrooms are expected to roll Journalism, which journalism schools in them searchable. Then journalists stepped out for the same story for optimization India will soon have to begin to grapple in to convert this data into information by through audience testing. Bots are used for with. The author is a computer scientist finding connections between companies, the ‘engagement’ and ‘attention capture’, which turned journalism teacher. transfer of money, and the people behind means they are used for driving traffic which News agencies are already using these operations. should bring revenues. automation in the realm of finance and Complex communication and expert Apart from new organizations many sports. Algorithms are used to churn out thinking are still realms where humans sectors use algorithms to generate data under-200-words corporate earning articles have an edge over computers—such as for them—data that they then go on to for the Associated Press, even as corporate interviewing, negotiating, interpreting. base operational decisions on. What the results come in. In the process they free up Where is the bot that can cajole a source into author calls algorithmic decision making is the humans in the newsroom to do longer parting with information? now widely used in the public and private follow up stories on corporate performance, Using automation is also about the sectors for a range of applications from with added value. Sometimes reporters decomposability of journalistic work— credit and insurance risk scoring to welfare use alternative data to add context and separating the elements of what they do and management systems and educational and interpretation to the automated story that figuring out which ones lend themselves teacher rankings. They make consequential has been produced. to animation. The author uses the term ranking, classification, association and One of the points this book makes is that ‘information subsidies’ to describe the cost filtering decisions that affect large numbers automation in the newsroom is actually used saving that computers make possible. Such of people. ‘Algorithms and the reams of data to complement human effort rather than as data mining masses of documents, which driving them, are the new power brokers in substitute it. Having them around changes would be a costly exercise if reporters were to society,’ Diakopoulos says. news production practices. Automation adds be deployed instead. What follows then is that to the extent scale to coverage. It helps you cover more How much real news work can artificial that these machine-made decisions are local soccer matches, more congressional intelligence perform? The chapter on contestable they need to be subjected to races, and more company results on the automated content production describes scrutiny. So you now have, hold your breath, stock market. And it makes the news process how automated text writing works, as also algorithmic accountability reporting— more error free. Robots do not make typos data visualization. What is a challenge journalists who specialize in auditing and and they do not make math errors. for computers in processing, curating or investigating algorithms in order to hold The book discusses hybrid journalism summarizing videos? What algorithms can their decisions to account. It is an offshoot and a hybrid workflow, which creates an do though is synthesize entirely new images, of computational journalism and a new beat. optimal partnership between computers and videos and texts. That is how fake news is One, which deploys reverse engineering, journalists. produced. auditing, sock puppets, crowd sourcing and What the author calls Computational Then of course there is the whole code inspection. Journalism is algorithmic information business of using bots in social media, But to the extent that the algorithm is The Book Review / December 2019 33 inert and performs only when programmed Informing the digitally enabled. by humans, it is the journalists and other We are not new to fake news and designers of algorithmic media who embed Misinformed misinformation in India. We have grown values in their functioning, who will up with it in one form or another. But the eventually be held responsible for contestable Ravi Guria scale and frequency it has acquired today is outcomes of what they do. unprecedented. Technology has amplified The next stage of evolution the author INDIA MISINFORMED: THE TRUE STORY fake news and misinformation beyond envisions is when AI is enabled to gather By Pratik Sinha, Dr Sumaiya Shaikh and Arjun measure. So technology has been blamed information by asking questions. Yes, doing Sidharth vociferously for this menace; but do we reporting! Not easily done, and for now HarperCollins India, 2019, pp. 304, R335.00 blame the car if it meets with an accident, all you have is a system Google launched or the driver? Technology companies in May 2018 to perform secretarial rather should take adequate measures to curb the ast year, a than journalistic functions: ask questions, spread of fake news and misinformation. promotional and process the answers. It is called Duplex However, people using that technology video produced and it helps in making reservations for L also need to take equal responsibility; those in Pakistan for the restaurants and hair salons, etc. who share fake news and misinformation purpose of spreading Whatever machines evolve to do in are sometimes driven by ulterior motives, awareness to the general the future, the enabler will remain better public against rampant and mostly because of lack of awareness and and better hybridization, the pairing of an kidnapping of children understanding. intrepid journalist with the computational from the street, which Pratik Sinha founded Alt News as a non- power of AI. For more on that, read the shows dramatization of a child getting profit initiative dedicated to fact-checking book. picked up from a street by kidnappers on fake news and misinformation originating a motorcycle, was doctored in such a way in India. They have formed a skilled team Sevanti Ninan is a media commentator and author, that has turned the process of debunking and was the founder-editor of the media watch that it looked like a CCTV footage of an website, TheHoot.org. The Hoot is now an archive. actual kidnapping taking place. The street fake news into a robust methodology, and appears to be like any normal street in they are doing so relentlessly. Over the last India with normal Indian children playing couple of years, they have dealt with a slew Book News Book News on the streets. The doctored video was of disinformation, misinformation and mal- Architects Of Intelligence: shared on WhatsApp, and horrified parents, information, across various categories. Their The Truth About AI From concerned for the safety of their children in incredible effort has resulted in priceless The People Building It is India, forwarded the video in large numbers insights and observations, which should a series of in-depth, one- without verification. The viral video led to be documented to holistically enhance to-one interviews where the first incident of mob lynching in Assam, the knowledge and understanding of the The New York Times where people lynched a couple of young men society at large. India Misinformed is one bestselling author, Martin outside Guwahati who had driven out of the such remarkable attempt to share a wealth Ford, uncovers the truth city for some nature exploration, because of experience with the general public. It behind these questions one of them had long hair and looked like reveals the world of fake news, and how it is from some of the brightest minds in the a child kidnapper to the eyes which were impacting us sociologically, psychologically Artificial Intelligence community. not exposed to perceiving cultural diversity. and physiologically. Pratik Sinha puts fake news in Packt Publishing, 2018, pp. 554, $34.99 Unfortunately, this was just the beginning of what has turned out to be one of the perspective. He writes, ‘Certain clear most excruciating social predicaments. patterns of misinformation have emerged. A prominent portion of Right-Wing Book News Book News Many States witnessed mob-lynching incidents after this, such as Rajasthan, propaganda seems to be anchored around The Rise and Fall of the Bihar, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Karnataka, misinformation targeting minorities. Dinosaurs: A New History Telangana and Tamil Nadu. In fact, mob- Distortion of history has also been a of a Lost World by Steve lynching incidents are still taking place in prominent theme. Misinformation is also Brusatte tells the real Uttar Pradesh, especially in semi-urban and being weaponized to target individuals story of how dinosaurs rural areas. People are in a state of panic such as journalists, activists, liberals and rose to dominate the and attacking anyone who looks suspicious, anyone who was critical of the Right-Wing planet. Using the fossil and in this scenario, more often mentally ecosystem. Misinformation peaks during clues that have been disturbed individuals, elderly persons and certain times, such as elections and major gathered using state-of- women are becoming targets. incidents. The most disturbing trend in the the-art technology, Brusatte follows these Fake news and misinformation are rise of fake news is the patronage it receives magnificent creatures from their beginnings challenging the democratic and secular fabric from the political parties and mainstream in the Early Triassic period, through the of Indian society. WhatsApp with over 400 media.’ Jurassic period to their final days in the million users in India alone has been held Misinformation about science, medicine Cretaceous and the legacy that they left responsible for the efficiency attributed to and health is directly threatening people’s behind. It is a timely reminder of what fake news going viral in India. One can only intellectual capability and poses serious risks humans can learn from the magnificent imagine apprehensively, what would happen to their lives. Hence, Alt News has started a creatures who ruled the earth before us. once maximum numbers of people out of science fact-checking section, which looks Picador, 2018, pp. 417, R699.00 the 1.3 billion Indian population become into misinfodemics, which are epidemics 34 The Book Review / December 2019 than anyone else at the moment, which Think Before You addresses the problem in any capacity, and has comprehensively categorized and curated Like the examples of misinformation that have lately sent panic waves amongst people, such Dushyant Arora as the Child Kidnapping video; Amritsar Train Accident Blamed on ‘Train Jihad’ ZUCKED: WAKING UP TO THE FACEBOOK by a Muslin Driver; Rohingya Refugees CATASTROPHE are Eating Flesh of Hindus; Shehla Rashid By Roger McNamee Pocketed the Funds Collected for Kathua HarperCollins, 2019, pp. 352, R894.70 Rape Victim; and more. The foreword of the book is written by Ravish Kumar, the Ramon Magsaysay ove Fast Award winning journalist, who has held & Break simple truth above sensationalism and lies ‘MThings’ in journalism throughout his long career, used to be Facebook’s when his peers were and are succumbing to motto till April 2014; and them for better TRPs. He says, ‘Future of break plenty it certainly any democracy depends on the alertness of did. In 2019, so much its citizens. Please read this book, so that you appears to be broken realize what has been done to you, and what or breaking—social may happen further.’ harmony, democracy, various freedoms and more. There is sufficient evidence to believe arising from health misinformation. ‘Alt Ravi Guria is a filmmaker, scriptwriter, and Head of that Facebook along with other Big Tech News Science’ is using technical skills based Media & Communication in Digital Empowerment Foundation. companies has played a significant role in on years of scientific training, research getting us here. and communication to debunk health and Book News Book News ‘Facebook admits it was used to incite science misinformation. violence in Myanmar’ screams The New Primarily, the book is a collection of Life After Google: York Times headline from November 2018. prominent cases of misinformation that The Fall of Big Data Another report in the same publication have been circulated in the past two years. and the Rise of the documents how false rumours on Facebook Blockchain Economy They are divided into thirteen chapters: led to widespread violence against Muslims. by George Gilder Spreading Communal Discord; Building An excerpt is worth reproducing: ‘A explains why Silicon Brand Modi; Portraying Opposition reconstruction of Sri Lanka’s descent Valley is suffering a Parties as Anti-Hindu; Rahul Gandhi: into violence, based on interviews with nervous breakdown The Favourite for Targeted Propaganda; officials, victims and ordinary users caught and what to expect PM Modi and the BJP Targeted; Other up in online anger, found that Facebook’s as the post-Google Targeted Politicians; False Historical Claims; newsfeed played a central role in nearly age dawns. Silicon Maligning Jawaharlal Nehru; Mainstream every step from rumor to killing. Facebook Valley, long Media; Targeting Individuals; Fake Polls, officials, they say, ignored repeated warnings dominated by a few giants, faces a ‘great Fake Lists, Fake Accounts; Others; Science. unbundling’, which will disperse computer of the potential for violence, resisting The chapters give an excellent idea of the power and commerce and transform the pressure to hire moderators or establish pivots around which sensational production economy and the Internet. emergency points of contact.’ Facebook has of fake news factories revolved. We have however repeatedly claimed that it is just a come across many cases on social media Gateway Editions, 2018, pp. 256, platform and is neither ethically nor legally platforms, WhatsApp and mainstream R2059.00 responsible for what people do on that media, and some may appear new. Every platform. Book News Book News case has been contextualized along with the Is that the truth? process of debunking them adopted by Alt Surveillance Valley: The Enter Zucked: Waking Up to the News. It unravels the cycle of fake news and Secret Military History Facebook Catastrophe, a book written by misinformation as one goes from one case to of the Internet by Yasha Roger McNamee, who was one of the another. Levine traces the secret initial investors in Facebook and was at I personally went into reading the book origins of the Internet least according to him, a ‘mentor’ to Mark hoping it would be more than the cases back to a Pentagon Zuckerberg. The book isn’t the only one on of misinformation, put together. I was counterinsurgency Facebook’s or Big Tech’s role in the crisis expecting a deeper and nuanced study; surveillance project. of polarization and the threat to democracy analysis of fake news and misinformation As Levine shows, that the world has just about begun in India, and how it has impacted the surveillance wasn’t processing. It is however, a crucial one and ecosystem and altered the behaviour of something that suddenly appeared on the not just because it comes from someone who people. Having said that, it is an important Internet; it was woven into the fabric of the was relatively closer to the organization than book because it is the first book in India technology. many others. by experts who understand the issue better Public Affairs , 2018, pp. 384, R1429.00 McNamee gives us a peek into the The Book Review / December 2019 35 The Majoritarian Our minds, our Social Platform “ communities, our democracies seem to be a Mahtab Alam

lab for experiment, and we THE REAL FACE OF FACEBOOK IN INDIA: are the guinea pigs. HOW SOCIAL MEDIA HAVE BECOME A PROPAGANDA WEAPON AND DISSEMINATOR OF MISINFORMATION AND FALSEHOOD ” By Cyril Sam and Paranjoy Guha Thakurta minds of Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg— Authors Upfront, 2019, pp. 164, R345.00 Facebook’s top two, their historical attitudes to the ideas of privacy and the notion of owning responsibility, their responses iven the when confronted with the knowledge that importance Facebook may have been used to influence Gthat social the elections in America. He also seamlessly media platforms and quite readably ties together the story of (especially Facebook how the world and Facebook got us where and WhatsApp) have we are. acquired in our lives, I have read several books based on the book under review similar themes––a trend now known as She did not apologize for running a giant has every reason to grab our attention, and ‘tech-lash’ but no other brings home the psychological experiment on users. Our rightly so. The subject acquires further horror of what the Big Tech is doing to us minds, our communities, our democracies importance because in recent years, social as well as this one does. In a book which seem to be a lab for experiment, and we are media platforms have become a vehicle for is replete with phrases like ‘behavioural the guinea pigs. spreading hate and misinformation across modification’, ‘persuasive tech’ you will There is, as usual, a flicker of hope. India. realize that the worst that Facebook is doing Hope in the form of whistleblowers, much In the introduction, the authors promise isn’t trying to sell you stuff you are talking like McNamee, and in the form of activists to provide us a critical examination of ‘how or writing or googling. Put simply––it is and organizations all over the world, which controlling us. It now has the technology are trying to ensure that tech giants are Facebook and its companion platforms— and the power to control our emotions, held accountable and put an end to this notably WhatsApp—have been complicit whether we are happy or sad, what we will catastrophe. in promoting the interests of India’s ruling believe or not believe, what kind of opinions In the movie, Terminator 2-Judgement regime and its Right-Wing majoritarian will we shut out of our world and which Day, an advanced robot travels back in time social and political agenda.’ The book kind will we bring in, whether or not we will to pull the plug on a company whose actions further claims to have examined ‘how critics hate an entire community, whether or not are going to destroy the world. In real life, of the Modi regime have felt marginalized by we will go out rioting, who we will elect and there are no second chances. So think before the social media platform and its associates.’ who we won’t. you like, and don’t miss this book. Referring to an investigation about Facebook If this feels like fear mongering, consider (Delay, Deny and Deflect: How Facebook’s this chilling excerpt from the book: Dushyant Arora is an advocate at the Supreme ‘In 2014, Facebook published a study Court of India, the founder of Law Tree, and a Leaders Fought Through Crisis) published by columnist. called ‘Experimental Evidence Of Massive- The New York Times in November 2018, the Scale Emotional Contagion Through Social authors argue that, ‘(W)hile contextualizing Networks’, where they manipulated the Book News Book News Facebook’s international activities, our balance of positive and negative messages book focuses on what has happened—and in the News Feeds of nearly seven hundred Smart: The Digital is happening—in India as we complete this Century by Frederic thousand users to measure the influence manuscript.’ Martel drawing of social networks on mood. In its internal However, after reading through the book, on hundreds of report, Facebook claimed the experiment one gets a sense that the authors have largely provided evidence that emotions can spread interviews in about fifty countries, deviated from what the book set out to over its platform. Without getting prior explore. Instead of clearly outlining the exact informed consent or providing any warning, examines the role played by social media platforms and Facebook made people sad just to see if it different ‘Internets’ on five continents. the company and subsidiaries directly related could be done.’ In so doing, he Confronted with a Tsunami of criticism, to them, and providing some concrete reveals that we are Sheryl Sandberg said this—‘This was part evidence of the same, the book ends up moving not only of ongoing research companies do to test merely documenting the cases of how Right into a connected, different products, and that was what it was; Wing forces and political parties, especially globalized world, but also a territorialized it was poorly communicated. And for that the BJP, have used these platforms for their one. communication we apologise. We never ulterior motives and agenda. While the use meant to upset you.’ HarperCollins, 2018, pp. 432, R599.00 of social media by political parties, especially 36 The Book Review / December 2019 Digital Lifeworld The authors promise “ to provide us a critical Nitish Verghese

examination of ‘how FUTURE POLITICS: LIVING TOGETHER IN A WORLD Facebook and its companion TRANSFORMED BY TECH By Jamie Susskind platforms—notably Oxford University Press, 2018, pp. 544, R595.00 WhatsApp—have been complicit in promoting the libaba co-founder Jack Ma and interests of India’s ruling ATesla CEO Elon regime and its Right-Wing Musk shared the World AI Conference stage in majoritarian social and Shanghai earlier this year. political agenda. It was one of the most interesting dialogues ” on the future of humans and the power of Right Wing organizations, is an important digital technologies like AI. At one point in subject, the book fails to fulfill its promise the discussion Elon Musk says, ‘If you think of explaining how social media platforms of technology and technology awareness, if have helped them to do so. It refers to there was a topological map of technology some of the connections (for example, the titled ‘Manipulating Algorithms?’ is heavily awareness, it’s mostly flat with a few short role of Rajesh Jain and Shivnath Thukral) drawn from a detailed reportage published buildings, and then some very tall spires. to show that Facebook and WhatsApp in by The Caravan magazine in January 2019. And unless you’re on that very tall spire, it’s India have indeed helped the BJP and its In chapters thirteen and fourteen of not obvious what the topology is.’ And to associates, but it fails to provide convincing the book, questions sent to Facebook and that Jack Ma responds by saying, ‘Yeah, I details of the same. That is not to say that the replies given by them are produced never worry about the things that I cannot Facebook and WhatsApp have not or might verbatim. In the next chapter, ‘Good solve. I left other people to solve it. If not have helped the Right Wing forces, but Corporate Citizen of India’, one expects nobody can solve it, just let it be. That’s my for a full length book to just relay on these there to be an analysis of the reply, but there life.’ connections is not enough. is none. Instead, the next chapter is focused Should we let ‘other people’ completely For example, consider the chapter on political advertisement through social determine how digital technologies should ‘Facebook Helps Modi’. The authors claim media, the role of the Election Commission evolve? Should we unthinkingly allow that ‘Facebook helped Narendra Modi of India, the Model Code of Conduct and the unleashing of a future we do not develop his online presence to ensure that the role of social media companies. The completely understand? Especially when he has more “followers” on the social media subsequent chapters are also not able to these technologies could have a significant platform than any other political leader on fulfill the promises made in the introduction. impact on our idea of what it means to be the planet.’ But they fail to answer basic In the concluding chapter, discussing free or equal, have power or property, or questions such as, was any special treatment the way forward to fight hate and even what it means for a political system to given to Modi, and if yes, then how, and up misinformation, the authors rightly suggest be democratic. to what extent. It quotes from a book How that, ‘One important task is to raise Jamie Susskind thinks not. Through to Win an Indian Election: What Political awareness. What is also important is that Future Politics he attempts to democratize Parties Don’t Want You to Know, written by social media users start questioning more, the understanding of what a future with a former BJP associate, Shivam Shankar become skeptical and not become excessively powerful digital technologies could mean for Singh, but again it hardly adds to the claim dependent on reciting information from one, humanity, in turn, hoping to empower us as that Facebook indeed helped Modi. His or a few, sources so that they can get well- citizens to participate in the political debates points are more about how Modi and BJP rounded perspectives of issues. However, that could shape the evolution of these strategically utilized social media for their many ordinary users of social media technologies. purposes. unfortunately don’t have the time or the Future Politics is not a book on Chapter six, which is titled ‘An Early competence to delve deeper into detecting philosophy, nor a book on technology, nor a Entrant’, is about how Modi had realized disinformation and falsehood.’ I would add book on economics. It is an attempt to blend the importance of Internet and social media that it is not just the case of many ordinary an understanding of all three—philosophy, well before he became the Prime Minster in users, but most of the users of social media technology and economics—to provide 2014. However, it adds nothing to the claim and the purveyors of hate and fake news insights on how the political landscape of of how the social giant helped Modi. In fact, know this quite well. Hence, they are so the future could evolve. Susskind manages this chapter seems to be nothing more than successful. to do two things at once—go back in time a reproduction of content from Nilanjan to provide a context of how we got to where Mahtab Alam is a Delhi based multi-lingual Mukhopadhyay’s book Narendra Modi: The journalist and writer. Currently, he is the Executive we are today, and also take a leap forward in Man, that The Times, published in 2013. Editor of The Wire, Urdu. He writes on issues related time and shine a light on where we are most Like this chapter of the book, chapter sixteen to politics, law, media, human rights and literature. likely headed. The Book Review / December 2019 37 Susskind makes the important point that digital technologies can in very subtle ways impact social justice. And that Through Future Politics digital technology firms are in effect social “ Jamie susskind attempts engineers. He gives the example of the voice recognition systems that don’t recognize to democratize the women’s voices because they had only understanding of what a heard the voices of men; or the auto-tagging systems that tagged black people as ‘apes’. future with powerful digital The implications of this are very serious. AI technologies could mean for systems depend on data for their training and the manner in which they are trained humanity. will determine whether digital technologies accentuate the existing social biases, stigmas ” and divides or ameliorate them. Overall the book is likely to throw up Susskind comes from a family of futurists. more questions than answers. But that most His father Richard Susskind is considered likely is Susskind’s objective. He wants an authority on the future of work. Susskind the future to stalk us so that we are not like his father believes that as AI systems complacent about it. His chief contribution become more powerful, most humans will is to have provided a useful framework of He recognizes the need to help the reader be out of work. The resulting inequalities thought to analyse the future of politics in imagine a world where there will be such generated could be mind-boggling. In this a world that is being transformed by digital a preponderance of digital technologies context he explores ideas relating to the need technologies. that the distinction between life and digital for a Universal Basic Income and the manner While the content of Future Politics deals life gets blurred. To do that he coins the in which the paradigm of private property with serious issues Susskind is able to weave phrase digital lifeworld to describe a world could be re-defined. He takes an exploratory in a sophisticated sense of humour in his with machines that are equal or superior to approach—weighing the pros and cons of writing. The book is well researched, well- humans in a range of tasks and activities; each idea—rather than being prescriptive. argued and well-articulated. It is a piece of technology that surrounds us all the It is not easy to provide solutions for the work that should not be ignored if you care time, embedded in the physical and built kind of future we are about to encounter. about things like freedom and power. environment; and more and more human But before attempting to provide concrete activity being captured and recorded as data solutions it is important to explore broad Nitish Verghese is a brand and marketing strategy and then sorted, stored and processed by principles which could help us navigate advisor who helps organizations develop their digital systems. through unchartered waters. Susskind narratives to better compete in the market place. In its essence the book explores the way does this by advocating a need for a new separation of powers, i.e., making sure that in which four basic principles of politics Book News Book News could be impacted through the rise of digital no entity is able to secure control over more technologies—Power (how the strong than one of the means of power—force, FinTech Revolution: dominate the weak), Liberty (what is allowed scrutiny and perception control—or achieve Universal Inclusion and what is prohibited), Democracy (how a monopoly over them. He stresses on the in the New people can rule) and Social Justice (what need for transparency, i.e., making sure that Financial Ecosystem duties we owe each other). those who have the power to affect our core by Sofie Blakstad In democratic systems the exercise of freedoms, or to affect the democratic process, and Robert Allen force is usually associated with the state—the or to settle matters of social justice never is a practical ability to create laws and enforce them– operate in darkness. He also believes that we guide to the and the exercise of perception control can increase citizen participation in shaping evolving landscape and scrutiny is associated with the media. the legal and political system by leveraging of finance, Susskind explains how these notions are digital technologies to explore ideas like highlighting how about to change. Big tech firms will have the Direct Democracy, Deliberative Democracy, it’s changing power to simultaneously exert force (a self- Wiki Democracy, Data Democracy and AI our relationship driving car that refuses to park on a yellow Democracy. with money and how financial technology, line), scrutiny (digital gathering and storing But Susskind isn’t an idealist. He together with macroeconomic and societal of information regarding us and using this somewhere believes that all this may not change, is rewriting the story of how to predict our behaviour even before it be enough. If AI achieves technological business is done in developing economies. Businesses and, in particular, financial happens) and perception control (digitally singularity he believes that there will be services organizations need to participate in influencing the news and information we can no place for homo sapiens. Alternatively, a global service ecosystem. This book will gain access to and the manner in which it is if a class of human beings are able to be of interest to financial professionals who presented to us). technologically enhance themselves—with work in banking, financial technology, and It becomes obvious then that those who higher longevity and higher cognitive development finance. control these technologies—big tech firms capabilities—will they qualify to be and political authorities—will wield power categorized as humans? In both scenarios it Palgrave Macmillan, 2018, pp. 406, over the rest of us. will mean the end of politics as we know it. R2274.00 38 The Book Review / December 2019 Effective Political for the country. Singh learned much under Kishor’s leadership before moving to work Their [BJP’s] nationalist Campaigning: directly for the BJP under the guidance of Madhav. Here, he realized that there is no “ overdrive encourages a Online & Offline one-rule-suits-all strategy to find success in lot of enthusiastic techies politics. Udita Chaturvedi Comparing politics to entrepreneurship, to serve their nation by Singh says that the former is either a hit- serving the political party HOW TO WIN AN INDIAN ELECTION: WHAT and-trial victory or a loss for everyone. POLITICAL PARTIES DON’T WANT YOU TO Technology, however, is an assistant, a of their choice... Then there KNOW means to the end of this political journey By Shivam Shankar Singh are lakhs of volunteers or Penguin/eBury Press, 2019, pp. 201, R240.00 in today’s time. This becomes even more crucial in the absence of data and karyakartas who are ready privacy regulations in India, which allows to help the party out with hivam Shankar political parties to not just access but also Singh’s How to play around with personal user data—all almost anything, from SWin an Indian without the user’s knowledge, let alone distributing pamphlets Election is an insider’s permission. Through personal anecdotes, candid narrative of how Singh shares how data analysts, supported by and carrying out surveys political parties leverage sophisticated technology, assist these parties to conducting pulse checks voters’ data and digital to reach their audience, map their identities, technologies for political monetize their emotions, and capture their and profiling families in campaigning. Singh votes. constituencies—and for headed data analytics and campaigns for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for the free. Manipur and Tripura Legislative Assembly rather data grabbing—and how mapping elections under the guidance of the party’s the electorate” on the basis of religion, caste, National General Secretary, Ram Madhav. geography, needs and priorities helps predict By sharing insights from his journey as or influence electoral behaviour. It also a former BJP data and campaign analyst, simplifies the process of turning a leader into Singh spotlights the scale, impact and a ‘demigod’ through effective campaigning, consequences of digital campaigning for both online and offline. micro-targeting citizens to influence voters. A key resource for this effective It makes you understand, to some extent, the role of data and new age technology in the campaigning is human resource. And the recently concluded 2019 General Elections, BJP, in particular, has no dearth of this. which saw the BJP grab a landslide victory. Their nationalist overdrive encourages a The book starts with an optimistic lot of enthusiastic techies to serve their look though. It starts with the vision of a nation by serving the political party of young, passionate Singh who desires to do their choice—Singh being an example of good for his country. He sees much value this. Then there are lakhs of volunteers or in returning to India from the US—for the karyakartas who are ready to help the party LAMP Fellowship—to serve his country by out with almost anything, from distributing engaging with Members of Parliament on pamphlets and carrying out surveys to policy matters. This fellowship phase in his Singh mentions in his book that in many conducting pulse checks and profiling life and career is marked by the ‘obsessive large Indian States, caste and religion of over families in constituencies—and for free. desire to learn about the Indian political 70 per cent of the people can be determined Bucketing of people on the basis of landscape and the people who populate it.’ by analysing their names, which are publicly religion and caste comes up repeatedly in After the fellowship ended, Singh joined the available on the electoral roll. Based on this Singh’s book, as does this in the Indian Indian Political Action Committee (IPAC), a and other information gathered by them, political landscape. The bucketing is company run by political strategist Prashant Singh shares, parties use fake news and extremely crucial when a voting population Kishor who had managed Narendra Modi’s propaganda on social media to shape—or is undecided, Singh mentions. These are Prime Ministerial campaign in 2014. Kishor rather manipulate—voters’ minds through a the votes that have to be swung in favour of backed campaigns that had a leading face. targeted profiling-based approach. the campaigning political parties. In Singh’s He believed this approach connected with For those who’ve read Swati Chaturvedi’s book, this undecided group has often been the public well and thus more marketable, I Am a Troll, the revelations in How to presented as credulous and, thus, target for especially in a country where citizens want Win an Indian Election will not come as a political fake messaging. to follow a supreme leader. At a time surprise, especially since Singh does not talk The personal and simple writing style when India was beginning to grow tired of much about the organized nature of creating makes it easy for a reader to understand Congress nepotism and corruption, it only disinformation or misinformation or the election war rooms and strategy building made it easier for Modi and his team to source of it. The book does, however, reveal without any jargon, Lutyen’s gossip or deep present the persona of a much needed leader the functioning of BJP’s data operations—or political analytical understanding. In his The Book Review / December 2019 39 Comparing politics to Art of New Age War Army of None is therefore “ entrepreneurship, Singh says Ali Ahmad “ an important one, with that the former is either a ARMY OF NONE: AUTONOMOUS WEAPONS AND its significance likely to hit-and-trial victory or a loss THE FUTURE OF WAR be remarked on more for everyone. Technology, By Paul Scharre W. W. Norton & Company, 2018, pp. 448, in retrospect some however, is an assistant, a R1549.00 twenty years on. Scharre means to the end of this has wrapped up some political journey in today’s he book’s cover has appreciative ten years of work into time. Tlines by Bill Gates, who–as the cliché goes— its covers, beginning book, which” draws on Singh’s experiences needs no introduction, with methodically and as a party volunteer, LAMP fellow and and Lawrence Freedman, political campaign consultant across multiple who may need an readably outlining the Indian states, he discusses—often distantly introduction only for technology: robotics, yet objectively—how voter buying, targeted those from fields other advertising, fear mongering, false sense than strategic studies, being the doyen of artificial intelligence, neural of victimization and use of violence are the field. Since Gates knows technology networks, cyberspace, bots common electoral tactics used to woo voters. and Freedman focuses on war, their Interestingly, it was these reasons that recommendation places the book on the etc. finally let Singh to feel disillusioned with this frontline of technology and war. mammoth party and resign from the BJP in It is no wonder that at the time of writing It needs being” read by those working 2018. While the book does not deep dive of this review, the headlines have it that on national security policy to challenge into these problems, it encourages politically- the army’s Jaipur-based South Western the military’s laundry list of twentieth- inclined youth and first-time voters to think Command is organizing a seminar at Hisar century hardware. The book must be made and analyse the information that media to get to grips with Artificial Intelligence and compulsory reading at the military academies and their political parties are feeding them. military operations. The media reports the and staff colleges, perhaps figuring on the Singh writes, ‘It is extremely important for seminar organizers modestly acknowledging next update to the ‘Golden 100’— an army the nation that educated people who want to that though the military has taken note of headquarters compiled list of ‘must read’, do something positive for the country enter the advances abroad, including China, it is ‘should read’ and ‘could read’ tomes. One politics, but it is also extremely important never too late to catch up. Clearly, here is way to focus young military minds on its that they know what they are getting into.’ the book to help them tank up. contents is to make it part of promotion and Political evolved society requires socially Even so, a headline alongside says that competitive exam syllabi. evolved leaders who have greater interest India is going in for another 1000 plus An additional target audience of the of the people in mind than their petty self- armoured personnel carriers. This underlines book is the think tank community. Though interest. a well-known trait in most militaries— the military glossies have been a dime-a- Leaving the readers with a tad bit of apparently more pronounced in the Indian dozen for over a decade now, there is little hope in a country where political cleansing one—that it is easier to get a new idea into cutting edge content. Technology has ample looks like a distant dream at present, Singh its head than to get an older one out. So coverage, since the arms industry is out warns the readers that honest politicians will long as the three services are busy throwing for a piece of the defence budgetary cake. continue to struggle and compete with the governmental largesse—set at $130 billion However, missing is deep-end thinking power and finance that dishonest groups over the coming ten years—on platforms presented by Scharre such as on the ethics hold. Many others with the passion and skills such as fighters, ships and tanks, it is unlikely of such weaponization. One doubts there is to drive policies will stay clear of politics and India will ‘catch up’ this decade. From what an equivalent project at any of the plethora choose corporate careers. However, those Scharre informs through his 446-page book, of Delhi’s think tanks to the one Scharre that will enter politics and manage to stick it would be too late. tenants at Washington’s independent and around will eventually help steer the political Paul Scharre is a good guide into an bipartisan Center for a New American discourse in this country in the years to esoteric subject since he makes intelligible Security: its Ethical Autonomy project. come. India could be a pluralistic and a formidable array of technologies that go This is a step further than merely the inclusive society, or it could be an intolerant into the making of autonomous weapons— technology or the operational usage of the and prone-to-conflicts society. For these new weapons he describes as not having a human weapon. It is engagement with the ethics entrants to Indian politics, Singh has a tip. in the loop for their firing. The science he of and ethical use of such weapons when When deciding what party to work for, they covers would interest sci-fi aficionados. The fielded. The current state of the art is semi- must consciously decide on the ideologies book itself is meant for practitioners, though autonomous weapons, requiring human sign that align with them the most and that it is written in a style that would attract off on targeting. Apparently, only the Israeli offend them the least. armchair strategists too. It is meant for those Harpy drone has so far crossed the line into Udita Chaturvedi is leading Research & into defence technology, specifically defence being autonomous. Armed drones have over Communication in Dasra, Mumbai. scientists and the fledgling defence industry. a dozen states in pursuit of the technology. 40 The Book Review / December 2019 later parts, ‘The Fight to Ban Autonomous Weapons’ and ‘Averting Armageddon’, Nothing is as It he comes to the meat. Thus the first three Seems quarters of the book would interest the tech savvy, while the last two parts can Ravi Guria be expected to detain policy wonks and academics. This ‘something in it for every- NON-FICTION FILM: THE GREAT HACK one’ aspect of the book comes from his Directors: Karim Amer and Jehane Noujaim background: an infantryman having served Streaming Platform: Netflix in both of America’s wars this century: Iraq Year of Release: 24 July 2019 (USA) and Afghanistan; and later as the director of the technology and national security programmme at his think tank. This review cannot but in closing reiterate Scharre’s rivacy has emerged sobering words: as the most prized ‘No piece of paper can prevent a state Ppossession in from building autonomous weapons if the ‘Information Age’. they desire it. At the same time, a pell-mell Technology giants such race forward in autonomy, with no clear as Google, Facebook and sense of where it leads us, benefits no one. Amazon are being taken to That there is much for ethicists here while States must come together to develop an task by the governments the technologists are still at it is evident from understanding of which uses of autonomy over the issue. But the the recent killings by a semi-autonomous are appropriate and which go too far and design and motivation of the relationship drone strike of 30 Afghan civilians out surrender human judgment where it is evolving between social media platforms nut picking on a Hindu Kush hillside. If needed in war. Weighing these human and users lead us to the grim conclusion and since things can go wrong even with a values is a debate that requires all members that perhaps privacy is a holy grail, the quest of which will lead us to the darkest human in the loop, what more can go awry of society, not just academics, lawyers, and alleys of misgivings. And when scandals when the human is at best with a kill-switch? military professionals. Average citizens are like ‘Cambridge Analytica’ come to light, On this count some 3000 robotics experts needed too, because ultimately autonomous it further reinforces the belief that is fast have already called for a blanket ban on military robots will live—and fight—in our finding purchase, that privacy is arguably autonomous weapons. world.’ This is the key area Scharre engages with. a myth in the Information Age that we He takes his time building up to the climax, Ali Ahmed is Visiting Professor at the Nelson are unable to accept. But it is a layered traversing the technology and its operational Mandela Center for Peace and Conflict Resolution, conversation, which needs to be looked at use, before getting to in Part VI on whether Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi. from many perspectives. and how strategy and ethics informs policy Privacy is perceived differently by choices. The take away is that a weapon millennials who are digital natives, and Book News Book News ban is wishful and fielding of such weapons generation X, Y, Z, who are digital adopters. is inevitable. Consequently, engaging with Tools and Weapons: Digital natives who have grown organically how these would relate to international The Promise and with Internet around them, accept the trade humanitarian law is necessary in the here and The Peril of the off between their personal data for digital now. The international community is taking Digital Age by Brad access more naturally; whereas, the older its usual leisurely course at the Convention Smith, Microsoft generation is still coming to terms with on Certain Conventional Weapons President, and becoming a commodity in the ongoing data meetings, even as developments overtake Carol Ann Browne, war between tech companies. Data is the speeches made. In early 2018, there was a with a Foreword new oil, as they say. It is important for the drone attack by Syrian rebels on a Syrian air by Bill Gates, tech companies to make accurate behavioural base that also housed Russians, with Russians is a captivating assessments and predictions about their shooting down the intruding drones. By late narrative from the users to influence them through ads, because 2019, ten drones targeted Saudi Arabia’s cockpit of one of that is where they generate their revenue premier oil facilities temporarily putting the world’s largest from; and governments want them to ensure a proportion of its oil production out of and most powerful tech companies as it finds national security. action and setting the region closer to a war itself in the middle of some of the thorniest However, what the Cambridge Analytica between regional rivals, the Saudis and Iran. emerging issues of our time. The book pulls scandal has revealed is that there is a sinister The book is therefore an important one, back the curtain remarkably wide onto game underway, which is slyly sneaking its some of the company’s most crucial recent with its significance likely to be remarked way into our lives, eroding the concept of decision points as it strives to protect the on more in retrospect some twenty years democracy and freedom of choice. hopes technology offers against the very real on. Scharre has wrapped up some ten years The Great Hack is an investigative threats it also presents. of work into its covers, beginning with non-fiction film released on Netflix, which methodically and readably outlining the Hodder& Stoughton, South Asia edition gets into the depth of the Cambridge technology: robotics, artificial intelligence, Hachette, 2019, pp. 346, GBP 20.00/ Analytica scandal and peels all the layers neural networks, cyberspace, bots etc. In the R699.00 from it, exposing the root cause and key The Book Review / December 2019 41 the behaviour of hostile target audience, such as convincing 14-30 year old Muslim boys Perhaps privacy is a holy and men not to join the Al Qaida. And they “ grail, the quest of which will started using this communication warfare on civilians during elections to suppress and lead us to the darkest alleys increase turnout. They called them ‘The of misgivings. And when Persuadables’ who had not yet formed a fixed opinion on who to vote for. First they scandals like ‘Cambridge identified them through psychographics and Analytica’ come to light, it then used weapons grade communication techniques, which are bombarding them further reinforces the belief intensely with blogs, videos and personalized that is fast finding purchase, messages till they saw the world the way Cambridge Analytica wanted them to. A that privacy is arguably a small number of the persuadables were myth in the Information enough to swing the elections one-way or the other. This was their ticket to becoming a Age that we are unable to billion dollar company. players for all to see and understand; the accept. But it is a layered The film follows the journey of key inevitable future that is staring squarely back players who were responsible for bringing conversation, which needs at us, placing the responsibility nowhere, the curtains down on the company: David to be looked at from many but right at our doorstep. It raises extremely Carrol who teaches and advocates digital important issues plaguing the technology rights in the US became concerned for perspectives... era, such as—privacy, security, surveillance, his data and took an arduous legal route digital rights, contravention of human rights government. We are all trying to perceive in a foreign land, Great Britain, to force what seems to be a reality” in a way it suits and integrity of democracy. Cambridge Analytica to turn over his data The game began much earlier, but it us. In an Age where we are imploding with it had harvested; Christopher Wylie, a became apparent during the US Presidential excess information, being aware is all that we data scientist, who initially helped set-up can possibly do, and hope that at the end of elections 2016, which saw Donald Trump Cambridge Analytica, but turned against becoming the 45th President of the world’s the day, technology will serve us right and the company terming it as a propaganda fairly. oldest democracy, the United States of machine; and the most vital whistleblower, The Great Hack is a very important film America. It was a watershed moment and Brittany Kaiser, Cambridge Analytica’s because it opens our eyes to the naked truth redefined election campaigns forever, which former Director of Business Development, we are pretending not to see or don’t see had found unimaginable effectiveness whose revelations proved to be the nail on out of ignorance. It is shocking to realize through technology. It also brought a the coffin. the extent to which we are being played by very disturbing reality to light, that in a The film reveals Cambridge Analytica’s those who control the system. The only way globalized connected world, a country’s sinister reach, which was far and wide. It had to beat them is by becoming more aware elections have ceased to be decided just by a major role to play in influencing the Brexit and brave to not compromise on our basic the verdict of its bona fide citizens. They referendum as well. Interestingly, the major morals and ethics. At the end of the day, are open and exposed to be manipulated by players in the presidential elections campaign it is not that complicated a choice: ‘You outside players who have ulterior agendas 2016, and the major players who had shouldn’t win by cheating.’ in the dice falling in a certain way that suit interest in Great Britain exiting European their interests. Union were hand in glove. Ravi Guria is a filmmaker, scriptwriter and is Cambridge Analytica, a British The world has changed. Authoritarian currently heading Media & Communication in Digital Empowerment Foundation, New Delhi. company, recognized itself as a data driven governments are on the rise and they are all communications company, which harvested using Facebook, which has 2.41 monthly Book News Book News data of more than 87 million Facebook active users around the world. Facebook’s users, building their psychological profile revenue comes directly by monetizing its How to Break Up without permission and using it in ways user’s data. Technology that is supposed to with Your Phone: they don’t understand. They had 5000 data connect us is driving us apart. ‘If you have to The 30-Day Plan points on every American by which they fundamentally change the society, you have to Take Back Your could predict the personalities of the voters to break it,’ states an important bad player. Life by award- because personality drives behaviour, which The film deals with the Cambridge winning journalist influences how one votes. Their modus Analytica scandal, but the questions it raises Catherine Price operandi was to unleash ‘Psyops’, which are have significance far beyond the company. presents a practical, psychological operations used by military to If it was not Cambridge Analytica, it hands-on plan to use as an alternative to warfare in conflict would have been some other company by a break up—and zones, which was perfected by Cambridge different name, but the state we are in is a then make up— Analytica’s parent company, Strategic foregone conclusion. As a society, we are in a with your phone. Communication Laboratories (SCL), in its state of flux, where no one quite understands The goal? A long-term relationship that earlier defence company avatar. They were where we are headed, and I mean no actually feels good. using communication warfare to influence one—be it citizens, tech companies or the Ten Speed Press, 2018, pp. 192, R399.00 42 The Book Review / December 2019 digital entrepreneurship

Illustration: Designed by Sharada Kerkar, Digital Empowerment Foundation The Book Review / December 2019 43 Development Here are my key takeaways from of creativity, value and, to some extent, the book, in terms of 12 shortcomings partnerships in innovative initiatives. Dialogue: 12 of the entrepreneurial discourse. Other However, the playing field is not level recommended books on related themes for many communities in India to access Contradictions of include The Rise of the Hybrid Domain entrepreneurial knowledge and promotional the Entrepreneurial (Yuko Aoyama, Balaji Parthasarathy), The networks. The entrepreneurial and design Platform Society (Jose van Dijck, Thomas communities in India are coming up with Movement of India Poell, Martijn de Waal), A Human’s Guide to models of education that address some of Machine Intelligence (Kartik Hosanagar), and the problems with rote learning, siloed Madanmohan Rao The Next Billion Users (Payal Arora). knowledge, and tuition/exam culture. Six core chapters trace the foundations Interestingly, many proponents of such CHASING INNOVATION: MAKING of development and design discourse in change themselves studied in the IIT, IIM, ENTREPRENEURIAL CITIZENS IN MODERN INDIA India. Local and international organizations, NID, SPA and CEPT institutes, and are By Lilly Irani intellectuals, and forums influence the advocating new models such as those of Princeton University Press, 2019, pp. 286, $99.95 narrative. These include TED talks, Harvard J Krishnamurti. They push for a change Business Review articles, Bill and Melinda from India as ‘ProcastiNation’ to ‘ImagiNation’, with a motto of ‘Feel, his compelling Gates Foundation, Citi Foundation, Ashoka, Imagine, Do, Share’. Every child is regarded book discusses the UNDP, IDEO, Schumpeterian analysts, as a potential entrepreneur, who does not ‘seductions, limits Silicon Valley tech giants and startup T evangelists, NASSCOM, CII, Barefoot need permission to change. A focus on and contradictions’ of the entrepreneurial movement College, and influential Indian diaspora. feeling, intuition and passion are elements in India. Entrepreneurship Indian intellectuals across the spectrum imbibed from models of design thinking. is being shaped as a have upheld the value of innovation, The advocates of new pedagogy call for movement that embraces including at the bottom of the pyramid, nurturing independence, creativity and creative freedom, business such as CK Prahalad, Sam Pitroda, Tarun critical thinking. value, and nation building. Examples Khanna, Anil Gupta, Soumitra Dutta, and However, many of the technology, and case studies are building up of how Navi Radjou. A design thrust is promoted business, developmental and design techies, designers, development specialists, by the likes of Kiran Bir Sethi and Ashish interventions of the entrepreneurial and business professionals can create Rajpal. A sense of urgency is being built up, movement in India reflect a range of entrepreneurial ventures for socio-economic with India’s ‘demographic dividend’ as a contradictions. I have summarized twelve uplift. backdrop and the rise of CSR investments of these below, followed by speculation and Lilly Irani, an Iranian-American in entrepreneurial initiatives. ‘Whereas the suggestions on future research. Communications Professor at the University Gandhian trustee treated the poor as objects Diversity is seen as key for ‘creative of California, San Diego, has a background of responsibility, the entrepreneurial citizen friction’ in entrepreneurship and design in computer science and design. She was treated them as opportunities—markets in via inclusion of a number of perspectives also a Fulbright Scholar at Jawaharlal Nehru the making’, Lilly explains. Entrepreneurship and generation of a wide spectrum of University, and spent nearly a decade as is seen as the way to opportunity and socio- ideas. However, much more is needed to fieldworker for a Delhi design studio. economic triumph. Entrepreneurship is address the true diversity of India in the Lilly cautions that the social, economic, being pitched as a way of achieving inclusive entrepreneurial movement, and distribute and political challenges in India may be growth in India as well as projecting a new the rewards more equally. The author too formidable to be solved merely by global image of India as a hub of innovation. cautions against ignoring ‘unequal starting startup projects involving founders, venture Corporate and development innovation is points, uneven distributions, or reparation’. capitalists, and global philanthropies. being seen as a way for Indian players to Hackathons, meet-ups and brainstorming Innovation is being framed as desirable, but climb up the value chain from outposts to sessions bring together diverse people, infrastructure building and maintenance, or the planning centres of global giants. but there are limits to this diversity; most the activities of craftspeople and labourers, The author traces how, in successive participants still seem of a like-minded are unfortunately not painted in the phases after Independence, India’s national nature and mindset. There is only just same light. Entrepreneurship and design economic agendas focused on top-down enough ‘easy difference’ to be ‘interesting should not be seen as a substitute for the development, big business, cooperatives, and even inspiring’ to each other, but not hard grassroots work of progressive social small industries, diaspora investors, deep contestation. Long-term solutions change, or as a way for government and big liberalization, local State governments, should address not just diversity but sharing business to pass the buck, or for middle- inclusive growth, microfinance, and of power. class professionals to turn their backs on the employment guarantees. Overall, the state The entrepreneur is portrayed as a heroic messy necessity of political movements. is ceding some control of the market and agent of change, powered by resourcefulness The book is a blend of scholarly analysis, of development. NITI Aayog replaced the and empathy. This is in contrast to the ethnographic observation, and storytelling Planning Commission, with command slow pace, arduous nature, and sometimes across a range of fields: development models shifting to coordination and danger-filled path of social movements, civic economics, design theory, startup frame- partnerships. India is coming under global activism, and political mobilization. Without works, and postcolonial studies. The book IP regimes as well, including process and these struggles that involve consensus spans 277 pages, including 37 pages of product patents. building and negotiation, the challenges references and a number of black-and-white The poor are being framed not just of caste, class, religion and gender cannot photographs. as consumers but also as latent sources be effectively tackled. However, many 44 The Book Review / December 2019 entrepreneurs regard politics as plagued The book is a blend with corruption, patronage and communal approaches. A number of entrepreneurs also “ of scholarly analysis, seem unaware of how deeply embedded they ethnographic observation, are in their own class position and kinship networks. The author flags the limitation and storytelling across of entrepreneur-led development, which a range of fields: chooses not to disturb existing social orders. The design movement is being hailed in development economics, India as a way to promote interdisciplinary design theory, startup collaboration, creative freedom, and a sense of individual authenticity. Sometimes, frameworks, and post- however, it has been difficult for founders of colonial studies. such design studios to clearly articulate their value proposition. Premium designers are overseas positions or chosen not to leave the seeking to pitch themselves as consultants ” country in the first place, so as to seize the for form, strategy and vision via long-term The case documented by the author also entrepreneurial opportunity. Unfortunately, relationships, and not just one-off vendors of shows how questions of ethics and politics this language gap can distance innovators commoditized products and services. from ‘hardcore ideological’ people were not from ‘the others’, the author cautions. The author notes the challenges that can seen as important at this demo stage of the Many hackathons reflect the conscious arise when some design team members are hackathon. The work is seen as collaborative and unconscious preferences of the not extroverts or rapid in their responses. but also fast-paced. organizers, such as calls for participation Furthermore, some labour forms are not ‘In this urgency, entrepreneurial circulated largely in English. The conference valued as highly as creativity, e.g., support citizenship renders social movements, proceedings, discussions and displayed functions of accountants, cleaners, cooks, deliberation, and even extensive research materials also are mostly in English, thus and drivers. Creative work is supported and planning as potential barriers to opening the door for more such publications by menial tasks, sweatshop work, and development and dilution of vision,’ the in Indian languages. even donkeywork. ‘Free will relies on author cautions. Too much deliberation is Design thinking advocates products unfree labours’, Lilly cautions; many of seen as ‘analysis paralysis’ and even getting and services built on empathy with the these support workers are not seen as ‘mindfucked’ (in the words of an interviewed end user; it claims to be in touch with entrepreneurial citizens in their own right. designer), but it is also important to weigh human emotions, needs and desires, and Furthermore, in the broader economic the judgment of domain experts and not just not just focused on technology. The author development context of India, peasants, rely on the insights of newcomers. shows that this approach is in contrast slum-dwellers, street hawkers, and the urban Moving forward fast raises challenges in to earlier top-down human-computer poor have often been dispossessed to make fields where solutions call for painstaking interaction (HCI), which was intended to way for larger projects favouring the middle grassroots footwork to build coalitions, reduce human-generated error in systems class. align frameworks, and win the trust of performance. But sometimes the end user While the glory of grassroots innovators target audiences and influencers. Some desires solutions that are beyond the scope (mostly male) has been celebrated through entrepreneurs even observe that lack of of the design team, in which case another initiatives like the National Innovation bias to action is present among ‘Bengalis, solution may be morphed on to secondary Foundation and Honeybee Network, they Malayalis, Brahmins and academics’, desires. The author documents the case relied on the support of their wives and according to interviews by the author. study of a water-filter product design, where parents who do not get as much recognition. There are many models of the end users actually wanted solutions for The micro-worlds of hackathons, a entrepreneurship driven by digital models fluoride filtration and not water purification. common activity of the entrepreneurial of infrastructure and interaction, but this The team should have shown responsibility movement, thrive on the pleasure of the will be a challenge for citizens on the other and ethical practices, and addressed the possible and the immediate, but not as side of the digital divide with respect to requirements for fluoride filters, e.g., by much on the labour of production and access, affordability and literacy. The civic collaborating with fluoride activists. maintenance. Quick-fix solutions and hackathon analysed by the author ‘rode The author cautions that though low-hanging fruit are no substitute for the the energy of euphoric faith in ICTs’, but designers claim to be empathetic, it can popular movements that push for social technical solutions are not as comprehensive be hard to see and work around in-built change, or for long-term investments in as political ones. In some cases, the author histories and biases of class, caste and transformative infrastructures, or sustained has documented positions at the Bill and nationality. Viewpoints, tolerances, and lobbying for policy change. Melinda Gates Foundation that were filled actions in such contexts are historically and The author documents a case where the by ex-Microsoft employees without any culturally mediated. preference for a quick tech demo in a civic background in development work. India has The author also traces how countries like or governance hackathon came in the way now become a laboratory for experiments in the US have developed entrepreneurship of solutions based on empowering poor ICT products for the poor. promotion as a way to deal with people’s movements and pressure tactics to Many of the globally connected shortcomings in foreign policy. For example, hold technocrats accountable. Besides, not entrepreneurs and designers speak English the then-president Barack Obama launched all participants in hackathons could afford and are educated at the elite IIT, IIM the Global Entrepreneurship Summit (GES) the week or weekend off for the activity. and NID tier. Some have returned from in Cairo in 2009, a practice continued The Book Review / December 2019 45 with the presence of Ivanka Trump at GES are sometimes expected to conform to Hyderabad in 2017. Supporting global regional pre-capitalist and pre-industrial Building entrepreneurship was seen by the US as a styles, and not modern styles. Thus, not all Technologically kind of soft power, and to draw people away differentiation and novelty are regarded as from the path of terrorism. This would help value in this context. Savvy Companies stabilize the networked global order. Venture capital and corporations One fascinating chapter addresses how are ready to harvest the most successful Amitabh Singhal Indians and global communities view entrepreneurial experiments, the author the country’s creativity and innovations. observes. However, many of the emerging DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION: BUILD YOUR The term ‘innovation’ has connotations sciences, technologies and infrastructures of ORGANIZATION’S FUTURE FOR THE INNOVATION AGE of novelty, uniqueness, alteration or the world require long-term and extensive By Lindsay Herbert introduction of forms or elements, use funding by government, which opportunistic Bloomsbury Business, 2017, pp. 265, R499.00 of technology, and intellectual property. entrepreneurs and VCs tend to stay away Innovation can involve integration and from. adaptation of outside ideas as well, and goes Though the author does not mention igital beyond imitation and repetition, according global warming and climate change as Transformation: to Jawaharlal Nehru. pressing issues of our time, it seems clear Build Your that entrepreneurial ventures can contribute D The author adds that what is seen as Organization’s Future innovative also depends on the power of to only a limited extent here. For example, for the Innovation Age who recognizes and values it. Some types of innovations based on renewable energy by Lindsay Herbert is innovation in India are seen as derivative, require government support and policies a practical guide for inauthentic, or even copies, while only some for widespread adoption, which calls for people, irrespective of others are seen as ‘proper’ innovation; this countering lobbying activities by entrenched rank, position, seniority reflects conditioning of class, caste, gender petro-energy corporates. and authority, who would like to see and rural/urban markets. Hallmarks of The author calls for more responsible their respective organizations transform proper innovation are intentionality, scale interventions in the development discourse, themselves by embracing the challenges and authenticity; these involve practices like beyond entrepreneurship. She cautions which the ubiquitous and constant churning thorough documentation. Some of these that there is more to solving the world’s and presence of digitalization has brought considerations apply to other emerging problems than casting everything as in need upon the modern-day businesses. And by economies also, in the postcolonial world. of entrepreneurial innovation. organizations, I mean businesses of any kind, The author traces how, through ‘Let us instead find ways to speculate whether single owner driven or startups successive Five Year Plans, innovation in collectively in ways that dismantle and SMEs to large-scale corporations. The India was seen as constituting acceptance oppression as we imagine and build’, Lilly book provides us a step-by-step knowhow signs off. It would have been great to end the of technology, accounting, professional on how to bring about changes within our book with a review of some alternatives to practices, R&D, organizational novelty, own realm of operations within the business entrepreneur-led development, and explore and intellectual property. ‘The meaning of entity that we run or may work for. As ways in which the various approaches could innovation thus shifted from a process of such, the book attempts to demystify the perhaps intersect and strengthen each other. change to a source of value,’ Lilly explains. jargon of ‘Digital Transformation’ where its She delves into three types of creativity in Madanmohan Rao is Research Director at advice to potential change makers is to go Indian public culture: jugaad, workarounds, YourStory Media and editor of a five book series. His about setting the objectives, identifying the and people’s solutions. Jugaad is variously interests include creativity, innovation, knowledge tasks and steps to achieve the goals, without seen as frugal, functional and sustainable, management, and digital media. He is also a DJ and making too much of a song and dance but also transient and sub-optimal. It does writer on world music and jazz. about it. But, since that’s easier said than not go to the root of the problem, and even done in real life, through this book, Lindsay is an act of helplessness ( ). ‘Critics majboori Book News Book News prescribes her ‘BUILD’ model encapsulating of jugaad countered that it stood for shoddy the stages of Bridging, Uncovering, Iterating, quality and short-term thinking that has New-Age Technology Leveraging and finally Disseminating. hobbled India’s development’, Lilly explains. and Industrial Lindsay’s constant prescription In this context, the role of Indian Revolution 4.0:Global throughout the various BUILD stages is very designers was framed as a way of sensing Public Policy sane and begins to look pretty doable, which and articulating people’s needs and actions, Issues in Economy, is encouraging for any reader. She does and translating design at scale into market Democracy, National advise not to lose sight of the organization’s opportunities via skills of distance, analysis Security and World mission and that every project to embrace and production. For example, the Honeybee Peace by Narendra and achieve digital transformation must at Network sought to translate jugaad works Jadhav brings the end serve the customer and enhance into grassroots innovation that could be together technology, his/her experience with the business and its economy, society and monetized via flexible IP regimes. products and/or services. national security, would benefit individuals, In many contexts, Indian designers This basic principle resonates with businesses, corporates, civil society as well as have had to show ‘Indianness’ (brand or me personally, of having worked with policymakers around the world. pehchaan) in their products, which reflect technology companies from the 1980s stereotypes held by their viewers. Therefore, Konark Publishers, 2019, pp. 288, onward; while there were some successful for example, Indian crafts communities R695.00 models for going digital, both internally 46 The Book Review / December 2019 (department wise) and ultimately organization wide, there have been instances No transformation process of attempts by even the most technologically savvy companies to deliver new product “ is the beginning and/or an and service experience to customers that end in itself and no stage ultimately found no takers. The launches failed spectacularly because those companies is ever a finishing stage. or specifically those in charge of designing It is a continuous process the platforms, service modules and products, and even marketing aspects of it failed to pay throughout the lifecycle of heed to the target customers’ ample feedback any business that has chosen on their needs to survive and thrive upon the very products and services that were to be to digitally transform delivered to them. itself. Actually, it is not The reason such transformatory projects are likely succeed or fail at each step, due even a matter of choice to to a variety of internal and external barriers transform or not. In this and circumstances, are well enumerated in the book. Readers are called upon to unearth ever-ubiquitous connected and be mindful of those barriers and address world, there really is no them appropriately while building their transformation project designs. Not doing so expansion project; BUILD applies equally choice... comes at the peril of a business’s failure. For well. example, misalignment of any project with The book’s advice is to start small and ” the business’s mission dooms the process to build on those small successes. It warns many bank unions in those early days went failure. The book provides real examples, repeatedly, throughout, of the internal and on strike against the perceived threat from such as those of once thriving video rental external threats and barriers, and bridging technology and digital transformation that marquee brands like Blockbuster, which those gaps through a process of building the government was trying to bring about failed to deliver their own mission of connections. Gaining insights into the pain then. That was then, and now it is difficult providing the best and most comfortable points and building project elements to take to even imagine for the current digital movie experience to their customers with away those for the customers. It focuses generation what that world was like. As advance technology. The likes of Netflix on customer expectations. One can clearly a society we have had to transform, and came and bridged that gap to become a sense the elements of marketing research, undoubtedly we will keep transforming. bigger success. Succinct lesson from this consumer behaviour and competitive This book basically attempts to example is: don’t concentrate on ‘How’; presence that have come into play. It tells us demystify and deconstruct the term concentrate on ‘Why’ you are trying to clearly that businesses have to have a benefit/ ‘Digital Transformation’, and explains the transform. Put the customer first under your loss statement chalked out clearly before transformation framework in a lucid and scope of target. embarking on a transformational journey. logical manner. Even when at times one I can vouch for this and have personally No transformation process is the feels that there is some repetition of certain been in situations where leadership and beginning and/or an end in itself and descriptions, I think that is in the nature of executive teams in charge of building the no stage is ever a finishing stage. It is a the work itself. Momentarily I disconnected platforms to deliver new products and continuous process throughout the lifecycle in one place, where there is an attempt to services were intent only on delivering what of any business that has chosen to digitally suggest that 3rd party outsourced technology they themselves thought was right and not transform itself. Actually, it is not even a suppliers only have selfish interests, which what the customer clearly wanted in terms matter of choice to transform or not. In may eventually put the organization into a of experience and value. Result: spectacular this ever-ubiquitous connected world, there compromised state at the mercy of the 3rd failure of the new transformatory project at really is no choice. parties, and goes on to suggest therefore that a global scale. If one pays heed to Lindsay’s I belong to a generation that grew organizations better think of starting to build BUILD framework, there is a better chance up with manual typewriters as a form of their in-house capabilities to protect their of making less visible mistakes and ensuring technology, to write our communication and own interests. that the projects have a better chance of post it by snail mail. And then we had to I believe, this cannot be the case all the success. embrace electric and electronic typewriters, time, until the organizations learn to treat All of this BUILD framework is surely personal computers, then the mobile phones these suppliers as partners in progress and not a onetime process, but a cyclical and and just a tad later the Internet. We had build a healthy trustworthy relationship repeatable process, an ongoing exercise no choice but to transform ourselves into together, focused on the overriding objective adaptable by every organization—whether a living digital entity that we are today. I of serving the customer’s interest first. I have it’s in the B2B, B2C, public, private, had not only to embrace these things that been with organizations, where I relaunched government, profit or non-profit space; and looked scary to begin with, but also sell these old stagnant businesses with the support of any size—local or global, whether you are technologies to others, to so many businesses of better resourced, experienced 3rd party thinking of launching any new product(s) or and organizations and government entities. suppliers, and treated them as our knowledge services, starting a new line of business, just I am a first-hand witness to widespread partners. Eventually, they became the perfect planning a market exploration or there is an fear that the personal computer generated; backbones, resulting in a smashing success The Book Review / December 2019 47 for the relaunched business for many years. The Role of a But due to what I could think were cultural, social and personal issues, later generation Mentor leadership that followed me, started to treat the 3rd party provider as a mere vendor, and Christie Maria James was intent on showing them their ‘place’. Result: disruption of business and brakes on MENTORING 2.0: A PRACTITIONER’S GUIDE TO growth of a well performing entity, with a CHANGING LIVES bad reputation within industry circles. By Sunil Unny Guptan Some chapters do allude to these cultural Sage Publications, 2018, pp. 256, R450.00 and personnel minefields when they talk of barriers and roadblocks that can hinder unil Unny Guptan transformation processes, but in my writes extensively experience these issues are omnipresent and about a topic that hardwired into people’s mind (and takes S probably has not been the form of politics within organizations, explored much or has which work without regard to the negativity been written down in the and losses they create) and need deeper form of short articles till understanding and deft handling to now. The book begins overcome the cut and dried recipe which the with a foreword by C book suggests. Parthasarathy, Chairman and MD, Karvy So, in conclusion, apart from these Group, who recalls his interactions with or they think they are, then answering these couple of hitches as I outlined above, Digital Dr. Sunil Guptan, his mentor, with utmost set of questions shall definitely help. Transformation by Lindsay Herbert is a fondness. The author keeps the readers The good thing about the book is practical guidebook, coming from her being engaged by narrating the story of ‘Mentor’— that it lets the reader assume the role of an experienced practitioner herself. There the son of Heracles and Asopis in Greek a mentor and mentee, as well. However, are other works as well such as Leading mythology. He beautifully captures the story the reader might come across the fact that Digital: Turning Technology into Business of Mentor and how this word went on to there is random and sudden shifting of Transformation by George Westerman, gain the meaning it has now. gender based pronouns—which almost Didier Bonnet and Andrew McAfee, whose Delving deeper in the book Mentoring ends up causing confusion. The book does synopsis too reminds me of many elements 2.0, one would be definitely reminded of one’s mentors. This book will also make have a problematic stance on gender based of Lindsay’s BUILD model. This may be a mentoring. The author seems to be still coincidence, but reading both may be well the readers question—both mentors and mentees—about their role in each other’s carrying the ideas of gender binary and to a worth the effort for those planning such a certain extent gender stereotypes. transformation in their own organizations. lives and the impact they probably had on each other. Detailing out every aspect of how The book has beautiful examples in There is no getting away from digital, if you every chapter that definitely helps the wish to survive in today’s world. a good mentor is and should be, Guptan ensures that he doesn’t forget the fact that reader get a better understanding with Amitabh Singhal runs a Business Consultancy mentors are also capable of making mistakes. helpful concepts and case stories. Soon & Advisory Services company and has worked for Interestingly, under the subheading enough, Guptan moves on from focussing several decades with technology companies. ‘Toxic Mentorship’, he talks about how on individual mentorship to organizational some mentors who might have ‘resigned mentorship. Emphasizing on the importance of organizations focussing on mentorship, he Book News Book News themselves to lesser position and fostering whatever level of benefits and good that they does give out a fair warning on how failure Making Cities may be able to accrue to their mentees from or absence of this mentorship might ‘vitiate Smarter: Designing their positions.’ This almost seems like a fair organizational culture and relationships’. An Interactive Urban warning to mentees to identify such toxic entire chapter titled ‘Designing Mentoring Applications by mentors and not to keep them on a pedestal. Schemes for Organisations’ is dedicated Martin Tomitsch The reader will also be met with a set of on exploring the nuances of individual focuses on an questions prodding them to re-think and mentorship in an organization versus a often-overlooked assess if the mentors in their life truly match corporate sponsored scheme. There are no element of the definition of the same. stands that Guptan takes while exploring the smart-city Throughout the book, the reader will these two sides, thereby, helping the reader discourse,―the realize that the author does not take the role identify their opinions and stance on this. interface between of mentorship lightly. Listing out qualities Even though in every chapter and in citizens and smart- of a mentor such as ‘right orientation and every broad theme the author ensures that city applications. attitude’, ‘clarity of values and direction’, challenges to mentoring are mentioned, he This volume translates principles from the ‘confidence in self’ along with the most delves deep into this topic in his chapter field of user experience design to explore important quality of being able to empathize ‘Challenges in Mentoring’. Taking into city-specific challenges, such as integrating and tolerate ambiguity—the author forces consideration aspects like ‘money’, ‘mentors physical and digital experiences. the reader to introspect whether they can be survival and career growth’ among many Jovis, 2018, pp. 240, $34.86 a good mentor to someone. In case they are, others, the book also has sections that takes 48 The Book Review / December 2019 into account gender based mentorship. Progress Towards a It does play along certain gender based stereotypes while dealing with this topic Greater Networked which might not come across as progressive for a lot of readers. Economy The in-depth analysis on mentorship done by Guptan is commendable. The Sakshi Abrol book does not entirely rely on explaining concepts with heavily worded paragraphs. INFORMATION SYSTEMS: DEBATES, APPLICATIONS The readers will find graphs and extensive AND IMPACTS flowcharts on the mentoring process—that Edited by Priya Seetharaman and Jocelyn Cranefield helps understand this concept better and Routledge, India, 2019, pp. 388, R10373.00 also leads to clarity of the same. In fact, in the chapter ‘Expectations in Mentoring’, the author has provided a compilation of uickly changing mentees’ expectation from the mentors’ and business vice versa. There is also a chart that maps the Qlandscapes driven difference and the common meeting points by technological trends of roles such as ‘mentors’, ‘counsellors’, already in motion are ‘coach’ and ‘guardian’. predicted to transform our The author does not ignore the new lives in the coming years. digital age where the concept of ‘being far From greater automation chapter, by way of gleaning several issues away’ has been erased. However, he does of daily chores, robo- concerning IS, and painting the scars as it warn about the implication of e-mentoring, advisories, virtual reality at homes to an were, buttresses the expectation that this will since there is a change in the medium of avalanche of e-commerce activities and serve as a first-of-its-kind compendium on IS interaction. Pitfalls to this kind of mentoring the rise of an AI-based shared economy, (albeit with a greater degree of sophistication are explained along with the benefits of the world around us is metamorphosing in the research chapters that comprise it, it. And like every other chapter in the in unfathomable ways. Concomitantly, relative to a typical compendium). book, this chapter on e-mentoring also has a cultural revolution altering the ways The chapter on ‘Automation and interesting stories to corroborate what the in which we conduct social interactions Computers’ originally written in 1987, when author is writing. is underway. What does this mean for India was in the throes of a microelectronic Guptan leaves no stone unturned in countries like India that are still trying to (computer) revolution assumes a didactic exploring and giving out all relevant issues equitably disperse the advantages of the tone. As the water has gone under the about mentoring. The book ends with an precursors (IT, ITeS) to these technologies? bridge, it is safe to argue that, albeit some extensive and exhaustive list of questions What are the challenges that organizations of the fears expressed by the authors were about mentoring where the author tries to and societies grapple with, in a tech-enabled unfounded, others pertaining to a changing put across relevant questions like, ‘what world, and how can these translate into social organization and work patterns is the difference between mentoring and opportunities? Moving beyond esoteric hold water as we confront Industry 4.0. executive coaching?’, or something as discussions on software tools, techniques Ramachandran Natarajan points to policy crucial as ‘is it essential to have a mentor?’ and concepts, the anthology on Information deficiencies, the lukewarm response from the Every question is again answered in a crisp Systems edited by Priya Seetharaman and private sector and a small domestic market way—almost as a summarization of the Jocelyn Cranefield, delve into these questions vis-à-vis the diffusion of a new technology. entire book. He tries to capture the basic and many more. The India market today, however, has grown essence of his book in the last chapter with The book makes a lucid attempt at laying manifold especially after the adoption of these questions thereby making sure that bare the nuts and bolts of Information SAAS, as has product innovation advanced. no stones are left unturned while learning Systems (‘IS’ hereafter) in India, both from Ergo, some arguments presented in this and knowing more about mentorship. It is an academic and an industry point of view section may be seen germane to the original safe to say that this book should be a guide with the former attaining precedence. The context. Nevertheless, the overarching theme for all aspiring mentors or individuals who first unit charts out the vicissitudes of the IT to selectively and cautiously adopt any are already playing the role of a mentor in industry in India with a view to comprehend new technology does not elude the reader. someone’s life and also all individuals who its impact on IS as an academic discipline Building upon this inference, have mentors who they look up to whenever and plunges deep into the subject right P Vigneswara Ilavarasan’s paper is a sombre they need guidance. Being a mentor is from inception by highlighting the dual reminder of the underlying problem a huge responsibility and is an intrinsic challenge of boundary-setting and ensuring with the development of ICT’s in India, aspect of leadership. An enterprising and inclusiveness in knowledge creation faced while arguing in the same breath that constructive future depends on nurturing by the discipline. The chapter lays down a the picture is not as dismal. Two points productive and conscientious individuals, convincing argument for a multi-disciplinary of contention second that argument— who will further assume the role of a mentor approach to understanding the subject at lack of prerequisites (policy framework, for others. hand. It is also interesting to see how they infrastructure, communication networks) Christie Maria James is a Senior Communication chose to delve into a seemingly colossal and and complementarities (industry research, Manager with Digital Empowerment Foundation, confoundingly ubiquitous theme such as up skilled manpower, financial resources) New Delhi. IS in the Indian context. The introductory to attain optimal results. Despite these, The Book Review / December 2019 49 banking. Finally, the theoretical paper by He makes notable postulates regarding the The book makes a lucid Mohd. Nishat Faisal in this section serves future of IT operations in India and the as an intermediate conclusion apropos its policy implications that it will have for the “ attempt at laying bare reference to the buzzwords of today (big data future of various countries. the nuts and bolts of analytics, artificial intelligence) with the need Undoubtedly, the ambitious project for IT functions to align with these. undertaken by the authors to encapsulate the Information systems (‘Is’ The papers on ‘Behavioural Issues’ IS juggernaut, underline its manifestations, thereafter) in India, both borrow models and theories from the discipline of ‘behavioural sciences’ to predict the future for countries like India from an academic and investigate group dynamics and examine and introduce new methods and multi- an industry point of view reasons for attrition among women, specially disciplinary theoretical premises to study the BPO sector. The papers would be of the same, makes for an insightful read with the former attaining greater significance to employers, team for students of management and social precedence. leaders and professionals in managerial sciences alike. The book is timely, because position as they provide the blueprint for an it captures the progress towards a greater ” effective management of human resources. networked economy and online channels The book has a slightly recondite of distribution to vouch for strategically ICT has been a major contributor to the but extremely well researched section on planned IT functions that use the pathways GDP and creation of jobs. The demand ‘Systems theory based methodology’. It side enthusiasm has also opened avenues introduces the reader to the paradigm of knowledge to make targeted, real-time, for the use of technology for greater social of system dynamics by elucidating upon consumer-centric decisions. The units good (e.g., public service delivery under twenty epistemological viewpoints and comprising the book are consciously chosen Digital India), which needs to be driven by grouping them into six stages of problem in an effort to capture an entire spectrum of an evidence-based policy intervention, the solving. And even though certain arguments discourse around IT and a common theme author contends. Partha Ray, in the same and formulations are quite technical, and that ties the sometimes-incongruent chapters section alerts against the grandiose optimism may be daunting to students outside the is the comprehension of technology, not with IT in India and a conscious effort to engineering and management circles, as an end, but as means to a larger social ensure we continue with our comparative the manner in which the authors have goal. Certain arguments in the book may be advantage as an exporter of IT and ITES. seamlessly traversed the philosophical contestable, and may defy the contemporary Nikhilesh Dholakia, later in the book, underpinnings of this methodology, is an reader but the analytical tools and methods expresses a similar disenchantment with absolute scholastic delight. They present a the unsustainable ‘outsourcing surplus’ strong case for the use of system dynamics used in these chapters and the invigorating advantage being enjoyed by the developed as opposed to econometrics or hypothetico- choice of issues, make for an erudite world. deductive approaches which is largely repository for researchers, policy enthusiasts, The succeeding section on the number-driven and ignores observations, business professionals and technology applications with the discussion on or other case study approaches that ignore enthusiasts. e-governance projects preceded by a the importance of a feedback loop in a theoretical understanding of the framework, causal relationship. The addendum to this Sakshi Abrol is a Policy Consultant at CPC Analytics by Rahul De gives greater perspective discusses the praxis of the methodology in and the Co-founder of the non-profit research to the reader. The introduction of the management and policy. These chapters organization, Policy Collabs, in Pune. concept of ‘disintermediation’ of supply introduce an interesting approach to solving chain spearheaded by the Internet as a problems in a world where it is fashionable Book News Book News virtual distribution system is an important to juxtapose logic with empiricism, which contribution to the literature on IS. The in turn is heavily derived from numeric data The Truth Machine: perusal of these research findings will analytics. However, the reader could face a The Blockchain and come in handy for anyone interested in slight dissonance on moving to this section Future of Everything understanding consumer expectations and as it falls short of making an explicit case by Michael J Casey preferences, and the value additive role for a system dynamics methodology for IS and Paul Vigna played by intermediaries in the new market research. demystify the scenario identified by fiercer competition, The final unit presents the readers with a blockchain and nuanced market segments and highly cogent analysis of the electronic globalization explain why it can specialized products. With the reduction in juggernaut from an economic standpoint, as restore personal costs of customer service, time to audience well as a socio-cultural and political vantage control over our data, assets, and and an increase in choice of vendors, point. The paper begins by discussing the identities; grant Internet banking has the potential to implications of a low-cost, reliable ICT for billions of excluded transmogrify the face of financial transaction business processes identified by ‘slicing’ and people access to the global economy; and and e-commerce. Consumer perception of ‘splicing’ of operations. From a discussion shift the balance of power to revive society’s risks, however, poses a challenge to reckon on a ‘new technology class’ to ‘lifestyle faith in itself. They reveal the disruption it with. The research by Professor Rajiv arbitrage’ enjoyed by IT professionals in promises for industries including finance, Kumra, RK Mittal and Laxmi Gunupudi India, the paper segues into a discussion tech, legal, and shipping. use theories from ‘Relationship studies’ on outsourcing by borrowing the Centre- to examine (lack of) of ‘trust’ in Internet periphery framework from the field of IR. St Martin’s Press, 2018, pp. 320, R777.00 50 The Book Review / December 2019 Digital Empowerment Foundation The Knowledge Products

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